"How ya gonna keep em down on the farm After they've seen Paree" - Network neutrality is a phrase that has been the subject of much debate - and the discussion about it reaches far beyond the recent conversations of the blogoshpere. Previously unbeknownst to me, I came across this term as I began to investigate whether access to the Internet author who framed this particular question, "means that the network does not discriminate among different types of traffic based on the traffic's source, destination or content." What is prompting the more prominent discussion about network neutrality? The impending Yoo goes on to articulate some pretty convincing points: "the major network neutrality proposals advocate regulating the logical layer in a way that promotes competition in the application and content layers. In the process, they direct their efforts towards the wrong policy problem. Instead, the focus of public policy should be to promote competition in the physical layer, which remains the level of production that is currently the most concentrated, the least competitive, and best protected by barriers to entry. While it is true that allowing Internet providers to impose proprietary protocols could have a significant impact on innovation and competition, forbidding them from doing so could have equally dramatic effects. Either decision necessarily involves policymakers in the unenviable task of picking technological winners and losers." His conclusion, however, is what prompted me to begin this post with a reference to that As is often the case of public policy debates, the outcome will largely be tied to the hearts and minds of the people. The Internet and for the most part, its content has been free. While Yoo lays out a solid case, winning over impassioned netizens will be hard to do. They've seen "Paree" - an interconnected global world filled with free stuff - they won't be ready to go back to the "farm" of paying for everything anytime soon. TECHNOSIGHT blog.
Network Neutrality - Itll Make Your Head Hurt
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