About Scott Cleland
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You are hereDeregulationFCC rules no Net Neutrality for Broadband over PowerlinesSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Fri, 2006-11-03 15:23
Please also make note of Chairman Martin's clever use of the word "neutrality" in his statement:
Check out this great new analogy for why net neutrality is so off-base -- "food-neutrality"Submitted by Scott Cleland on Fri, 2006-11-03 13:25Every now an then someone comes up with a new great analogy that really helps us get to the heart of a matter. Canadian Mark Goldberg's telecom trends blog really hit the nail on the head in this post. Let's go right to his analogy:
Before I worked at Videotron, I was in the food business – we were a 'content producer' in the parlance of today's communications business. To reach our customers, we dealt with a distribution channel, in our case, grocery stores.
Diller's IAC unabashedly showcases their Net Neutrality competition double standardSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Thu, 2006-11-02 17:55Newsweek's article "Diller Weaves a Web" is a very clear example of the gross competition double standard that tech companies are pursuing in asking for a "non-discrimination" principle to only apply to competitive broadband companies but not to themselves.
Don't get me wrong, I don't have any trouble with IAC pursuing this business model.  I am only needling IAC for its bald, self-serving hypocrisy of seeking to get the government to protect them from potentially "discriminatory" competition so they can freely "discriminate" against the little guy website that ItsOurNet claims to be supporting. Let's look at an interesting quote from the Newsweek article: Google's self-serving "innovation without permission"Submitted by Scott Cleland on Wed, 2006-11-01 14:50Something that Alan Davidson, head of Google's Washington office, said at our NVTC net neutrality debate yesterday has been troubling me. He said Google believed in "innovation without permission." While "innovation without permission" may be a useful mantra in encouraging Google folks from not getting bureaucratic and to "think outside the box" -- it's very troubling because it seems it is their public policy too. I guess it means Google doesn't need any property owners' permission to innovate.
What a buzz kill to have to ASK for permission to innovate. Doesn't everyone understand that Google is just "liberating" that property for the common good and just earning a little commission along the way for their altruism? What's the harm in that? They are not "doing evil" are they? Net neutrality is an online fundraising ploy masequerading as public policySubmitted by Scott Cleland on Tue, 2006-10-31 18:16I launched the debate this morning at the NVTC forum on Net Neutrality with the following comment: "Net neutrality is an online fundraising ploy masequerading as public policy." It certainly focused the debate on the real reason why this issue has become so big so quickly. I pointed out that on substance it was a bogus issue. No substantiated problem or consumer harm and that all the substantive assertions made by net neutrality proponents have proven false. When the substance was so weak and the threat only theoretical, there had to be more going on. I focused on the dirty little secret that partially-motivated many net neutrality proponents --which is how super-productive it is for groups that want to raise money online to scare people that there are boogymen that want to take the Internet away from them. Net neutrality has clearly become one of the most efficient ways to "shake the money tree."  Alfred Kahn "A liberal Democrat's Caution on Net Neutrality"Submitted by Scott Cleland on Tue, 2006-10-31 17:45Attached is a link to Alfred Kahn's (of Airline deregulation fame) views on Net neutrality. Thanks to PFF for posting this gem. It's a very relevant read because Mr. Kahn considers himself: "a good liberal Democrat." He is also one of the most respected figures on the subject of regulation and de-regulation regardless of party or political persuasion. Here are a couple of good quotes:
If Noam's right that the future of Internet is telecom-like regulation -- everyone should be very afraidSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2006-10-30 14:07Read Eli Noam's recent FT editorial "TV regulation will become telecom regulation", becuase if he is right (and I don't think he is) you should be afraid for the future, very afraid. I have always respected Professor Noam of the Columbia Business School even if I often don't agree with him. He is a rare person who sees this complex space as a whole and has clarity of thought. His basic point is that TV regulation will become to resemble telecom regulation more are and more. He concludes that "the present debate over net neutrality is a harbinger of more to come."   Net neutrality's "moving goalpost" on competitionSubmitted by Scott Cleland on Mon, 2006-10-30 12:07I wanted to make sure folks did not miss a classic comment by a leading net neutrality proponent last week which shows their stubburn refusal to acknowledge the reality and "proof" of competition. In Communications Daily last week in the lead article on the AT&T-Bell South merger was the following quote:
Until competition can be proven? Hello? Gigi you are obviously ignoring all the existing proof and playing the Washington game of "moving the goalposts." Search Peeping: Does Google value protecting American's privacy?Submitted by Scott Cleland on Fri, 2006-10-27 16:36Robert Scoble of Naked Coversations fame (great book Robert! Thank you.) posted a very interesting 7 minute video of Google's Lobby on his widely read Scobleizer Blog:
After initial fascination like Scoble with reading real random searches as they were occurring, upon reflection I found it very troubling. Why its interesting is exactly why its troubling. It's interesting because none of us in the public domain ever get to see what anyone else is searching for at a specific point in time, because that is potentially very personal/private search information -- which I thought until now -- was supposed to be guarded as private information by Google. What's troubling is that if Google handles American's private information so cavalierly as to use it for perfomance art in public, what other private information are treating cavalierly that we don't know about? Is anyone else troubled that Google doesn't see anything wrong with "search peeping" or a public "search peep show?" What do privacy advocates think?
  Is Microsoft no longer a member of ItsOurNet? Trouble in paradise?Submitted by Scott Cleland on Thu, 2006-10-26 18:34What's going on at ItsOurNet? Google, eBay, Amazon, Yahoo are still listed, what happened to Microsoft which was one of the five big companies bankrolling the effort?
Could the organization be getting a little too radical, regulatory, government intrusive, or anti-market-forces for their taste? Pages |