Telecom News: 'Net Neutrality' Backers Have Their Own Agenda

Supporters of so-called "net neutrality" are lobbying Congress to regulate the Internet and restrict the services that telcos and cable companies can offer, threatening the build-out of high speed connections to households in the United States.

This current fight over high speed Internet — a battle among corporate giants — threatens to ignore the interests of the public and consumers who need a faster build-out of high speed broadband with speed requirements and access for all.

CWA strongly supports an open Internet. But it's clear that it's the telecom and cable companies that are actually investing in building the high speed pipeline to the home — a huge investment of tens of billions of dollars.

Ten years ago, the United States led the world in the development of a high speed Internet. But over the past decade, we've dropped steadily in terms of providing access to real high speed Internet service. Currently, the United States ranks 16th among the nations of the world, and according to some measures, countries like Singapore and Estonia are passing us by in terms of the build-out and availability of high speed Internet service.

We need to provide incentives for build-out and not throw up legislative roadblocks. "Net neutrality" supporters want these companies to spend billions building the connection to households across the United States and then let other companies use the networks for free.

Pushing "net neutrality" are companies like Google, Amazon, E-Bay and others that aren't investing in infrastructure but are looking for ways to profit from the investments of others, by offering video streaming but supplying minimal if any investment.

CWA President Larry Cohen and other CWA leaders have been meeting with leaders in Congress to try to clarify misconceptions spread by "net neutrality" forces and to get Congress focused instead on a national public policy that promotes high speed build-out and sets a timetable for reaching targeted speeds and access.

CWA has outlined four principles to ensure an open Internet which includes allowing providers to reserve a portion of bandwidth for their video service so that telecom companies can pay for the huge investments they are making. Without a vehicle for companies to recoup the build-out investment there won't be a build-out and that is bad for the economy, bad for jobs and bad for our future.

CWA's open Internet principles are online at www.speedmatters.org/plan/open-internet.html.