Why network neutrality is such an intractable problem—and how to solve it
THE idea that certain businesses are so essential that they must not discriminate between customers is as old as ferries. With only one vessel in town, a boatman was generally not allowed to charge a butcher more than a carpenter to move goods. This concept, called “common carriage”, has served the world well, most recently on the internet. The principle of blindly delivering packets of data, regardless of origin, destination or contents, is welded into the network’s technical foundations. This, more than anything else, explains why the internet has become such a fountain of innovation.
Yet with the internet becoming more crowded and traffic-management tools improving, this principle—known today as “network neutrality”—is under threat. Telecoms firms would like to create lanes of different speeds, not just to manage their networks better, but to capture more profits. Internet advocates fear this would lead to an online world studded with toll booths and other choke-points. They fret that rent-seeking network operators would abuse their market power. Prices would shoot up for those using the fast lanes; everyone else would get much cheaper, but much crummier, service.
Governments are taking action. On February 5th America’s Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which has been chewing on the problem for years, will put forward yet another set of network-neutrality rules. Latvia, which holds the presidency of the European Union’s Council of Ministers, has just outlined its own European proposal (see article). Both plans will face opposition: from Congress and in the courts on one side of the Atlantic, and from the European Parliament on the other. How can the debate be settled?
More providers, fewer rules
Finding a solution has proved tricky. First, neutrality is a slippery concept. Although the internet was designed to treat all data equally, it was never completely neutral: services such as games or video have always been at a disadvantage because the public internet cannot guarantee real-time connections. Second, any reform involves legal quandaries. Should an e-mail campaign from a political party count as spam, or freedom of speech? After losing several American court cases because the internet was held to be an unregulated information service, the FCC wants to reclassify it as an old-style utility in order to impose network-neutrality rules.
The debate is, therefore, unlikely ever to end—which means that trying to impose detailed rules or even utility-type regulation, as the FCC is likely to do, looks misguided. Better to stick with broader rules, such as insisting that a provider’s basic broadband service cannot be much slower than the fast lanes it offers—and ensure that regulators and the public can police them. Each operator should be required to publish detailed information about its network’s performance. Broadband providers can then be exposed if they slow or ration customers’ access to, say, Netflix or Skype. Regulators should have the power to punish such underhand tactics.
Wherever possible, however, they should leave the market to sort things out. The best way to do this is to encourage vigorous competition in all parts of the internet, particularly between broadband providers, so that none can become a bottleneck and exploit that position. That, alas, happens all too often, particularly in America, where 75% of households have no choice of provider for fast internet access. Get rid of those monopolies and there would be much less need to worry about the mind-numbing intricacies of network neutrality.
This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition under the headline "Gordian net"
