[Air-L] Fwd: [IP] AT&T says there is no duopoly, net neutrality is bad

[Jeremy Hunsinger]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: David Farber <dave at farber.net>
> Date: October 24, 2007 9:06:13 PM CDT
> To: ip at v2.listbox.com
> Subject: [IP] AT&T says there is no duopoly, net neutrality is bad
> Reply-To: dave at farber.net
>
>
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> From: dewayne at warpspeed.com (Dewayne Hendricks)
> Date: October 24, 2007 6:09:24 PM EDT
> To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy at warpspeed.com>
> Subject: [Dewayne-Net] AT&T says there is no duopoly, net  
> neutrality is bad
>
> [Note:  I attended the MW conference yesterday and saw Cicconi's  
> performance.  Simply amazing!  He just kept throwing out one zinger  
> after another.  DLH]
>
> POSTED AT 9:49 AM ON OCTOBER 23, 2007
>
> Blogging from the 2007 MW conference: AT&T says there is no  
> duopoly, net neutrality is bad
> <http://www.muniwireless.com/article/articleview/6560/1/23>
>
> It's Day 2 of the Muniwireless Silicon Valley Conference and they  
> have an executive from AT&T talking about municipal wireless networks.
>
> AT&T has not changed its tune. It is still against cities using  
> public funds to compete with private enterprise and believes that  
> communications should be left up to private firms like AT&T.
>
> James Cicconi, Senior Executive VP Legislative and External Affairs  
> for AT&T claims that there is no duopoly and there is enough  
> competition in the market for telecommunications services, so  
> cities should stay out.
>
> What is AT&T's position on net neutrality?
>
> Net neutrality is a challenge for all companies. You spend billions  
> to deploy your assets and net neutrality means someone telling you  
> what you can do with your assets - what you can charge, tiers of  
> service, etc.
>
> "All bits should be treated equal" is a problem for network  
> engineers because one bit is porn another bit is heart surgery,  
> another is email, yet another is voice, another is spam. That  
> everything should be moved equally end to end is ludicrous. It's a  
> more costly way to do things. It's not efficient, according to AT&T.
>
> AT&T cannot build and maintain assets quickly enough to meet the  
> demand. They are spending $19 billion this year. Some of the demand  
> is driven by video. What happens when people start delivering high  
> definition film? They can't build networks fast enough! What's the  
> answer? Effective traffic management.
>
> The antitrust laws can deal with the problems of net neutrality  
> (side note: unfortunately these are not being enforced today). Why  
> should AT&T want to degrade traffic? They will go to someone else  
> (side note again: in a duopoly, you've got Comcast which has been  
> blocking Bittorent traffic).
>
> - - - - -
>
> Note: Given what I have heard here today, the only solution here is  
> structural separation.
>
>
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Jeremy Hunsinger
Information Ethics Fellow, Center for Information Policy Research,  
School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee  
(www.cipr.uwm.edu)

Words are things; and a small drop of ink, falling like dew upon a  
thought, produces that which makes thousands, perhaps millions,  
think. --Byron