David Weinberger:Notes from a Disappointed Fanboy: ... But, this compromise goes too far. For one thing, it enshrines a major shift in Google’s definition of Net neutrality that CEO Eric Schmidt casually announced last week: Google is fine with access providers deciding which services should get preferential treatment, so long as they don’t differentiate within a service. So, Verizon could decide to slow down your online video game so that other subscribers could watch high def video. But Verizon would have to treat all high def video traffic equally. That’s better than Verizon deciding that its own video library would work better than Comcast’s, but it means that those who give us access to the Internet get to decide what it’s really for. Nope. It’s our Internet. We get to decide, and then to invent new uses. That is the source of the Internet’s value. Letting the access providers decide which services and content get preference is especially worrisome since they’re also in the business of selling us those services and content. They’d get to shape the Internet to reflect their business model. ... So, Verizon could cut a deal with a company to deliver, say, a jukebox service over Verizon’s broadband connection, and charge more for delivering it faster than a competitor’s service, so long as that service is “distinguishable in scope and purpose from Internet access service.” In a posting on its Public Policy Blog (disclosure: I am friends with the author, Rick Whitt), Google notes that providers “already offer these types of services today,” and says that the compromise in fact hedges the services in. I’d be more disposed to believe that if I knew what “distinguishable in scope and purpose from Internet access service” meant. Couldn’t anything delivered as a “differentiated service” also be delivered as an Internet service? Further, the Googizon proposal would allow these differentiated services to “make use of or access Internet content, appplications or services…” Again, I’m not sure what this means, except that it sounds like a company could pay Verizon to deliver content from the Internet faster than that content would travel over the Internet connection Verizon gives you. This would (if I’m understanding it) provide a strong incentive to big companies to move their service out of the Internet, and pony up the “fast lane” fees that Net neutrality is explicitly designed to prevent. ... My growing doubts now have me looking for language that wiggles — the “it depends on what the definition of ‘is’ is” moments. For example: The proposal says providers “would be prohibited from preventing users” from “sending and receiving lawful content…” So, could my access provider block me from visiting Wikileaks? How about file-sharing sites like ThePirateBay.org? Could they without penalty block my fair use of copyrighted materials? In fact, since we already have a legal system for prosecuting those who do illegal things, why are we putting the access providers in charge of this? The proposal would prevent broadband access providers from blocking any usage in a way that causes “meaningful harm to competition or to users.” Since the providers’ justification for discriminating among bits — that is, for violating Net neutrality — has always been that they’re doing it for the benefit of their users, this is a hole that could not be papered over even with the world’s entire available supply of good will. ... ------ Rick Ellrod faceva una osservazione interessante che ho riproposto sul mio blog: Reasonable network management includes any technically sound practice: . . . to address traffic that is unwanted by or harmful to users, the provider’s network, or the Internet; . . . If this complex exception parses out to (either unwanted by or harmful) to (either users, the provider's network, or the Internet) then it would include 'traffic unwanted by the provider's network'. Interessante notare la premessa dell'articolo: Net Neutrality is a complicated issue. The recent Google/Verizon policy proposal has raised new questions about the open internet - the idea that all online content gets treated equally. To explore this issue, we’re featuring a series of guest blog posts on our site. Today, the thoughts of David Weinberger, Senior Researcher at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society E in particolare come si faccia confusione tra "open" e neutralità. Sarà perchè ho appena rivisto il film Sesso e potere... -- www.reeplay.it www.eximia.it