Thanks for the Sideshow, Let’s Get Back to Work
We need clarity about our antitrust standards as they apply to the Internet, safeguards for personal data, and reverse auctions to bring better broadband to rural America. None of that is terribly sexy, but it’s all important.
California’s Unlawful Net Neutrality Law
The Justice Department has already filed suit to block the California law, so this is the time for supporters to bring forward the case law they claim supports their position. Don’t hold your breath.
Europe Gets Serious About Copyright
EFF claims that Article 13 is an “extinction level event for the Internet.” Please, haven’t we had enough of that sort of hysteria? The Internet will remain a vibrant and vital system for communication despite – and perhaps because of – reforms such as Article 13.
Wireless ISPs Manage Video Streams Under High Load
The Wehe data doesn’t tell us whether the observed behavior is consistent with company disclosures or general net neutrality conventions. While we don’t expect legal opinions from network performance scholars, it’s important to know more about the triggers of network management.
Making the Internet Secure Once Again
An awful lot of things that are sold to us as improvements to Internet security simply deliver more information into the hands of a small group of companies. Whether that’s a good thing is for you to decide, but for my own part I like to be selective about what I share with which players.
Judge Kavanaugh and the Internet
Changing ISPs from their historic status to Title II is a move the FCC can’t make without Congressional authorization. This is especially true given the 1996 Telecommunications Act clearly declares ISPs to be information services. There is no clue in the ’96 Act that substituting dial-up for broadband changes the nature of ISP service.
All Edge and No Core
The peril of net neutrality is stagnation. If we force the Internet back to the traditional straight jackets, this fully competitive future may never arrive. I’m not willing to take that risk when lawmakers are so blind to the reality of the Internet that they can float this “one word at a time” nonsense with a straight face.
Regulatory Balance Across Platforms
Perhaps the best path to correction of our regulatory schizophrenia begins with the Alternative Infrastructure. It has some properties of ISPs and some of the Internet-Based Services.
From the Core to the Edge: Perspective on Internet Prioritization
The Internet is not simply a sandbox for network research any more, it has become the primary means of electronic communication around the world. Before long, it will be the only such means and we will all be better for it. Please allow firms that depend on networking to invest efficiently so as to maximize their incentives to innovate.
Tim Berners-Lee is Depressed about the Web
The web’s greatest shortcoming, as well the greatest shortcoming of the Internet before the web, is the absence of tools for commerce in the plumbing. The web needs to provide each user with a persistent identity – or more, and they don’t need to be real – and a dance card for all the permissions we’ve given for data collectors to record our activities.