Mozilla asks FCC to unleash the nuclear option on net neutrality

Title II communications

[tangor]

Mozilla has filed a formal request to the US Federal Communications Commission asking it to reclassify internet-provision and content-provider's traffic under Title II of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which would ensure the net remains neutral.

The Firefox firm's proposal is twofold. First, it petitions the FCC to reclassify internet traffic as a telecommunications service, meaning it must be provided to all without offering graduated service. Second, Mozilla wants similar protections for relationships between content creators and ISPs, suggesting that this be called remote delivery services and granted the same protections.

[theregister.co.uk...]

[aristotle]

It was originally put under Title II in 1996 by the Clinton administration, but the Bush Administration moved it to Title l in 2002. Barack Obama said that he wanted it moved back to Title ll, but telecommunications lobbyists convinced his first FCC appointee Julius Genachowski that net neutrality can be maintained even under Title l, and he came up with a plan for doing so. But then some telecommunications companies took it to the courts and got crucial parts of the plan thrown out. The new FCC appointee Tom Wheeler apparently still believes that sufficient protections can be maintained under Title I, but has threatened to move it to Title ll as a last resort. So who knows what will happen?

[phranque]

the worst thing that ever happened to the FCC was Michael Powell's tenure as Chairman.
he is now the chief executive of the cable industry trade association.
Top Cable Lobbyist Argues Against Broadband as Utility - NYTimes.com:
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/29/top-cable-lobbyist-argues-against-broadband-as-utility/ [bits.blogs.nytimes.com]

While the Internet and broadband systems were built "with the help of the government," Mr. Powell said, "they have suffered terribly chronic underinvestment." In 2002, when Mr. Powell was chairman of the F.C.C., the agency voted to regulate cable-modem broadband service as a lightly regulated "information service" rather than as a "common carrier."

what he meant to say was, "while i was fcc chairman we handed out gobs of taxpayer-funded infrastructure investments without actually forcing you guys sitting in front here to actually invest that money in infrastructure improvements."