Post Tagged with: "net neutrality"

FCC Chair Pledges To Enforce Net Neutrality

FCC Chair Julius Genachowski tells The Hill that "his agency will support 'net neutrality' and go after anyone who violates its tenets."

August 26, 2009 — 3 comments — News

ITWorldCanada on CIPPIC’s DigitalAgenda.ca

ITWorldCanada covers the launch of CIPPIC's DigitalAgenda.ca, the new digital advocacy site.

August 19, 2009 — Comments are Disabled — News

CIPPIC Launches DigitalAgenda.ca

CIPPIC has launched an exciting new advocacy site – DigitalAgenda.ca. The site provides information and tools for speaking out on copyright, net neutrality, lawful access, and the ECPA. The copyright section is the most robust at the moment, complete with a sample letter for the consultation and an Idea Torrent […]

August 14, 2009 — Comments are Disabled — News

U.S. Net Neutrality Bill Big Leap Over Canadian Law

Last week, Congressional Representatives Ed Markey and Anna Eshoo introduced the Internet Freedom Preservation Act of 2009. Public Knowledge provides a great rundown of the net neutrality bill. While some have suggested that the bill merely allows the U.S. to catch up to Canada, a closer look reveals that the bill would move the U.S. far beyond Canada in dealing with net neutrality issues as it directly addresses many of the issues raised during the CRTC network management hearing. In particular:

1. Traffic management guidelines. It establishes a reasonable network management traffic management guidelines similar to those proposed by the OIC and CIPPIC. The bill states:

a network management practice is a reasonable practice only if it furthers a critically important interest, is narrowly tailored to further that interest, and is the means of furthering that interest that is the least restrictive, least discriminatory, and least constricting of consumer choice available.

This is not current Canadian law, though the CRTC has been asked to adopt something very similar.

2. Transparency. The bill requires full public disclosure of traffic management practices, something opposed by some ISPs at the traffic management proceeding. The bill states:

each Internet access service provider shall provide to consumers and make publicly available detailed information about such services, including information about the speed, nature, and limitations of such services. Each Internet access service provider must publicly disclose, at a minimum, network management practices that affect communications between a user and a content, application, or service provider in the ordinary, routine use of such broadband service.

This bill would provide far greater mandated transparency than that found in Canada.

August 12, 2009 — 5 comments — News

BitTorrent Speaks: Correcting the Record in CRTC Net Neutrality Hearing

BitTorrent has shaken up the CRTC network management hearing with a late submission ~~[no online link yet]~~ that seeks to set the record straight on BitTorrent and its impact on ISP networks. The company begins by noting:

Our company, more specifically our BitTorrent application, has been referred to repeatedly in various submissions in this proceeding. From these submissions, there appears to be some misconceptions as to the effect of BitTorrent, as well as in general peer-to-peer (“P2P”) applications, on the Internet and in fact there has been an overstatement of the effect of such
applications on network congestion.

After describing BitTorrent (the company and the application), the submission addresses several misconceptions:

Shaw argued that the high number of connections with P2P subverts the fairness of TCP. BitTorrent says this is incorrect, since very few connections (4 – 5) are used at any one time.
Rogers argued that users do not care about upload performances. BitTorrent says this is inaccurate given the correlation between download and upload for BitTorrent users.
Cogeco argues that P2P is not a real-time or interactive application. BitTorrent says this too is false since some apps like Skype are clearly interactive and some BitTorrent clients supports streaming.
Rogers argued that P2P can create 24/7 always on usage. BitTorrent says this is exxagerated with the average client only active around 4 days per month.

BitTorrent then focuses on the effect of Canadian traffic management practices on the application's performance. The two main paragraphs are worth quoting in full since they have major implications beyond just the CRTC as BitTorrent states that movie executives report that Canadian P2P usage has declined dramatically over the past year. The comment:

July 28, 2009 — 16 comments — News