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Email: Tom.Wheeler@FCC.Gov
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And after months of declining Netflix performance on Comcasts network, the two companies announced a new paid peering arrangement on Sunday, which will see Netflix pay Comcast for better access to its customers, a capitulation Netflix has been trying to avoid for years. Paid peering arrangements are common among the network companies that connect the backbones of the internet, but consumer companies like Netflix have traditionally remained out of the fray and since theres no oversight or transparency into the terms of the deal, its impossible to know what kind of precedent it sets. Broadband industry insiders insist loudly that the deal is just business as usual, while outside observers are full of concerns about the loss of competition and the increasing power of consolidated network companies. Either way, its clear that Netflix has decided to take matters and costs into its own hands, instead of relying on rational policy to create an effective and fair marketplace.
THE INTERNET IS A UTILITY, JUST LIKE WATER AND ELECTRICITY
Go ahead, say it out loud. The internet is a utility.
There, youve just skipped past a quarter century of regulatory corruption and lawsuits that still rage to this day and arrived directly at the obvious conclusion. Internet access isnt a luxury or a choice if you live and participate in the modern economy, its a requirement. Have you ever been in an office when the internet goes down? Its like recess. My friend Paul Miller lived without the internet for a year and Im still not entirely sure hes recovered from the experience. The internet isnt an adjunct to real life; its not another place. You dont do things "on the internet," you just do things. The network is interwoven into every moment of our lives, and we should treat it that way.
Yet the corporations that control internet access insist that theyre providing specialized services that are somehow different than water, power, and telephones. They point to crazy bullshit you dont want or need like free email addresses and web hosting solutions and goofy personalized search screens as evidence that theyre actually providing "information" services instead of the more highly-regulated "telecommunications" services. "Common carrier rules are basically free speech," says the Free Press Aaron. "We have all these protections for what happens over landline phones that were not extending to data, even though all these people under 25 mostly communicate in data."
THERE IS ZERO COMPETITION FOR INTERNET ACCESS
None. Zero. Nothing. It is a wasteland. You are standing in the desert and the only thing that grows is higher prices.
70 percent of American households have but one or two choices for high-speed internet access: cable broadband from a cable provider or DSL from a telephone provider. And since DSL isnt nearly as fast as cable, and the cable companies are aggressive in bundling TV and internet packages together, its really only one choice. And that means the level of innovation from these providers has almost completely stagnated, even as prices have gone up.
Why are cellphones so much cooler now than they were in 2000? Because Apple and Google and Samsung all had to fight it out and make better products in order to survive. Theyre competing. Comcast hasnt had to fight anything, at any time. It is fat and lazy and wants nothing more than to get fatter and lazier. Thats why Comcast is spending $45 billion on Time Warner Cable instead of integrating Netflix into its cable boxes and working with Apple and Google and Microsoft on the real next generation of TV: when youre the only real choice in 19 of Americas 20 biggest markets, you get to move real slow and still make a lot of money. It's not clear Comcast even knows what real competition looks like.
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What happens in countries where theres real competition? In the UK, where incumbent provider BT is required to allow competitors to use its wired broadband network, home internet service prices are as low as £2.50 a month, or just over $4. In South Korea, where wireless giants SK Telecom and LG Uplus are locked in a fierce technology battle, customers have access to the fastest mobile networks in the world up to 300Mbps, compared to a theoretical max of 80Mbps on Verizon thats actually more like 15 or 20mbps in the real world.
American politicians love to stand on the edges of important problems by insisting that the market will find a solution. And thats mostly right; we dont need the government meddling in places where smart companies can create their own answers. But you cant depend on the market to do anything when the market doesnt exist. "We can either have competition, which would solve a lot of these problems, or we can have regulation," says Aaron. What Comcast is trying is to have neither." Its insanity, and we keep lying to ourselves about it. Its time to start thinking about ways to actually do something.
THE FCC IS WEAK AND INEFFECTIVE
The Federal Communications Commission is ostensibly in charge of managing broadband deployment and regulating companies like AT&T and Comcast, but its shown no actual ability to do so in a focused and effective way and when it tries, it does so in such a half-assed way that it gets smacked around in court and loses.
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The FCC also sat in the back seat when AT&T tried to buy T-Mobile, has remained virtually silent about the rumored linkup between Sprint and T-Mobile, and has offered little public comment about the Comcast / Time Warner deal instead letting the Department of Justice take the lead in opposing these obviously anticompetitive mergers. The FCCs stunning lack of presence and leadership during these watershed moments in communications history is an extraordinary failure for an agency that is officially tasked with protecting the consumer interest.
The FCC "doesnt seem to have the confidence to stop a merger," says Columbias Wu. New FCC chairman Tom Wheeler has "to be willing to take the heat," if hes going to get involved, says Aaron. "If youre going to take this job, you have to lead," he says. "The whole reason we have an independent agency is to shield it from Congress."
So theres the entire problem, expressed in four simple ideas: the internet is a utility, there is zero meaningful competition to provide that utility to Americans, all internet providers should be treated equally, and the FCC is doing a miserably ineffective job. The United States should lead the world in broadband deployment and speeds: we should have the lowest prices, the best service, and the most competition. We should have the freest speech and the loudest voices, the best debate and the soundest policy. We are home to the most innovative technology companies in the world, and we should have the broadband networks to match.
If you want to write/call:
Email: Tom.Wheeler@FCC.Gov
Phone: 1-888-225-5322 (press 1, then 5 to connect to agent)
