Much apocalyptic ink has been spilled over the issue of network neutrality recently. There are two key issues that are germane to the subject and they are whether service providers should be reserve bandwidth for some services and whether or not service providers should be able to discriminate against traffic from other providers. The "two-tier Internet" that would be created by network discrimination policies scares many seem to be the beginning of the end for the free-wheeling Internet that many of us have come to expect, but that is hardly the case.
Many service providers have for some time now implemented controls over how bandwidth is allocated in an effort to keep the quality of service acceptable to their customers. Were it not for these efforts, a few file sharers could easily bring down an entire cable or DSL residential service by themselves. In fact, according to some estimates, as little as one percent of all broadband users use forty percent of the entire network's capibilities.
In order to provide high quality on-demand multimedia services over the Internet, it will be imperative that ISPs be able to discriminate to some degree. Some providers, such as Verizon, want to create their own alernative to the cable networks. In order to do that, they will need to be able to maximize the amount of bandwidth that they can provide to that service while balancing that service with their DSL packages.
Video on demand is incredibly taxing on network resources and the quality of service that would be present for such a service where all bandwidth is available in one big pool would poor in the best case scenario. Any delays caused by overconsumption by other users could cause unacceptable delays in the transmission of the video (or other) data that would have a very damaging impact on the user experience. The best solution for that problem is to allow ISPs to take a percentage of the bandwidth capabilities they have built up and allocate them exclusively toward their bandwidth-intensive services so as to be able to guarantee a baseline of performance to their customers.
Some people worry that this sort of discrimination might cause a loss of competition, but it is nothing more than an evolution of existing policies to meet new needs. Network service providers have no incentive right now to become hostile toward legitimate protocols such as instant messaging protocols, email or web access. Fortunately for consumers, even if they were to become hostile toward legitimate protocols and commercial services, most of the popular, legal uses of the Internet are not bandwidth-intensive and would not see much disruption from such discrimination.
The one network neutrality issue that could be a short-term cause for concern is whether or not network providers will be able to wreck havoc on each other's traffic as it moves out of network. AT&T raised the spectre of this issue when they started to suggest that Google is a free rider (ironically, they're the epitome of a paying customer) and ought to have to pay extra to let Google users on AT&T's network access Google at full speed. This issue ultimately becomes a conflict between the ISP and its users, not those who build services on top of its network, and that is why it is doomed to failure.
If an ISP were to actually make good on a threat to impose an "Internet toll" to connect to its users, the service providers targetted by the threat would be able to retaliate by modifying the delivery of their service to inform the user why the service is slow. This ability is something that every content provider from the lowliest blogger to the elite of the Fortune 100 could bring to bear on the ISP. It is incredibly unlikely that the ISP's customers would remain passive in the face of a deluge of notices informing them that their ISP is attempting to extort money out of companies that are already paying hand-over-fist for bandwidth to provide their services to the public.
As if market pressure were not enough of an incentive to "play nice" with others, the federal government has let it be known in the recent past that it will not tolerate network discrimination whose sole purpose is to be anti-competitive. When North Carolina-based ISP Madison River attempted to but the kibbosh on its users access to Vonage's Voice over IP (VoIP) service, the FCC quickly intervened on Vonage's behalf and resolved the matter. This sort of problem is nothing new to federal regulators as it is little more than any other run of the mill anticompetitive business action.
A "two-tier Internet" does not represent a fundamental shift from the original architecture of the Internet. It is in fact a recognition that there must be some control over the network in order to make it work as a popular medium. The primary concerns over the "two-tier Internet" have been mostly disingenuous hand-wringing over the fate of file sharing networks.
There can be little doubt that in the future, ISPs will have a great deal of incentive to shut down illict file sharing as legitimate services take off. This process will certainly not be perfect, but it is infinitely preferable to a scenario in which the government determines network policy. It is much easier to negotiate with private corporations than federal regulators and bureaucrats. One need only look into the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act to realize why the ham-handed attempts by the federal government to formulate IT policy and standards for the general public are nothing short of a disaster waiting to happen.
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