People who affect a "from the trenches" voice often express alarm when the idea of enforcing net neutrality comes up. Here's a good example of the kind of thing I often find:
http://www.telepocalypse.net/archives/000822.html
and
http://scrawford.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2005/11/11/1381605.html
An excerpt:
"I am as committed to the ideal of the open internet as the next guy, and my dream is to have OneWebDay support that goal. But the mischief that can be done to our future (in so many unexpected ways) by insisting on statutory and regulatory definition of neutrality seems to outweigh the possible benefits of this path. There is so much nonsense, so much horse-trading, between where we stand now and the glorious goal of neutrality. The sad fact is that Americans don't mind vertical integration one bit, and the duopolists know that. Not only that, but price discrimination in a competitive market is actually a good thing. Now all we need is a competitive market.
I'd rather see a future that doesn't depend on a "third pipe" but that includes broadband internet access that is neither cable nor DSL. I can imagine a network owned by its users, or by a cooperative, or subsidized by a large company that has no interest in controlling use of the network. Our devices will be doing most of the computation, so there will be no way to tell the difference between devices and routing. We'll have network-aware applications, too.
This admittedly techno-determinist view fits with how the internet was supposed to work. Routing is not supposed to be centrally determined, and the idea of mesh networks pushes this even more to the edge -- individual devices will make decisions about routing. As long as we don't make this kind of broadband provision illegal (even by accident, by some casual legislative drafting), it will likely emerge in time."
Many tech-oriented people seem to think that a regulatory or political solution will have the unintended (and tragic) consequence of squelching the emergence of the ultimate (and superior) technological solution. I have my doubts. Even if we accept that people should be free to vote with their feet, who is to say they will have anywhere to walk to?
Will a "third pipe" (say, broadband wireless in addition to cable and DSL) make a big difference? I'm interested in the potential for community or municipal broadband; however, large incumbent service providers have been lobbying against these efforts.
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