In all content categories, net-neutrality advocates say that fair competition requires an open delivery platform that cannot be slanted toward a provider with deep pockets. Opponents of net neutrality oppose regulation of a free market. Cable companies and other major bandwidth providers have spent fortunes building broadband infrastructure, and think they should have the right to give, sell, or lease bandwidth at their discretion.
If you don’t succeed…
This will be FCC’s third try. In January, the agency lost a court decision, largely on a technicality. That case as built by ex-Commissioner Julius Genachowski, who mistakenly classified the Internet in a way that forbade the net neutrality regulation sought by the FCC. the court decision spelled out the error plainly enough, and practically invited the FCC to try again. Picking up that cue, the federal agency (now led by commissioner Tom Wheeler, has decided not to appeal the decision, but to reboot the effort.
Expectations were that the FCC would re-classify the Internet as a common carrier, like phones, which would place its previous arguments on a more legal footing. Instead, Wheeler is building a case on a portion of the Communications Act, avoiding hard line and allowing for some degree of case-by-case resolution.
One interesting aspect of the proposed argument, as reported by the New York Times, would be an attempt by the FCC to remove some state laws that prevent cities from offering broadband service to their residents.