The Free State Foundation's Fourteenth Annual Policy Conference – #FSFConf14 – was held on May 6 in Washington D.C. The conference featured a group of distinguished speakers on the "Hottest Topics in Communications and Internet Policy" panel. One of those hottest topics discussed was network neutrality regulation.
When asked about his views about net neutrality regulation, USTelecom President & CEO Jonathan Spalter stated:
To look at the last two years of our experience with the Internet and unbelievable amount of streaming, health care, and civic engagement and conclude that—somehow—we have a net neutrality problem in the United States defies logic and reason. Ideological? Yes. Common sense? No. Fact based? Certainly not. If we could expend some of the energy that we're giving to this rinse-and-repeat cycle of considering the Title I/Title II consideration and draw that to the more fundamental issue of getting broadband deployed to every American that needs it, I that would be a much better use of our time and resources than rehearsing old and stale debates of resurrecting dead and gone net neutrality provisions that are rooted in a 1934 law.
NCTA President & CEO Michael Powell offered his views:
I think the government has a hard time demonstrating on any measure of reasonableness how they're going to make the Internet world better for consumers and providers by virtue of these rules. We haven't had rules since 2015. There is no pattern and practice of the supposed negative behavior that we're apparently chomping at the bit to engage in. Quite the opposite has happened. Contrary to predictions, our network speeds have increased 800%. Our prices are one of the lowest, lagging consumer inflation in the country—only at around 2.5% to 2.8% of the CPI, which is moving at 8.5%. You've had 5G networks invested in in the interim, you've had 10G in the cable industry, you’ve had fiber builds and the country has moved on.
The two most central focuses of broadband policy today is the infrastruture mission, which is job one, and the complexity of issues that rise from Big Tech. I find this issue to be painfully distracting from the issues that matter. It will absorb an enormous amount of time, effort, labor, and conflict. And no matter what the rules say, it will make very little difference to the Internet experience that consumers are getting today. And it's even more disheartening because the rules are always born with a fatal flaw. And that flaw is: they're easy to change and they'll change in the next administration. When will we stop the madness? It doesn't even matter what the rules say. You could be two years from them being eliminated again, by the next administration. If someone were genuinely committed to ending the merry-go-round, it could be done. It could be done easily. I hope and urge the FCC to do it. But I doubt it because it's become a form of political virtue signaling, not policymaking.
A contrary viewpoint was offered by Public Knowledge President & CEO Chris Lewis:
Net neutrality protections are needed because the harms that we're concerned about are real. And that's why just about every company that is a member of these trade associations, when asked the actual protections, supports them: no blocking, no throttling… No paid prioritization—I don't know if they agree with that or not. But I think there is a real important case for it, because as the DOJ said many years ago, broadband providers sit at place in the marketplace where they have the ability and the financial incentive to preference themselves or preference others. These are basic rules of the road. And if we can agree on the rules of the road, if the companies agree that those rules, then it's really about how you implement them. And that is really what the debate is about. That is why you hear about Title II. I would love it if the Congress was serious… about creating legislation to end the merry-go-round… But they haven’t seemed serious. We hear about task force being created in the Senate to create a net neutrality law. This task force isn't meeting with anyone. They haven't met with us. And we told them that we’re ready to come and meet with them.
This is why the folks advocating go to the FCC every chance we get and say "We need to create rules." This is why we advocated for rules, the strong ones out of California, that got upheld in the court four times now. And hopefully, this is why we haven't seen egregious violations by companies since the 2015 rules were repealed—because there is a law in California, because they know that we’re going to lists in front of policymakers and show them that these violations are real. But they are real and they’re not getting investigated, whether you're talking about AT&T preferencing their own video services when data caps are applied, Comcast doing the same thing, and the incident with emergency services getting throttled in California during wildfires. These need to be looked at by an agency with authority…
If you're talking about digital platforms, we also advocate for a digital regulatory agency to deal with non-discrimination issues at that level.
And CTIA President & CEO Meredith Attwell Baker offered her take on net neutrality regulation:
We need one rule, it needs to come from Congress. Consumers are benefitting from an Open Internet. I don't think that what consumers want has really changed, and I think we're giving them that. The only thing that probably has changed is that in 2022 it shouldn't be ISP-specific, only for ISPs.
For more from this group of CEOs at #FSFConf14, be sure to watch the video online.
(*Note: The #FSFConf14 quotes contained in this blog are based on an unofficial, edited transcription made by the author of this blog. The edits were made for purposes of readability but none of the meaning was changed in doing so.)
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