You are here Professor Wu, Father of Net Neutrality, calling for "law breaking" to advance net neutrality?
Submitted by Scott Cleland on Thu, 2008-03-13 10:42
Professor Tim Wu, who coined the term "net neutrality" is reportedly now advocating "law breaking" to advance the "information commons" agenda, which believes Internet infrastrructure, spectrum and content should be publicly owned and not privately owned.
- Communications Daily quoted Professor Wu on March 11, 2008:
- "To move things along, unlicensed users should start occupying unused spectrum for wireless broadband, Wu said: "You gotta start somewhere, and it always starts with law-breaking.""
- My experience is that Comm Daily is careful to accurately quote people and if Professor Wu did not to clarify his remarks, we can assume them to be accurate. I also have not seen a clarification of this after two more publications.
- I would also like to extend the courtesy to Professor Wu to be able to qualify his remarks that they were meant to be flippant, or a joke, or that he really didn't mean to call to publicly encourage people to break the law.
- He could resolve this issue with a simple blog post.
That said, it is very troubling to any public civility minded person who believes in the rule of law and respect for property, that such a prominent person as Professor Wu (who coined the term net neutrality, and who proposed Caterfone open access rules for the 700 MHz auction) would advocate "law-breaking" to advance his political agenda.
My simple question is do other net neutrality supporters condone Professor Wu's reported support for "law-breaking" to jumpstart the net neutrality open Internet agenda?
- Does the Open Internet Coalition, Google, eBay or Amazon,, which prominently displays Professor Wu's views condone his reported support of "law breakiing to advance the cause?"
- Does the Save The Internet Coalition, which lists Professor Wu as its #3 Charter member condone his reported support of "law breaking to advance the cause?"
- Does the National Christian Coalition, which supports net neutrality, condone stealing or disrespect for authority, as implied in his reported support of "law breaking" to advance the cause?"
- Do the other 45 prominent tech advisors who endorsed Senator Obama for President along with Professor Wu, condone Professor Wu's reported support of "law breaking" to advance a policy cause?
- Does the FCC, the nation's lead adjudicatory body for communications laws, which has followed some of Professor Wu's Carterfone advice and has heard his official net neutrality testimony before the FCC, condone or have concerns about Professor Wu's reported support of "law breaking" to advance his policy cause?
Bottomline: I believe it is important for Professor Wu to have the opportunity to qualify or distance himself from his reported support of "law breaking" to advance his policy proposals.
- A simple blog post by Professor Wu could quickly clarify and resolve this troubling development.
If Professor Wu does not repudiate advocating "law breaking" to advance his policy proposals, certainly other entities and individuals who respect the rule of law, and the constitutional deliberative process for making laws, would seek to distance themselves from appearing to advocate "law breaking" to advance a political cause.
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