The Longest April Fools' Day
I began April 1 by leaving the hotel in Wellington, NZ at 5am; I ended it by arriving in Greenwich Village, NYC, at 10:30pm. I keep trying to mentally calculate how many hours that was, but I'm too tired to get the same answer twice in a row.
It's an indication of just how badly things are going for telecom policy in this country that TWO well-respected people just posted to well-respected policy listservs the confident announcement that a terrible Telecom Act of 2006 had passed Congress in the middle of the night. They did this with saddened alarm.
They had fallen for an April Fools' joke, but … it's understandable. They took as valid a posting by Benton's Communications-Related Headlines that said:
In votes cast in the wee hours of Saturday morning, the House and Senate passed, by narrow majorities, the Telecommunications Competition and Investment Act of 2006. President Bush signed it without a ceremony after a quick return from a visit to Mexico just a few hours ago. Because of the timing of the votes — held when even C-SPAN cameras were dark — and the President's signature, coverage of the new legislation is spotty. The Telecom Act of 2006, as some are already referring to the bill, aims to increase competition in the video delivery market by allowing easily entry for telephone companies like AT&T and Verizon. Apparently, the process for awarding truly “national” franchises has been streamlined for these new entrants so that they may simply inform the Securities & Exchange Commission of their intent to provide video services before beginning to bill consumers. The complex provisions related to Universal Service, critics are already saying, will redirect up to 30% of USF funds to just four states: Alaska, Texas, Illinois and Montana.
Funny, right? Of COURSE the SEC notification is ridiculous; of COURSE there won't be billions going to the home states of key Commerce Committee members. But it feels as if anything is possible these days.
The Benton tomfoolery post continues:
In addition, the legislation phases in spectrum fees on all licenses beginning in Fiscal Year 2007 and ends the use of “unlicensed” spectrum. Municipal telecommunications networks, including so-called “Wi-Fi” networks, will be prohibited beginning January 1, 2008.
Hah! Unbelievable, right? But there's more:
Finally, the bill aims to end the “Net Neutrality” debate by 1) allowing network operators to discriminate between traffic if it is “economically advantageous,” 2) relying solely on “market-driven agreements” to determine interconnection and 3) restricting use of a network by the terms of service agreed to when subscribing.
The best jokes cut closest to the bone, prompting a shocked laugh of recognition. That's what the much-forwarded Benton post did, because all the Benton folks had to do was slap together slightly-enhanced versions of the current network owners' rhetoric. Wise minds were fooled.
Another April Fools' razor-sharp joke: New York Metropolitan Transit Authority Outlaws Speaking on Subway.
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8 Responses to “The Longest April Fools' Day”
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It troubles me to see that well reasoned individuals believe both that members of Congress can be bought AND that those members should be invited to regulate the internet…a medium that's innovation exists largely BECAUSE of the lack of governmental regulation. It's not logical, imho.
People really send around April Fools jokes regarding telecom reform? I mean, don't get me wrong, but has this issue reached “April Fool's Day” levels of pop culture relevance?
Oldhats, I found irony in the same thing. We fully expect our legislators to regulate in accordance with their own special interests, and yet we wish to give Congress carte blanche to regulate the Internet as they please.
National Research Council, Funding a Revolution: Government Support for Computing Research, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., 1999, Ch. 7: Development of the Internet and the World Wide Web:
(emphasis added.)
I s'pose that it might be considered “innovative”—even “radical”—to completely divorce taxpayer-funded research from “governmental regulation”.
In RFC 3869: IAB Concerns and Recommendations Regarding Internet Research and Evolution (2004), Atkinson and Floyd note on p.3 “[I]f commercial funding is the main source of funding for future Internet research, the future of the Internet infrastructure could be in trouble.”
There's a big difference between funding and regulating. Our defense budget might give Lockheed Martin money to make missiles, but our Congressmen don't legislate the technology that they use to make them. Same with the Internet - the government gave the money but it kept its hands off the development. And we seem to have good results so far.
Oh.
So the suggestion that markets somehow, sometimes and under some circumstances might be capable of “self-regulation” is nothing more than a complete load of horse-hooey then?
Surely the government has played an instrumental role in developing (i.e. paying) for much that led to the early success of the internet. That, however, does not imply that it has been the source of innovation. Amazon, google, Vonage, and others had little to do with the government, yet they are innovators and profitable companies. I think people like oldhats are trying to suggest that government regulation of the net neutrality sort will actually make it harder for innovators like these companies to come along and compete as regulation of any industry has a tendency to slow growth and hurt innovation in favor of promoting the status quo.
Thank you, Paulaner & pkp…I've been out of the loop for a couple of days and you're right–investment does not equal regulation. Nedu, of course it's not horse hooey that the markets will regulate themselves…which is exactly why we should let them do that instead of inviting Congress in to regulate.
On March 29th, 2006, Dr. Adam Drobot testified before the Senate Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Technology, Innovation and Competitiveness regarding Investing in Communications for Tomorrow’s Innovations: The Case for Increased Basic Research Funding [PDF]. “Speaking as the Chairman of the Telecommunications Industry Association’s Communication Research Division,” Dr. Drobot urged “that federal funding for communications-specific, pre-competitive, basic research be increased […]” (p.2). Further, he concluded his testimony with:
But, Oldhats, you advocate keeping Congress out of the telecom marketplace. Perhaps your well-informed economic judgement leads you to believe in the mystical power of the self-regulating “Market” which magically provides optimum investment in public goods.