Google’s Eric Schmidt – the battle continues
As you all know (or hopefully know) Net Neutrality was defeated yesterday. A vote in the house of representatives took a crack at stopping Net Neutrality from happening.
Today Google CEO Mr. Eric Schmidt posted an update to a short article he posted clarifying what Net Neutrality is (because there is still a bit of confusion regarding it), why its important to the future of the internet and information, and what we (you and I) can do to make sure its not over looked and turned into a law (or not turned into a law should I say) by people who can’t even figure out how to get music on their iPods without their grandson’s help.
Today the Internet is an information highway where anybody – no matter how large or small, how traditional or unconventional – has equal access. But the phone and cable monopolies, who control almost all Internet access, want the power to choose who gets access to high-speed lanes and whose content gets seen first and fastest. They want to build a two-tiered system and block the on-ramps for those who can’t pay.
He goes on to list steps and links to help make sure Net Neutrality doesn’t become another faceless, nameless bill… although its a bit late now, he does bring good news with a short update.
Update 6/8/06: For those who are interested in the legislative nuts-and-bolts, we support amending the House bill through the Markey-Boucher-Eshoo-Inslee Amendment to preserve network neutrality, which would add meaningful net neutrality provisions to H.R. 5252 [PDF], the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement (COPE) Act. We believe anything less than this amendment would be a loss for freedom and innovation on the Internet.
Lets hope it works.
