Fergie's Tech Blog

Net Nutrality Field in Congress Gets Crowded

Anne Broache writes on C|Net News:

U.S. senators have unveiled their latest effort at legislating Net neutrality principles, marking the second such proposal this week and the sixth this year.

Called the "Internet Freedom Preservation Act," the bill was introduced on Friday by Maine Republican Olympia Snowe and North Dakota Democrat Sen. Byron Dorgan and enjoys support from six other Democrats. The nine-page measure [.pdf] contains a detailed list of obligations for all broadband service providers.

Specifically, they would generally not be allowed to "block, interfere with, discriminate against, impair or degrade" access to content or to prevent users from attaching devices of their choosing to the network. Network operators would also be barred from making special deals with content providers to ensure speedier delivery or improved quality of service and would be required to offer all Internet material on an "equivalent" basis.

The bill won immediate praise from the chorus of Net neutrality advocates, which includes consumer groups and a large number of Internet companies.

posted by Fergie @ 5/19/2006 04:37:00 PM