Telecom Trends

I was having trouble understanding Michael Geist's article that appeared in various papers this past week [Toronto Star version, Geist web version].

On Wednesday, I pointed out the problem with his allegation that "many Canadian ISPs" are fiddling around with customers' traffic on the basis of the content.

I have read the article a few times and I was not sure if I understood the proposal. At first blush, it seemed that he is calling for a deeper level of deep packet inspection than anything employed by carriers today. He seemed to be proposing that, if traffic shaping is to become a fact of life, then ISPs should agree to give Canadian content a free pass to un-managed bandwidth as their "Internet equivalent of cultural funding."

As ISPs move toward tiered access that grants preferential treatment (such as faster speeds) to their own content or to premium content promoted by deep-pocketed interests, an equal opportunity approach to new media content would effectively bring Cancon into the Internet era by asking for nothing more than a fair shake.

The implementation of a regime that might need to examine all new media content for a Canadian content flag in order to be awarded 'safe passage' is of great concern and was the subject of some of the comments on his blog. So he provided a clarification by way of a reply comment:

I am an advocate of net neutrality and this is a call for net neutrality. The piece argues for the promotion of the Canadian content by treating all content equally.

So, there must have been a hidden meaning to the article.

With this clarification, he seems to be suggesting that net neutrality would be the solution to providing incentives to stimulate access to Canadian content, as if providing unfettered access to all content is enough of an incentive to promote Canadian content.

How does net neutrality provide a promotion of Canadian content?

Is the root of this proposal the unfounded presumption that any ISP is treating traffic differently on the basis of content?

Professor Geist will be speaking at the Public Policy Forum session on net neutrality in Ottawa next week. I suspect we will hear more about this proposal there.

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net neutrality, Michael Geist