Net Neutrality: Last Day for Comments to FCC

Today is the last day of the FCC's public comment period on the network neutrality issue.

The FCC opened an inquiry March 22 exploring whether or not big ISPs like AT&T and Verizon give preferential treatment (for a fee) to certain companies' internet traffic over others, and whether consumers are adversely affected. The commission asked industry and the public to put in their two cents, too.

Don't worry about it if you make today's deadline or if you don't--it won't make any difference. The FCC will never pass any meaningful rule on the subject of net neutrality.

Why not? Because the FCC has always been the lapdog of big telecom companies like AT&T and Verizon, and probably always will be.

This may sound cynical, but it's not. It's simply my impression after talking with industry people on both sides of the debate, as well as with attorneys/lobbyists from both the Telco and Internet industry camps over the past two years.

The telecommunications lobby is one of the biggest and most powerful in Washington. Relationships between Big Telco lobbyists and FCC staffers go way back. The Internet industry lobby is small by comparison, and far less entrenched.

Congress tried during the last session, the 109th, to pass sweeping reform of the 1996 Telecommunications Act. It was the network neutrality language in the reform bills that ultimately killed the effort. The FCC is charged with carrying out the mandate of Congress; if Congress can't pass a network neutrality mandate, the FCC sure isn't going to do it on its own.

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