As the Federal Communications Commission prepares to say Comcast Corp. acted illegally and too broadly in limiting some users’ trading of movies and music as part of Web traffic management, a congressional leader is urging the FCC not to act.
In a letter Thursday, on the eve of an expected FCC vote to sanction Comcast, House Minority Leader House Republican Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, called the move “unprecedented regulation of the Internet” and urged FCC Chairman Kevin J. Martin to keep the Web free of regulation.
“This dangerous path would limit freedom, stifle innovation and entrepreneurship, and kill American jobs. Internet regulation is a solution in search of a problem,” he said. “We should maintain the hands-off approach that has served the Internet, the American people and our economy so well.”
The FCC action stems from steps Comcast took to deal with heavy peer-to-peer traffic and congestion; it involves some of the issues first raised in the congressional and FCC debates over “net neutrality.”
The arguments were over whether the government should act to ensure Internet service providers didn’t offer favored Internet content a better path to consumers’ computers than other content. At the time, providers and some congressmen argued there was no reason to act, because there was no evidence any content was getting favorable treatment.
That changed when the Associated Press reported last year that Comcast was sending false signals to users’ computers to cut off connections with file servers and effectively stop downloads, even as Comcast allowed other downloads to proceed.
Consumer groups Free Press and Public Knowledge complained to the FCC that Comcast’s action amounted to discrimination. They also argued that Comcast had acted overbroadly and illegally in not telling subscribers and in blocking most peer-to-peer downloads, even at times the network wasn’t congested.
Comcast has questioned the FCC’s authority to act, but it also has since worked with file-sharing sites and consumer groups to incorporate more tailored network traffic management practices.
Read the complete post at http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/tvweek/News/~3/352007990/boehner_urges_fcc_not_to_regul.php
Posted
Thu, Jul 31 2008 6:42 PM
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