mediageek

Category: networks

  • Telco Scare Mongering: High-Bandwidth Video Will Clog the Pipes

    A story about the looming threat of high-bandwidth video on the internet, authored by AP technology writer Peter Svensson, has been making the rounds of the blogosphere today. In it, a Verizon lobbyist claims that “The plain truth is that today’s access and backbone networks simply do not have the capacity to deliver all that…

  • A Thin Facade of Democracy that Fred Upton Doesn’t Even Try To Believe

    Aw, come on, you didn’t think that debates in committee and on the House and Senate floor really amounted to anything, did you? Rep. Fred Upton, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee sure as hell does, and was remarkably candid about that fact last week, as reported by the Cox News Service: The…

  • An Hour on Net Neutrality with McChesney and Co.

    Yesterday’s edition of Prof. Bob McChesney’s weekly radio program was dedicated to net neutrality, with guests Tim Karr of Free Press and Adam Green, of MoveOn.org, which I think only recently joined the campaign. It’s a packed hour and worth listening to, especially since guys like Karr have been pretty much living and breathing net…

  • Little Telcos’ Merger Challenge Adds New Wrinkle to Net Neutrality Fight

    Last year the dual mergers of AT&T with SBC and Verizon with MCI passed the justice department with nary a speedbump and only the most minimal of conditions. Those mergers also gave reason to kick off the campaign for network neutrality, because it was the newly engorged and emboldened AT&T and Verizon which started making…

  • The Internet as We Know It Is an Accident, but the Design Isn’t. For the Telcos, It’s Just an Excuse.

    Earlier this week Tim Berners-Lee, the architecht of the world-wide web, posted a short essay on network neutrality. Like other wise commentators such as Vint Cerf and Larry Lessig, Berners-Lee argues that without net neutrality being law the US’s dominant telephone companies will inhibit the future introduction of innovative internet technologies all in service of…

  • Pushing Net Neutrality: Coalition to Save the Internet

    If one thing has become clear with this year’s session in Congress, it’s that some serious organizing has to happen if our congresscritters are going to be pressured into keeping the internet free of speedbumps and corporate-imposed taxes. Legislators might get the issues, but they need to be convinced that their constituents care about them.…

  • How Do You Sell Neutrality?

    Josh Breitbart of MediaTank and Clamor has been blogging lately, and raises a really good question about the framing of the network neutrality debate: Only a Democrat would think people could get excited about neutrality. What’s the opposite of “neutral”? Non-neutral… Partisan… In gear…? The same issue has been bugging me, but I haven’t been…

  • Net Neutrality To Be the FCC’s Responsibility? Or Nobody’s Responsibility?

    On Monday Sen. Commerce Comittee Chair Ted Stevens told reporters at a press conference that he’s considering charging the FCC with protecting network neutrality. He was speaking at an event sponsored by CompTel, which represents the smaller telecom companies that compete with the big Bells like Verizon and AT&T. For it’s part, CompTel supports legislating…

  • Universities as Providers of Neutral Networks?

    Andrew at funferal takes up my question about a grassroots effort for network neutrality via constructing neutral networks, and brings up a good point about Universities: Incidentally, if we’re looking for a useful partner for the grassroots, why not look to the Universities. They probably have as much capacity as Google, if not more, with…

  • The Future of the Internet Is on the Table

    I dedicated all of yesterday’s radioshow (already available for download) to the issue of network neutrality. I’m quite convinced that this is the most important communications issue to watch in 2006, since whatever Congress does will have long-lasting repercussions on the very basis of our telecommunications infrastructure. Yesterday’s show featured some excerpts of testimony from…