The recent U.S. Supreme Court decision on Internet access may be technically correct but it will hinder broadband, subvert a competitive marketplace and harm those must vulnerable in out country while serving only elites and corporations.
I'd like to ask you to correct the situation by persuading the Federal Communications Commission to create open networks that allow customers choice and investors a return on investment.
The Court's decision seems to suggest cable companies are somehow different from telephone companies, even though they provide very similar services. Both provide data, if by slightly different means. Telephone companies started with voice but now serve Internet access and want to sell entertainment, like movies. Cable started the other way, but both types aim to provide voice, Internet and entertainment, mainly in the form of the same data packets through almost identical networks to identical customer devices. How the Court could say cable companies can restrict who uses their wires while telephone companies cannot is a mystery.
The marketplace is uneven now, but telephone companies are looking to get the same advantage that cable companies enjoy: the ability to decide what flows over their networks. If this is allowed, the end result will be something of a near-monopoly for a handful of network owners, to the severe detriment of the consumer and the American economy. The divestiture of the Bell system made clear that a monopoly in communications is not a good idea, so there is no reason to recreate that bad situation. It would be better to allow those network owners to recoup their investment in part through services but also by renting space on their networks to other providers. This way the market and the consumer get to choose services while investors are not disadvantaged. Without such an arrangement, independent Internet service providers (IISPs) like me will go out of business, which costs my investors money, but also costs the community, the economy and harms the spirit of the Internet.
I am one of about 7,000 American IISPs with about 7 million customers and 75,000 employees, no small number of people. We work, pay taxes and spend our money supporting other small businesses in small towns and big cities. If Internet laws favor corporations, it harms my ability to serve my customers and intereferes with the job creation of the entrepreneurial ethic that is so important to America.
Small companies are also where the innovation lies, both in creating and adapting technology and in taking care of our clients. I can't invest like a conglomerate but I can change with the market very quickly, unlike my larger rivals. I also spend a great deal of time helping my customers in ways they tell me the big companies can't and don't do. I am a small business and I help other small businesses; together we support the majority of the American workers and the lion's share of the economy.
A more closed Internet architecture also threatens the civic health of communities like mine. We like to have some control over our activities, but if a large company can decide what information sources we'll receive, we lose our ability to self govern, we lose our independence. If such a large company decides it only wants us to have access to certain commercial information, we lose our economic power too because we can only shop for what we know of. The conglomerate media companies that seek to restrict Internet access would then be our only real sources of information about the world around us, and the marketplace of ideas would cease to exist. This is the opposite of the revolution that is the Internet: information wants to be free.
Some might suggest that having a large consumer base is the very resource a large company would need to be able to spread broadband access throughout the country as the President wishes. These companies, however, have had these resources for years, yet it is the IISPs that serve the small towns, the rural areas, the underprivileged. It is the small providers who do the most to bridge the Digital Divide. If we lose our ability to use cable lines and even DSL lines, the remaining large companies will, as they have to date, spend their time upselling the urban centers and elite cities where margins are fat; the American heartland will be left behind and unconnected to one of the most cost-effective mechanisms for people to decide their own fates and raise themselves by their own bootstraps.
Some cities are seeking to correct these problems by building their own municipal networks. Large corporations have lobbied hard to make this impossible, insisting that government should not compete with the private sector. I agree with that argument, but a municipal network can also operate as a conduit for competitive services so it need not compete but can actually improve the marketplace by providing vital infrastructure. If you are to make the market fair, as I ask, I would hope you would allow cities to build their own networks, even wireless ones, as long as they are open to all content providers, just as a road is open to all commerce. Indeed, private wireless networks should likewise have to carry others' content at a fair market rate.
A robust market of Internet providers is also more secure in this age of terrorism and online scams. True, a large player can shut down more intrustions at once, but when compromised can also allow more intrusions. Likewise, a large player is less likely to notice unusual network traffic because there is too much to watch. IISPs know their customers well and quickly spot suspicious traffic. Perhaps that is why small businesses have been the most successful security innovators and why government often turns to them for the latest breakthroughs. Diversity of opportunity is good for economics but also good for security because it brings more scrutiny to the task.
In many ways a rich and varied set of companies is the best way to run any economic sector, especially one so important as data communications. There is a place for large companies, to be sure, but there are many good social, political, economic and security reasons why small companies have a role to play as well. I'm not asking that you hurt my competition, just that you let me compete fairly against them instead of let them unfairly shut me out of the market. Communication is important for a strong America and I want to continue to be a constructive citizen in our national enterprise. I hope you'll use your influence with federal agencies and other lawmakers to see to it we have open networks so consumers can have choices and control their own destiny.
Contact information:
http://www.ii4a.org,
email: isps@ii4a.org or phone
813-496-2122