Not quite neutral

In an NYT Op-Ed, Mr. Timothy B. Lee argues that historical regulation of monopolies have turned against consumers, and that Congress ought to just let new technology fight it out since consumers can ‘rebel’.

Except they can’t.

Users are held hostage to one or two providers right now, and if my experience is any indication, both will be as horrible as they can get away with.  If neither one is restricted, they both will “protect” users from those horrible bandwidth hogs who won’t write checks… and the users will have no real choice in the end.

Lee has a good point – regulatory capture is a real danger, but his hope for ’several promising new technologies’ is just pie in the sky right now.  So let’s focus on the real danger and improve the legislation to handle an automatic sunset… perhaps after a certain period of time, or a certain amount of new market penetration, or by allowing the ‘promising new technologies’ unregulated reign, so even the existing carriers might try to build new networks.

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One Response to “Not quite neutral”

  1. 2produces Says:

    3engross…

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