Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Commissioner Ajit Pai called out Netflix, one of net neutrality's most well known advocates, in a letter to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings Tuesday, saying that the video streaming service provider was in fact trying to set up its own "fast lanes" on the Internet.
President Barack Obama recommitted his position on the net neutrality debate, calling for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to enact new rules to secure a "free and open" Internet.
It seems Tom Wheeler can't catch a break: His latest attempt to charm both sides of the contentious Net Neutrality debate has seemingly pleased no one.
The debate over net neutrality has sparked major public outcry. The 1,477,301 public comments made to the Federal Communications Commission as of Wednesday is the most of any issue in its history.
On Wednesday, Netflix, Digg, Reddit, Tumblr, and many others took part in an online protest reminiscent of the 2011 anti-SOPA action to protest against the Federal Communications Commission's planned new Open Internet policy and the "fast lanes" proposal associated with it. Meanwhile, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler hinted this week at expanding Net Neutrality-type protections to wireless broadband.
This week in social media, Facebook's took its Blue Dinosaur privacy bot mainstream while giving up on Slingshot's lamest feature. Meanwhile, there were more worries over the "Facebookification" of Twitter feeds, after comments from Twitter's CFO, and both Tumblr and Reddit will take part in next week's Net Neutrality protest.
The Sunlight Foundation released a study on the FCC Open Internet comments this week. What did they find? An overwhelming majority of the public is in favor of Net Neutrality, unsurprisingly.
The U.S. Federal Communication Commission decided it would continue to accept comments on its Open Internet rules until September 15, which gives the public a little more time to submit their opinion on whether or not the new proposed framework does enough to protect a free and open Internet.
The public response to the Federal Communications Commission's open comment period for its controversial reformulation of its formerly Net Neutrality-friendly Open Internet rules has been huge -- the highest ever for an FCC policy procedure. Now one analysis of the comments shows the vast majority were pro-Net Neutrality. And there were so few unique "anti" comments, they don't even register on the analysis' infographic.
Late last week, the Federal Communications Commission announced it was going to do a series of roundtable discussions about the Open Internet. It would be hosted in the FCC's Washington D.C. offices and streamed on the Internet. Now Senator Patrick Leahy is telling the FCC that's not enough.
The FCC Net Neutrality debate has caused division between minority and Latino advocacy organizations, sparking a war of words between two, in particular.
Chairman Tom Wheeler, of the Federal Communications Commission, has hinted that the agency might be interested in increasing Internet broadband competition by stopping local and state laws, often imposed with pressure by big incumbent Internet service providers, that outlaw municipal broadband.
Netflix's public disputes with ISPs have lead the Federal Communications Commission to take a look at paid interconnection deals, and a little light is already being shed on the contentious issue of paid peering.
To help protect net neutrality, comedian John Oliver on his HBO show Last Week Tonight called on internet lovers to do what they do best: trolling. The result? They probably crashed the FCC's servers.
In the wake of news that the Federal Communications Commission had decided to look into the issue of paid peering on the internet, Comcast CEO Brian Roberts took the stage at Re/code's Code Conference Wednesday. Doing his best to talk about anything but broadband, Roberts was forced to give his opinion about the issue.
The same group that brought us the strong message from Senator Al Franken calling net neutrality the "free speech issue of our time," the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC) and NoSlowLane.com, is keeping up the pressure against "fast lanes." This time, they're targeting a younger audience.
What's been a side show to the general battle over net neutrality, the possible Comcast/Time Warner Cable merger, and the FCC is the more technical issue of network interconnects and "paid peering." Google Fiber -- which has been seen as the only hope for a fair, open internet if the FCC allows "fast lanes" and the largest cable merger in history -- just announced it doesn't and won't charge for peering.
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak published an open letter on Tuesday calling the current action on Net Neutrality one of the "most important times ever" for the FCC. At the same time, reports that Apple has made interconnection deals with ISPs might indicate that the company he helped found doesn't have a problem with the proposed "fast lanes" of the internet.
At the Federal Communications Commission's meeting on Thursday to take the first step towards controversial new Open Internet rules, it seemed no one on either side of the political spectrum -- inside or outside of the building -- was entirely satisfied by the proposal. Nevertheless, the FCC voted to advance the process of adopting new rules that may drastically reshape the way the Internet works.
