FCC’s Christmas Gift for the Internet: Net Neutrality Regulation
James Gattuso /
Should bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., set rules for the Internet? Julius Genachowski, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), thinks so. In remarks today, he stated that he had developed a new plan to impose so-called “net neutrality” rules on Internet service providers, setting a vote on the issue for December 21.
Details of the plan are yet to be released, but the chairman indicated that the plan was based on a legislative proposal floated a month ago by Representative Henry Waxman (D–CA). That plan, however, was soundly rejected by Congress. Genachowski’s plan—which the FCC would adopt without specific approval by Congress—should be rejected as well.
The Waxman proposal would have banned Internet providers such as Verizon and Comcast from managing the flow of traffic on their networks in a way that “unjustly or unreasonably” discriminates against particular types of content. The new rules would have been enforced on a case-by-case basis by the FCC. (more…)