About Scott Cleland
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You are hereRegulationCritical Gaps in FCC’s Proposed Open Internet RegulationsSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2009-11-30 17:19Like the FCC’s National Broadband Plan task force identified seven critical gaps in the path to the future of universal broadband, the FCC should resolve six identified “critical gaps” in the FCC’s proposed Open Internet regulations before moving forward to regulate the Internet for the first time -- by dictating Internet access pricing, terms and conditions or dictating what services which businesses can and cannot offer on the Internet.
Credibility Gap: The FCC isn’t "preserving," but changing the Internet by regulating it for the first time. Kudos to ACI for its new book on "The Consequences of Net Neutrality Regulations"Submitted by Scott Cleland on Sat, 2009-11-21 18:01I commend The American Consumer Institute for their excellent new book of scholar essays, “The Consequences of Net Neutrality Regulations on Broadband Investment and Consumer Welfare.”
The net neutrality/open Internet debate needs more of this kind and quality of substantive professional analysis. Debunking the Rewrite of Internet Privatization HistorySubmitted by Scott Cleland on Wed, 2009-11-18 15:54To help the neutralism movement de-privatize the Internet and transform broadband providers into quasi-public-utilities, some attempt to rewrite the long and very bipartisan history of Internet privatization as a partisan history, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Is FCC Declaring 'Open Season' on Internet Freedom?Submitted by Scott Cleland on Tue, 2009-11-17 12:56The piece below ran on BigGovernment.com today. (One-page version here.)
Is FCC Declaring 'Open Season' on Internet Freedom?
The FCC, in proposing to change the definition of an “open Internet” from competition-driven to government-driven is setting a very dangerous precedent, that it is acceptable for countries to preemptively regulate the Internet for what might happen in the future, even if they lack the legitimacy of constitutional or legal authority to do so, or even if there is the thinnest of justification or evidence to support it.
Any FCC Reliance on Harvard Study Would Damage the National Broadband Plan's CredibilitySubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2009-11-16 22:32The FCC's non-competitive-bid, sole source contract with the Harvard Berkman Center to "conduct an independent review of broadband studies to assist the FCC" with the National Broadband Plan -- appears to have been a near complete bust.
A summary of some of the critical flaws/errors of the Harvard Berkman study follow: NTT-Japan commented that the Berkman study was "seriously in error." Specifically NTT said: "First, facilities based competition, not unbundling, has been the key to broadband growth in Japan." ... "Second, the report mistates the importance of 'government-subsidized loans' to the success of broadband deployment in Japan." ... "Third, the Berkman Center's draft study is internally contradictory." Phoenix' Ford Skewers Harvard Berkman CompetenceSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Thu, 2009-11-12 16:07Anyone who cares about the competence of the studies the FCC has commissioned/outsourced to produce the FCC's National Broadband Plan, needs to read George Ford's devastating critique of the economic literacy of Harvard Professor Benkler's broadband survey for the FCC. In a nutshell, the econometric analysis Professor Benkler relied on would have earned a failing grade in any Harvard economics class, because the supply curve slopes in the wrong direction. Oops! To be fair, Professor Benkler is a law Professor not an economist, but even an undergrad economics 101 student could have caught the fatal flaw in the analysis Professor Benkler relies upon. The FCC should insist that Harvard employ competent reviewers to ensure that the basic information and analysis provided to the FCC is at least minimally competent in the disciplines covered by the survey.
FCC Unintended Consequences Could Lobotomize the InternetSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Wed, 2009-11-11 19:35George Ou has a great new post -- "FCC NPRM ban on paid peering harms new innovators" -- that should be humbling and give some serious pause to the FCC and those pushing its proposed Open Internet regulations. The Internet's complex ganglia of technologies, networks, agreements, standards, incentives, collaborations, contracts, innovations, relationships, safeguards, protections, economics, etc. -- approaches the complexity of a brain.
What is really scary is apparently how little regulatory humility there is on the subject of the Internet or appreciation that good intentions could easily become serious unintended consequences.
Net Neutrality is a Made-Up Issue: The Smoking GunSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2009-11-09 12:03To see "smoking gun" proof that "net neutrality" is a made-up issue and argument, read the short but telling excerpt below from George Lakoff's Book: "Thinking Points" published October 3, 2006, when the only net neutrality incident at that time was the FCC's Consent Decree with rural telco, Madison River Communications in February 2005. From Thinking Points, Chapter 8, The Art of Arguments:
"Thus, the argument for Net neutrality becomes an argument for government regulation in this form by the FCC. "Open" Internet = benefit without cost for "Piggy-backer" GoogleSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2009-11-02 13:21As the lead bankroller of the "open Internet" slogan that the FCC now proposes to adopt as new U.S. policy without Congressional authorization, Google knows what an "open Internet" is supposed to mean: Google gets the benefits of the Internet without its costs. Google Voice's Plea for Special FCC TreatmentSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Thu, 2009-10-29 09:51Google responded to the FCC's questions that effectively address whether or not Google Voice should be subject to the FCC's proposed net neutrality regulations. In a nutshell, Google basically asserted that it is acceptable for a benevolent provider of free services like Google Claus to discriminate and block calls as an information service voice provider, but it is unaccceptable for profit-seeking broadband voice and information service providers to discriminate or block calls. Pages |