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Tuesday, March 08, 2011

Update on why politicos all gone ominously quiet about 'net neutrality'

It seems that in Washington, Brussels and points in between, the consensus is that the kerfuffle in November and December over net neutrality means that its better to quietly abandon the policy than have those troublesome public consultations and political embarrassments. (John Boehner's barking aside, that is).
Thus Verizon decided to insert its throttling clause on top 5% iPhone users (viz - those buying latest iPhones) without making a fuss about, you know, unilaterally altering customer contracts. Its too late to break the contract in response if you paid last month's bill (for those of contrarian bent, Orlowski's anti-freetard latest will stimulate).
Similarly, Commissioner Kroes had the CEOs of major telcos in for coffee last week in private to talk investment in network speed - guess how much she discussed net neutrality? Meanwhile, BCE buys CTVGlobal just after Comcast buys NBC, and News Corporation is cleared to buy Sky - vertical integration, anyone?
All the big box sellers were in Barcelona a fortnight ago to sell their micro-billing equipment to mobiles - expect a flood of throttling to follow even when using unpaired TD-LTE.
As long as they're all transparent and you can vote with your feet in a competitive differentiated market, or you're French - its Paris where the implementation of the European Directives should be most keenly observed.
The only telcos making headlines on network management today appear to be Libyan...

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