Level 3, the middle-mile Internet provider and the newly crowned content delivery network for Netflix, has accused Comcast of violating the tenants of network neutrality as the cable company seeks an additional payment to deliver content from Level 3 to its subscribers. Read more »
Internet services providers are calling for an Federal Communications Commission with less authority over regulating broadband, just as the FCC reportedly prepares to vote on new neutrality rules. It’s all part of a larger attempt by the telecommunications industry to undercut the power of the FCC. Read more »
What keeps a man like FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski up at night? Try 40th out of 40. That’s the U.S.’ ranking in broadband improvements from 1999-2009 according to a study last year. Genachowski is worried that the U.S. is in danger of losing its competitive advantage. Read more »
Today on the Net: net neutrality is a sticky issue for media and Internet companies, MySpace has launched its first music video app, dubbed Romeo, and cable distributors and programmers are looking increasingly to tablets for creating new video applications. Read more »
In November 2007, I remember reading then-Senator Obama’s Technology and Innovation Platform for the first time. I was amazed that a candidate had said that he understood what net neutrality was about and that he knew it was important to the nation’s economy and culture. Read more »
Google has broken the relative silence it has maintained after coming out with a controversial framework for addressing net neutrality, which it developed with Verizon. In a post called “Facts about our network neutrality proposal” Google explains itself. But here are the facts about Google’s facts. Read more »
Several grassroots organizations are planning a protest at noon tomorrow at Google’s Mountain View campus. The groups plan to protest because the search giant has teamed up with Verizon to offer a compromise on net neutrality that has the potential to create a two-tiered Internet. Read more »
Google’s problems aren’t just a result of its huge size — its global ambitions and the impact it has on so many aspects of our lives has given it a whole new class of problems. In many ways, the company might as well be a nation-state. Read more »
On Monday Google and Verizon announced a controversial framework for compromise on the contentious issue of network neutrality–the idea that ISPs shouldn’t discriminate against web traffic. But for those who really want to dig into the issue, read what the web is saying. Read more »
Today’s compromise between Verizon and Google on network neutrality is a big story, not because it’s going to change the policy discussion much, but because it marks Google selling out the tech and startup community so it can advance it’s own economic interests. Read more »
It’s unclear whether Verizon and Google will end net neutrality with an agreement to prioritize some traffic on the Internet, but any such deal would have a devastating effect on startups and video publishers that don’t have Google’s deep pockets to pay for better access. Read more »
T-Mobile wants Apple, Google and other companies offering mobile video and music services over their networks to pay up. René Obermann, CEO of T-Mobile parent Deutsche Telekom, said in an interview with a German business magazine today that these kinds of services should be “priced differently.” Read more »
Internet service providers, Microsoft, Intel and Google have created a broadband technical advisory group to provide an engineering perspective on issues associated with broadband networks. But the group’s lack of focus makes it hard to know if this is a good thing or not. Read more »
The FCC will begin the process of reclassifying broadband as a telecommunications service subject to greater regulatory oversight from the agency. The reclassification was in response to a court ruling that challenged the FCC’s ability to enforce network neutrality under the current broadband regulatory regime. Here’s what the web is saying. Read more »
The Federal Communications Commission today laid out its plans to solidify its authority to regulate broadband after an appeals court seemingly neutered the agency’s regulatory powers when it ruled the FCC didn’t have the authority to censure Comcast for throttling P2P files. Here’s how. Read more »
Netflix is harming Hollywood, and the studios have to team up with telcos to get priority treatment for the traffic of their own VOD offerings if they want to turn their fate around: That’s the gist of a new report published by the U.K.’s Telco 2.0 […] Read more »
Google’s core philosophy about opening up access to the world’s information drive its pro-net neutrality stand, is the reason Google is building its own fiber network and is driving it to search for protocols for moving information between cloud providers. Read more »
Last Tuesday a federal court of appeals called into question the FCC’s ability to regulate Internet access, but after talking to people in D.C., the consensus is that regulations guaranteeing net neutrality will survive, and the FCC will begin a proceeding to reclassify internet access. Read more »
Google has long been a proponent of net neutrality, but it appears the company may have unknowingly allowed an advertising partner in India to promote preferential treatment for certain video streams on YouTube. A reader in India tipped us off that YouTube advertiser Bharti Airtel, a […] Read more »
President Obama took questions via YouTube today, and in response to a question about keeping the Internet open and neutral, professed a belief in net neutrality that may even include resistance to allowing carriers to deliver managed services or possibly tiered pricing on the consumer side. Read more »
Over the past three years, the Internet has become a major secondary distribution platform for free-to-air broadcast programming. Whether through network programmers’ own sites, such as ABC.com, or through aggregators like Hulu and TV.com, ad-supported broadcast programming today is generally available online shortly after its initial airing at no cost to the user. However, programming such as ESPN, TNT and the Discovery Channel, which originates on pay-TV platforms (i.e. cable, satellite and telco TV services) has been a different story.
Cable system operators and other multichannel video program distributors (MVPDs) are loathe to see the programming for which they are charging subscribers hefty monthly fees made available “over-the-top” without a subscription. Over time, they fear, consumers would be tempted to drop their expensive cable service if they could access their favorite programs online.
Cable networks, for their part, collect hefty fees from MVPDs for the right to retransmit their programming, from a few cents per subscriber per month, to as much as $3.75 per subscriber per month, for the most popular channels like Disney’s ESPN. In aggregate, cable networks collect about $25 billion per year in “affiliate fees” from MVPDs, about the same amount as they generate collectively from advertising sales.
As a result, much of the original programming on pay-TV networks is not currently available online, and that which is often doesn’t appear until well after its original air date. The popularity of portals like Hulu (not to mention illegal sources of TV content), however, has accustomed consumers to expect access to their favorite shows online, putting pressure on the industry to respond. Network programmers and marketers, meanwhile, are also anxious to extend their programming franchises by tapping the broad, online audience.
TV Everywhere, which aims to make subscription programming available online exclusively to current pay-TV subscribers, represents an effort to square that circle. In this report, we look at the players, potential costs, and emerging opportunities of these efforts. Read more »
[qi:gigaom_icon_social_networking] A public interest group and Some law professors sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission this morning questioning the FCC’s commitment to preventing carriers from discriminating against certain types of traffic on their pipes. The letter, signed by seven professors and endorsed by The […] Read more »
The Democrats’ efforts to preserve our Internet freedom through net neutrality legislation needs more help, according to U.S. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who held a press conference today in order to recruit more sponsors for his net neutrality bill and petition more citizens to make their views […] Read more »
The FCC has yet to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) formally kicking off the process of writing and promulgating net neutrality regulations, but the battle over the scope of the new rules is already well underway within media and technology circles in Washington, D.C. At the Future of Music Coalition […] Read more »
Updated: Senate Republicans last night backed off a plan aimed at popping the net neutrality balloon floated by the FCC on Monday, according to the Washington Post. This is smart thinking, as there’s still much to learn and a lot less to fear about the proposed […] Read more »
