The Moveon.org/FreePress petition to the FCC to declare Comcast's reasonable network management illegal, is a deceptive back-door scheme to reverse FCC deregulation of broadband as an information service and to (de facto) reinstate common carriage for broadband.
- The petition will be found to be a bogus and manufactured scheme to deceive the FCC and the public that necessary, responsible, and "reasonable network management" -- that serves consumers and the Internet public by delivering quality of service and protecting consumers from the harm of viruses, spam etc. -- should be declared illegal "degrading" of an Internet application.
- Upon full FCC airing of this issue, it will be clear that the offending P2P application traffic is the culprit that is in fact harming the overwhelming majority of Internet consumers by "degrading and imparing" the responsiveness and utility of the Internet for the many because of the irresponsible bandwidth hogging of the few.
First, if managing out-of-control p2p traffic that is degrading and impairing the responsiveness and utility of the Internet for the many by the few is not "reasonable network management" then no network management is reasonable.
- The petitioners have made a grave error in choosing to put all their "eggs in one basket", defending spiraling p2p traffic, because there is probably no more widespread "rotten" Internet application than most p2p traffic.
- The head of the Patent and Trademark Office recently provided a large report to Congress that documented that p2p traffic not only was still used for rampant copyright theft (a la Napster and Grokster) but that p2p networks were a serious data security threat to Americans' personal, corporate, and government information.
- The Homeland Security Department views the data security problems inherent in p2p networks as a serious real and potential threat to homeland security.
- I doubt in time of war, that the FCC is going to rush to give aid and comfort to Internet usage practices that the rest of the government has grave homeland security concerns about.
Second, if networks cannot manage their networks to deliver expected quality of service and consumer protection from the scourges of viruses, spam and other Internet threats to consumers, network owners cannot serve and protect their customers and business at the most basic level.
- An FCC declaration in favor of this petition would be tantamount to siding with anarchy and chaos over order, stability and security.
Third, if the FCC were to rule that networks could not engage in "reasonable network management" the ruling would render property ownership near meaningless, as the network owners would lose dominion over their property and would not have the ability to conduct normal commerce because the FCC took away their ability to offer a service that consumers demand and need.
Bottom line: This petition is a new low in the net neutrality movement. They are so blinded by their mission to establish the Internet as communal property, that they have lost total sight of what is "reasonable." Despite their views to the contrary, the Internet does not have infinite bandwidth and there are lots of problematic applications that require reasonable network management to protect and well serve consumers.
- The FCC should reject this petition and the bogus "high horse" it rode in on.
