http://www.businessinsider.com/net-neutrality-google-facebook-amazon-fcc-ajit-pai-congress-2017-7
Don't pin your hopes on Facebook, Google, and other massive tech companies to
keep the internet a level playing field — here’s why
Jeff Dunn
There’s a tendency to talk about net neutrality in black and white terms.
The narrative often deems net neutrality a liberal versus conservative issue,
or a battle between two different types of tech forces — internet service
providers like Comcast and Verizon on one side, internet companies like
Netflix, Google, and everyone else on the other.
The truth is, things are a bit more nuanced.
For one, polls have repeatedly suggested that most Americans, regardless of
their political affiliation, support net neutrality as a concept. Most people
involved in this debate agree that an ISP shouldn’t be allowed to artificially
block or slow certain websites, or give preferential treatment to some sites in
exchange for payment.
The dividing lines here are really about power: who has it, who doesn’t, and
who would have it in a world without enforceable net-neutrality laws, which is
what Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chairman Ajit Pai seems intent on
creating. And within that divide, there are layers.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg defended the FCC's current net-neutrality rules on
Wednesday, but has run afoul of net-neutrality advocates in the past.Justin
Sullivan/Getty Images
This past Wednesday, hundreds of internet companies participated in an online
protest designed to rally the net neutrality-supporting base and put pressure
on the Pai and other Republicans' plans to scrap the existing net-neutrality
rules. Those rules treat ISPs akin to public utilities — a la water or
electricity providers — via Title II of the Communications Act, and have been
upheld in court. The protest’s organizers said more than 2 million comments
were submitted to the agency in support of the rules as a result of the event.
The vast majority of the protest's participants were organizations you’ve
probably never heard of. Tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Amazon joined
the action as well, though, and since those are the companies the masses care
about, they got the headlines. Which is fine! Big companies have more influence
than smaller ones.
But there are differences between what these giants of the internet and their
smaller counterparts are saying. More importantly, there’s a difference in how
the most powerful internet companies are incentivized to act. It’s a fine line,
but an important distinction for those who want the existing net-neutrality
rules to stay.
Here’s how some of the major firms decided to take action on Wednesday:
Google published a post on its public policy blog, which it emailed to users
who have signed up to receive policy action alerts from the company. It did not
put any notifications on its core websites.
Facebook issued a blog post, and execs Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg
posted messages of broad support for net neutrality. The company said the FCC’s
current rules are working, but stressed it is willing to work with Congress to
“keep the internet free and open.”
Amazon put this small, simplistic ad on the side of its homepage (via writer
David Dayen):
All of these companies, along with various other big names such as Netflix,
linked to a page in support of net neutrality from the Internet Association, a
lobbying group that represents many major tech firms. That page lays out the
current situation regarding net neutrality, and encourages users to comment to
the FCC demanding rules that prohibit blocking, throttling, and paid
prioritization by ISPs.
There are two common threads here: The protests themselves were more subdued
than past demonstrations, and few of the major companies involved explicitly
demanded the legally enforceable, Title II-based net-neutrality rules stay in
place today. And that leaves the major tech firms a small but significant bit
of wiggle room.
The implication here is that the some of the internet’s powers-that-be are
willing to work with Congress on a solution if Pai overturns the agency’s
current rules. That feeling was bolstered by a later report from Axios, which
said top House Republicans told Facebook, Google, and Amazon to keep their
net-neutrality advocacy toned down prior to the event. (Facebook, Google, and
the Internet Association declined to comment on the report. Facebook and Google
pointed us to the aforementioned messages. Amazon did not respond to a request
for comment.)
That doesn’t have to be a bad thing, of course. Bipartisanship is great! But
Republicans in Congress have proposed net-neutrality bills in the past, and
those bills have typically been weaker than today’s rules in scope: One
would’ve kept the main principles in net neutrality in place but weakened the
FCC’s ability to regulate ISPs in the future; a current proposal simply repeals
the rules and prohibits the FCC from ever making anything similar.
There is obviously speculation involved here: The left and right in Washington
are so far apart at the moment that it’s not even clear what a net-neutrality
compromise could look like. There’s also no guarantee that Pai’s attempt at
overturning the rules would be held up in court, in the likely event that he is
challenged there. But given that Pai has questioned whether a ban on paid
prioritization is even necessary, and given the broad support he has from
Republicans in Washington, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to expect a weaker set
of laws.
To be clear, it is wholly wrong to say that major tech firms like Google or
Facebook are opposed to net neutrality. They have benefited greatly from it,
they likely have thousands of employees who support it, and, again, they have
continually expressed support for it as a concept in statements.
But their relatively meager actions on Wednesday serve as a reminder: Net
neutrality is about the small, not the big. Google, Facebook, Amazon, Netflix,
and the like are titans of their fields. If the (still mostly hypothetical)
fears of Title II advocates come true, and ISPs are able to set tolls for
access to better quality, the companies with better funding will more easily be
able to pay them.
And if those ISPs want to sell lower-cost internet packages that include a few
zero-rated sites, but not the whole web — much like Facebook’s Free Basics
concept, which Zuckerberg pseudo-defended Wednesday and has been praised by
members of President Trump’s FCC transition team despite being blocked in India
for violating net-neutrality principles — the largest services are the ones
most likely to be included.
Netflix’s gradually weakened stance on net-neutrality is instructive. The
streaming giant has gone from threatening ISPs to behave themselves to telling
shareholders earlier this year that any change in legislation is
inconsequential in a span of three years. In that time, it’s grown to a point
where ISPs can’t afford to keep Netflix — or Google, or Facebook, or Amazon —
from being easily accessible at a high quality.
Proponents of net neutrality protest against Federal Communication Commission
Chairman Ajit Pai outside the American Enterprise Institute before his arrival
May 5, 2017 in Washington, DC.Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Instead, it’s the next Netflix or Facebook that’d be the most vulnerable in a
world with no regulatory pressure hanging over ISPs’ heads. It is harder for a
startup or smaller competitor to compete when it either can’t afford the
payments necessary to stay on a relatively level playing field, or isn’t
prominent enough to warrant inclusion in a zero-rated package. A good idea
could still win out, but incumbents on all fronts would have a competitive edge.
Again, the major internet firms have made their support for net-neutrality very
clear. And working with Congress may be the most realistic thing to do here
anyway, given how dead set Pai seems to be on overturning the current rules.
But if you care about the future of internet legislation, don’t expect the
web’s biggest forces to throw all their weight in one clear direction. There’s
too much at stake.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Business Insider.
