The proponents of Net Neutrality have long claimed that the FCC needs to lay down some rules insuring freedom of speech on the internet.
As a songwriter I have a problem wrapping my mind around the concept that the FCC is going out of the censorship business and into the protection of free speech.
Wasn't it the FCC that banned Billy Holiday's wonderful recording of "Love for Sale" and Cole Porter's "I Get a Kick Out of You?"
Wasn't it the FCC that agreed with Vice President Spiro Agnew that the recording industry was promoting 'drug culture' with songs like "Puff the Magic Dragon" and "A Little Help From My Friends?"
Isn't it the FCC that gave us Janet Jackson's 'Nipple Gate' and drove Howard Stern off the air and onto satellite radio? Didn't they ban Ice-T for Cop Killer? Fine Bono for cursing at an awards show?
I could go on, but I hope this short list demonstrates the controversial history of the FCC's role in censoring free expression in music.
Here is a video of Chase Fontaine, an enthusiastic, and thoroughly fictitious, supporter of Net Neutrality, attempting to explain the free speech 'benefits' of Net Neutrality (with mixed results)...
The Songwriter's Guild of America is not the only organization that is concerned about the idea of the FCC's protection of free speech on the internet.The EFF, a strong proponent of Net Neutrality, has also expressed concern: "While we're big fans of net neutrality, we worry that the FCC may want to build its net neutrality regulations on a rotten legal foundation,"Title I 'ancillary authority' which is both discredited and unbounded. As we've said before, if ancillary jurisdiction is enough for net neutrality regulations (something we might like) today, the FCC could just as easily invoke it tomorrow for any other Internet regulation that the commission dreams up (including things we won't like, like decency rules and copyright filtering)."
So even some of the most fervent Net Neutrality supporters understand that turning over the internet to the FCC may be a problem for people who want free expression to survive and thrive in the wonderful new information medium that is the Internet.
Net Neutrality supporters tell us to distrust the ISP's, who have, with no Net Neutrality rules in place, given us an Internet that is the closet thing in history to a censorship-free zone. Alternatively, they ask us to trust the FCC, which has been banning, bleeping, and blurring everything in sight ever since the 1930's.
While the EFF realizes there are problems with the "rotten legal foundation" that underlies attempts to regulate the internet under the "unbounded" Title I ancillary authority, we worry about similar problems under Title II.
Under Title I, where the Internet is classified as an information service, the FCC could potentially look directly at content in order to see if all transmitters are being treated equally. But what if the FCC decides to do what it has done so many times in the past; and seeks to apply decency rules to content? Therein lies the very serious problem of Title I regulation of the Internet.
Under Title II, if the internet is classified as a telecommunication service, the FCC would purportedly make sure that everyone has equal access to the "on-ramp" of the Internet at the
purely data transport level. The FCC promises it would 'forebear' any attempt to control content under Title II. Seriously, they 'promise'.
But can we really trust the FCC to 'forebear' authority to reach any further than the transport level? The history of the FCC is replete with examples of attempts to apply decency rules and censorship to content. Should we believe that 'this time it's different?' We already have groups like Free Press calling for the FCC to reach up into the content level of the Internet and take action against 'hate speech'.
Laudable as their underlying objective might be, the effect would be to put the FCC squarely into the internet content censoring business.
If other strong Net Neutrality supporters like the Electronic Frontier Foundation realize that FCC regulation might very well have a negative effect on freedom of expression on the Internet, one would hope that a group calling itself 'Free Press' would share those same concerns.
If Comcast and ATT ruled the Internet, do you think our personal Internet rights and freedoms, such as they are, would evolve to be in our best interest?
I don't want a 'Net Nanny' vetting thru my songs...
You use the word 'Corporations' like Rush Limbaugh uses the word 'Liberals'. But it was a bunch
of Corporations that invested the money to build the internet. They set it up in the Neutral way
that it already operates. Now you want to turn control of the internet over to the FCC because they
promise to 'forebear' when it comes to censorship???
I am not as sanguine as you are about the intentions of the FCC in the future. The FCC has proven
to be a very political organization. One election could flip the switch and they could be back
in the censorship game.... then what will we do??? Governments are not very good at
giving back the power to the people. That is why we should only give them the power when there
is a REAL problem not some potential hypothetical problem.
All recent examples of disruptions in end-to-end offerings (mainly what is discussed related to net neutrality) share one common feature. They were all resolved through the actions of consumers before the government was even able to react. The biggest example, involving comcast and bittorrent users was resolved 4 months before the FCC attempted to admonish Comcast for their behavior. 4 months before the FCC could respond, bittorrent and comcast came up with a protocol which allowed for traffic to resume uninterrupted.
Consumers have a history of success in maintaining net neutrality, and right now there is only the threat of a future disruption of service. The FCC has a history of protecting telecoms from competition (which serves consumers by forcing telecoms to serve them rather than influence the FCC) and passes along the additional costs to consumers. While forcing us to pay higher costs, the FCC has also shown us that they are not nimble enough to adequately respond to immediate disruptions in service.
Why do people want to give this authority to the FCC?
I'd far rather have a legistlative solution for net neutrality that doesn't leave the FCC with broad powers, but I don't see it happening any time soon so I am willing to accept the FCC proposal. If it happens, I'm sure Rick Carnes and the Songwriters Guild will be pushing for copyright filtering/tracking on a huge scale in league with the RIAA and MPAA, despite the majority of musicians who think that suing their customers is a terrible way to do business. I'm far more worried about that than I am about censorship (censorship doesn't really work online anyway, just google "how to get around chinese firewall").
If you're paying for non advertiser sponsored media, such as satellite radio (concerning the non advertiser channels) and cable tv (concerning the movie channels), the level of censorship involved would be, perhaps, the the extent of the comfort level of individual producers and network execs. (Even pornography can be viewed on cable tv if a subscriber specifically pays for it.)
As I understand one of the more present concerns with Net Neutrality is with "content favoring." In other words, ISP's favoring (think Comcast favoring NBC content, for example) their own content, while disfavoring (think bandwidth throttling or outright blocking) of other ISP's content. Or, in the case of P2P, bandwidth throttling or outright blocking of specific Internet protocols to "cut down" on piracy, even though those protocols *CAN* (but rarely are, admittedly) be used to share non-copyrighted content.
I appreciate the angle in which the author is coming from, and understand why he is coming from that angle, as an artist, but the larger concern I see is content filtering. I have no illusions about the FCC and censorship, but from my perspective I'm looking at the larger picture.
All interesting comments.
It may be, as you say, that the FCC will only want to censor WiFi because of the public nature of the distribution. But then if they are reclassifying the internet as a something akin to a public utility
then they might, under another administration, want to go farther adn claim that the public
nature of the internet allows them to reach farther. After all, satellite radio and cable TV are all
behind access walls that the internet doesn't have. The FCC may decide that those walls need
to be in place or there needs to be 'protection' for the populace at large.
Compare this to how Canada regulates oil drilling: You must drill the secondary relief pipes at the same time as you drill the primary in case of disaster.
However, since they're a government organization we can control what they do via elected officials. Unlike corporate entities that can do basically whatever they want, and have a vested interest in ganking as much possible money from you as they can.
Lastly, the biggest bone of contention about the whole net neutrality thing is the way the FCC is forcing telecom companies to give all internet content equal treatment, as in content from "roadrunner", will not get preferential treatment (e.g faster connection/download speeds) as compared to content from, say "youtube". I fail to see how this is in any way a bad thing.
Who in their right mind wants the corporate companies deciding our future? I mean, I can't imagine the absurd fees and restrictions we would have if they had all the power.
On the other hand, the idea of the government getting into the nitty-gritty doesn't give me the best of comfort.