Google is quite strongly in favor of the Third Way according to the
official comments they've filed with the FCC on the Third Way NOI;
there's never been any doubt about that. Their talks with Verizon
started 10 or 11 months ago, long before Genachowski had heard of a
Third Way and long before the DC Circuit smacked down the Comcast order.
The reasoning behind the negotiations and the rationale for the proposal
was an attempt to find a consensus that all the relevant parties would
find acceptable, largely to prevent ongoing court challenges against an
order that the FCC might impose unilaterally. The lawyers are fairly
certain that the language of the 1996 Telecom Act is quite vague and
ambiguous regarding FCC authority over broadband Internet services. This
puts the FCC in a position of powerlessness unless there's a consensus
against a court challenge.
It's fair to say that there are people at Google in positions of
authority who are all over the place on how to regulate Internet
services, with one exception: they're all pretty much in favor of
leaving search, ad sales, e-mail, map services, and privacy outside the
scope of regulation.
It should be noted that until Genachowksi issued his Open Internet NPRM
earlier this year, mobile networks weren't on the table in any of the
serious broadband regulation debates. It was always assumed that mobile
was more competitive than fixed, and there was therefore no need to
apply a flat priority rule to it, nor was there any meaningful way to
write such a rule for a network that provides voice, data, and SMS at
different priority levels and at different prices anyway.
Like it or not, the VG framework is pretty damn close to a consensus
position within the networks and network services industries. That's not
to say that it couldn't be better, but there's always been an element of
religion in this debate. Regulating the Internet is like passing a law
legalizing gay marriage: Some stubborn old people will have to expire
before a lasting consensus can prevail.
RB
On 8/25/2010 7:44 PM, David P. Reed wrote:
Jennifer Zeidman Bloch is the Senior Manager of Broadcast Media at
Google, and is a "Director" of AWM.
So I guess Google also opposes FCC's "Third Way". I do note that the
Board of Directors is dominated by lawyers and NAB folks (and Ms.
Bloch is historically NAB-associated).
What to conclude from this? Well, the main common denominator is
that they are all wealthy, all conservative.
[ Is it fair to assume that the presence of a Google manager
as a director at an organization means that Google itself
necessarily agrees with all positions of that other
organization?
-- Lauren Weinstein
NNSquad Moderator ]
--
Richard Bennett
Senior Research Fellow
Information Technology and Innovation Foundation
Washington, DC
