After a series of vague comments and a perceived reticence about speaking out on the issue, President Barack Obama finally articulated his administration's views on net neutrality, specifically on the creation of Internet "fast lanes."
Speaking to reporters at a summit for African leaders in Washington, Obama made it clear that pay-to-play bandwidth access that would improve speed for some, at the expense of those unable to afford special treatment, is decidedly against his administration's policy.
Obama said, "One of the issues around net neutrality is whether you are creating different rates or charges for different content providers. That's the big controversy here. So you have big, wealthy media companies who might be willing to pay more and also charge more for spectrum, more bandwidth on the Internet so they can stream movies faster. I personally, the position of my administration, as well as a lot of companies here, is that you don't want to start getting a differentiation in how accessible the Internet is to different users. You want to leave it open so the next Google and the next Facebook can succeed."
He prefaced his remarks by expressing support for an open Internet, saying "And so what we should be doing is trying to maintain an open Internet, trying to keep a process whereby any talented person who has an idea can suddenly use the Internet to disperse information. There are going to be occasional tensions involved in terms of us monitoring the use of the Internet for terrorist networks or criminal enterprises or human trafficking. But we can do that in ways that are compatible with maintaining an open Internet."
So far, the administration, the FCC and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler are not on the same page. The FCC has proposed rules that permit some differentiation in Internet usage rates by bandwidth, but the policy is built around a tepid caveat that only "commercially reasonable" accommodations would be made.
Wheeler, in his own comments, says paid prioritization is by itself commercially unreasonable. To help sort matters, Wheeler opened the discussion to the public, as the FCC created a response page on their site, initially with dramatic results as the site was soon logjammed with responses.
Wheeler and the FCC are likely hoping the public makes the decision for them, as no matter what the commission decides, it will be making political enemies either way.
Meanwhile, the European Commission ruled in favor of net neutrality back in April. In the United States, there is no resolution in sight.
