Clash of the Titans

Content providers and telecom companies square off over your bandwidth.

By Ezra Klein

In 1890, the US Census Bureau declared the end of a contiguous frontier line, spurring the famed historian Jackson Turner to write “the Significance of the Frontier in American History.” His thesis turned on the centrality of the frontier – as a concept, as much as a place – in the American psyche. To Turner, the frontier was the line of “the most rapid Americanization,” it was there that the most quintessentially American of traits—"that coarseness and strength combined with acuteness and acquisitiveness; that practical inventive turn of mind, quick to find expedients; that masterful grasp of material things… that restless, nervous energy; that dominant individualism” – were developed, and without it, the strength of the American character would doubtlessly come to harm.

But the Census Bureau erred; the frontier didn’t close, it merely moved: in battle to Western Europe, Latin America and the Pacific Rim and, in the popular imagination, to space. But, with apologies to Gene Roddenberry, space was not the final frontier. As the 20th century grudgingly made way for the 21st, a new land, lawless and filled with potential, opened. But this frontier possessed a different character entirely; it was virtual, a series of 0s and 1s that could only be viewed intelligibly after the diligent efforts of programmers and the interpretive technologies buried in computers had done their complex work.

Conceptually, it’s a bit odd, but the internet had all the characteristics of the classic frontier: low barrier to entry, little regulation, possibility for great riches, the need for new skills, and equal access. But where the old frontier used acreage or coastline, the new frontier required bandwidth. And so the latter day cowboys came; they had pocket protectors rather than holsters, keyboards rather than six-shooters, and glasses rather than gallon hats, but they tamed the electric wilderness just the same, creating everything from Amazon to Craigslist, YouTube to Yahoo!

The net, though, relies on equal access to bandwidth, and a consortium of telecom behemoths are preparing to deny that to some. The principle at hand is called “net neutrality”; it means that broadband carriers, the folks who own the physical connection infrastructure, can’t decide how it’s used or who can use it. If you’re using SBC as your carrier, they can’t redirect you away from Comcast’s website. If you’re using AT&T, they don’t bar you from patronizing competing online telephone providers like Vonage. In short, as CNET put it, broadband carriers cannot configure their pipes to play favorites. In other countries, this principle is sacrosanct: South Korea, Japan, and the UK have all enshrined it in law. America has not. And if the telecom providers have their way, the net neutrality will give way to online favoritism.

The first showdown came on Thursday April 6th, when the House Telecom Committee voted against Congressman Ed Markey’s net neutrality resolution, 23-8. Nothing neutral about that. The prime mover against Markey has been subcommittee chair Joe Barton, and a quick glance at his funding sources may explain why. $57,000 from SBC, $20,000 from Comcast, and so on.

See, the telecoms don’t much like that there net neutrality standard and are hoping to overturn it and gain complete control and total discretion over the use of their pipes. And with 20 companies accounting for nearly 94 percent of broadband subscribers (and again, these aren’t necessarily your providers, but the phone and cable companies who control the physical infrastructure) – not to mention SBC and AT&T merging—there really will be no escape from their rules.

Here’s what that would look like: Right now, the net is best described by its ubiquitous pseudonym: the information superhighway. It is, essentially, an interstate, freely traveled by all cars, regardless of weight. What the telecoms want is to section it off into a series of toll roads, which will charge based on vehicle characteristics. So heavy travelers – sites like Google and AOL and Yahoo and YouTube – will be charged far more, at least at the beginning, than light travelers (say, local community bulletin boards). Fair’s fair, right?

Not quite. The next step would be for the telecoms to enter into content distribution deals with various providers. Think of the toll road operator partnering up with Toyota, and attempting to choke Toyota’s competition by making it prohibitively expensive for competing sedans. So assume SBC/AT&T partners with Google Video, the logical next step would be knocking down YouTube’s challenge by jacking up their connection rates or slowing down users who access them through the SBC/AT&T pipes. It’s easy enough, you don’t block their content, you just handicap it a bit, killing off competitors and heading off newcomers. You’re the Tonya Harding of the internet.

Luckily, the behemoth telecoms are being opposed by some goliaths on the other side. The net’s major content providers – Google, Amazon, Yahoo, AOL, Microsoft, Skype, and so forth – have allied to lobby against the bill. And while Markey’s resolution was rejected, Barton has signaled a flip-flop, hinting that he’ll support a slightly weaker net neutrality bill by Michigan Representative Fred Upton. Meanwhile, the Senate is circling towards protective legislation of their own, with Olympia Snowe and Byron Dorgan introducing a bipartisan bill to ensure blanket net neutrality. So for all of us who enjoy like the online demimonde complete with its chaotic creativity and unexpected successes, there’s hope yet. Every frontier, after all, needs a few good sheriffs.

Ezra Klein is a writing fellow at The American Prospect.

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