True to its word, Comcast has indeed backed off from throttling Bit Torrent traffic, as new data from Measurement Lab demonstrates. Three years ago, the company interfered with about half of all Bit Torrent traffic on its networks. Today, that number is down to 3%.

This type of network traffic management is apparently much more common in Canada, where most major ISPs do it, sometimes blocking as much as 78% of the traffic, which is far more than Comcast was ever caught doing. In Britain, things are a bit more mixed. BT Group throttled about 27% of Bit Torrent traffic, while another big ISP, BSkyB, only blocked 3% of it.

ISPs in France and Sweden allow their customers to exchange files via Bit Torrent without limitations.

The compete data set, complete with interactive charts is available for your curious perusal here.

Cellular data usage has become subject of contention among consumers, carriers and federal regulators. Consumers want more data with less restrictions at manageable prices. The carriers want the opposite. The federal government is left to balance consumers' rights with spectrum allocation, bandwidth requirements, net neutrality and mergers that may disrupt the ecosystem.

There are a lot of balls in the air. It is likely that there will not be any type of compromise between the interests of these groups any time soon. Carriers are starting to set bandwidth limits into their data plans and throttling users who exceed those limits. The data plan needs to evolve.

15 Facts About Net Neutrality [Infographic]

AT&T + T-Mobile - The DOJ's Case for Almost-Not-Quite-Price-Fixing

U.S. Sues to Block AT&T Acquisition of T-Mobile Over Antitrust Concerns

AT&T Buying T-Mobile for $39 Billion

Lawmakers Take Their First Whack at AT&T/T-Mobile Merger

Hulu's Sale Could Have Big Implications On the Future of the Web

AT&T to Start Data Throttling, How Will It Affect Users?

In Preparation for the iPhone, Verizon Plans to Throttle Its Heaviest Data Users

Scenario: Families' Data Plan Headache

Imagine that you are a parent trying to balance your budget. You have a teenage son and daughter (let's call them twins for sake of argument) and the family is fairly well off, perhaps upper middle class. There is money, it just needs to be managed between the mortgage, old school loans, the car, household utilities and the ever growing web of data plans for every member of the families devices.

Mom and Dad both have smartphones and some type of tablet on a data plan. That is four data plans between them. Then, let's say each of the twins has a smartphone and they share a tablet. That is seven data plans for a four-person family ranging from $15 to $30 per device. That is not outrageous for a well-off family in a connected world, especially as smartphones and tablets continue to penetrate the market.

But every member of the family does not use their devices the same way. For instance, Mom uses a lot of data because she travels a lot for business and likes to download and stream movies and upload pictures. Dad uploads the occasional picture but really uses his devices mostly for email and checking up on the news. Between them, the twins use a fair amount of data between social networking, pictures and watching short videos. Mom often exceeds her data limits while Dad comes nowhere near his. The twins come close to their monthly data allotments, sometimes under or over. Regardless of the usage, the family is paying each month for those seven data plans.

Carriers Want To Increase ARPU

The carriers like it like this because the average revenue per user is high. Yet, it drives Mom and Dad crazy because they have to manage all these disparate bills and the fact that they are not reaching maximum return on investment for data not used. It is confusing and expensive.

This is a system that needs to change. One way to do it would be to block a set amount of data for the entire family that can be used between every device, with unused data rolled over into the next billing cycle.

In this scenario, there is one data plan for the seven devices. Let's call it 15 GB per month, slightly less than 2.5 GB per month per device, which is basically what the average data plan between Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile is currently, with fluctuations between each carrier. That 15 GB can be allocated to the family as a block and spread between the devices. One plan, one bill, less headaches. There will be months where Mom is not traveling and streaming as much content and the family will come in well below that number. Or perhaps they go over on a month. The family should not be throttled or forced to pay for extra data depending on the circumstances of the month if they have unused data from another month.

The carriers will hate this. Data is the new version of text messaging, which was the new version of voice minutes. It is the cash cow for carriers because they can set the plans and rates in such a way to maximize ARPU. The last thing that the carriers want to be are "pipes" that are just conduits for data usage through block data plans.

Content and The Pipe: What The Carriers Want

The carriers want to grow their networks. That means they want more users with more data plans on faster networks that handle data flow better. That is what is happening as smart devices proliferate and "4G" such as LTE comes to maturation. The more user that have data plans on multiple devices and the more efficient the network itself becomes, the higher the margins for the carriers.

Yet, the carriers are in a fight over content, ostensibly the source of data usage. When a user streams a Netflix movie over their iPad and stay within their data limits, the carrier does not make any more from that user. From the carrier's perspective, they are just the "dumb pipe" that delivers the over-the-top content. In their minds, that is unacceptable.

That is why you are seeing more carriers trying to throttle usage while also setting up their own content delivery networks. AT&T's U-Verse is a prime example. If the carriers can make money both from the data being used and the content going over the network, they are making money on the same data flow twice. In a blocked data plan scenario, this would be less lucrative.

Regulators Sticky Issues

The AT&T-T-Mobile merger puts a lot of this in to perspective. The Department of Justice thinks that if the merger goes through, the three remaining major carriers can do just about anything they want. Seven data plans for a family of four? Certainly! Let's charge more for every GB they use and then throttle them or make them pay more if they go over. The DOJ thinks that the carriers could collude to increase prices without actually intentionally doing so. All it takes is for one carrier to start increasing data prices and the others will follow, calling it "industry standard pricing."

But what if T-Mobile were to stay free? To compete with the bigger companies, they institute data blocking plans with rollover of unused GBs per month. That is precisely the type of competitive practice the DOJ thinks will be inhibited in a three-carrier ecosystem.

Change Will Come For The Carriers ... Eventually

Regardless of whether or not the AT&T-T-Mobile merger is approved, data plans are going to change in the future. The carriers are going to try and squeeze as much revenue as they can from each user, until they face a backlash from both consumers and the government.

It is probably inevitable that the carriers are going to be caught between regulators and users and be forced to change data plans to something that is more consumer friendly. Yet, the next several years will see data plans become more expensive, overage and throttling more frequent and consumers feeling the strain.

At the eG8, 20th century ideas clashed with the 21st century economy. The inaugural eG8 forum, held in Paris before the G-8 summit of global leaders, showed that online innovation and freedom of expression still need strong defenders. As Nancy Scola reported at techPresident, at the eG8, civil society groups re-staked their claim to the 'Net.

Prior to the forum, organizations concerned with human rights, liberties and civil society released a statement to the eG8 and G8 that advocated "expanding Internet access for all, combating digital censorship and surveillance, limiting online intermediary liability, and upholding principles of net neutrality."

[EN] La société civile s'en va t'en guerre à l' e-G8 from OWNI on Vimeo.

After the press conference, I talked further with Benkler about the eG8 forum and what the ideas and policies discussed there could mean for citizens. What's at stake for the open Internet today?

It's "what's been at stake for over 15 years: the possibility that a coalition of forces who are afraid of the internet will shut it down," said Benkler. "There is still a very powerful counter argument, one that says both for innovation and for freedom, we need an open Net. Both for growth and welfare, and for democracy and participation, we need to make sure that the Internet remains an open Internet, remains a commons we all share, remains neutral at all layers, the physical layer, at the logical layer, at the data layer, at the content layer - at all of these layers, we must have an open Internet.

"That's still very strong, but it seems more threatened today than it has been for five or six years. We seem to be closer to the risk we were at in the late 90s, than the risk we were at five years ago."

To what extent do politicians need to understand the relationship of politics and an open Internet? "The primary reason we need to support the Net is because it is a foundational part of how we have our democracy," he said.

What's changed? Why is this conversation happening in Paris? "The first critical thing is the shift to mobile broadband and the possibility that in that shift the primary way we will use the net will be one that comes from the tradition of controlled networks," he said. Benkler offers much more reflection in the video embedded below, and comments further on the Arab Spring, Wikileaks and open speech, the threat of cyber security and the forces that are influencing the discussion around Internet policy.

How have economic models shifted from 20th century approaches to capturing value from content to 21st century frameworks? Below is Benkler's answer from the eG8 press conference. For much more, read his seminal book, "Wealth of Networks."

"The critical change produced by the digital network environment is the radical decentralization of the capacity to speak, to create, to innovate, to see together, to socialize, the radical distribution of the poor means of production, computations, communications, storage, sensing, capture human sociality that which gets us together inside the experience, being there on the ground.

"That is true for the first time since the industrial revolution, that people can actually, with the things they own, capture the world and do something that is at the very core of the most advanced economies. Preserving that framework, preserving a framework that is open, free-flowing, flexible, adaptive to change and inviting so that one person's sacrifice in Sidi Bouzid can then be translated throughout the Arab world into a moment of mobilization. That's new, that's what is critical. For over fifteen years now, we have seen two opposing camps around the question of internet policy.

"One camp is the camp of the 20th century incumbents, who are afraid that something will change, who are afraid of the people rising to participate, afraid of the outsiders innovating, and coming from the edges, who aren't authorized by the incumbents to innovate, who don't have to come and say: 'Will you please implement this for me on your network?."

"These are all the companies that we see now as great fifteen years ago, were from the outside. That's where the source of innovation is. And the other model has been 'Let's keep things open, let's keep things flexible, let's keep things flow.' And this opposition between those who say "It's going too fast, slow it down, make it manageable, make it safe' and those who say "It's extraordinary, it's creative, let's open this up, because we're in a process of continuous experimentation, and adaptation, and learning."

"This is an enormous learning moment. That opposition has been there for fifteen years, and occasionally we've seen periods such as in the United States twelve years ago where the approach of shutting things down, making Internet Service Providers have to look upon of what it is that the content of their producers, regulating on software, regulating new services to make sure that they don't make too much of a threat to the incumbent industries win.

"Then there was a long period of lolling in between where we understood the centrality of the commons, where we understood the centrality of what's open, and now what is baffling about this two days is the seeming resurgence of what we saw ten, twelve, fifteen years ago as though we had learned nothing.

"When people yesterday on the panel on IP were talking about if we don't have strong intellectual property the Internet will be just an empty set of tubes and boxes, I heard that fifteen years ago, and maybe, maybe then it was a plausible assumption. Today, it is laughable, except that it seems to have the ear of power. So, I think that what's critical here, is to understand is that there are pathways, like the Hargreaves Report from last week shows a pathway that says: No! I don't have to lock things down, I have to be very careful about locking things down for IP; instead I need to explore ways to open and allow flows. That's the critical opposition.

"Achieving socially desirable and acceptable and legitimate goals while retaining an open fluid free Internet. Versus, being so scared of the new, that you are willing to lock it down, or to try to lock it down and to distort it. That's the opposition on which we all have to be - whether it's about business, and innovation, about social equality and access, or about democracy and participation, whether it's about liberty, equality or fraternity - we all have to be on the same side of the path of retaining an open net."

At the end of the day, did the eG8 matter?

"This conference could matter if the message continues to be as tightly scripted as the organizers seem to make it, and that gets converted into an alignment between the G8, between the various players who are afraid of different kinds of threats from an open Internet," he said.

"My intuition is, my hope, is that there's been enough of a voicing of an opposition, that that core claim that there's consensus, that we need to civilize or slow down or calm the Net, or make it more compliant, that that is very far from the consensus, and if that comes out of this conference, and if that influences that actual debate that says, you know what, the political risk of going to a closed Internet is too great, then it shall have been a useful conference. Otherwise, it's a really threatening one."

Photo by mikiane

Now we live in a different world, a post-Cold War information age. Power used to hinge in large part over who had the biggest bomb stockpile. In the future it may be a question of whose voice and content gets delivered through the tubes. If this deal goes through, the many tubes that belong to Comcast will have a vested interest in getting NBC content to customers fast. Other content, not as much. Into that breach may come legislation. The openness of the Web will be hotly debated.

They excerpt the following from the public statement of the one dissenter in the four to one FCC vote to approve the deal, senior Democratic commissioner, Michael J. Copps.

"[It] confers too much power in one company's hands...The Comcast-NBCU joint venture opens the door to the cable-ization of the open Internet. The potential for walled gardens, toll booths, content prioritization, access fees to reach end users, and a stake in the heart of independent content production is now very real."

The FCC has imposed a list of conditions on the deal that are intended to prevent that from happening, as well as compensate society for our trouble through steps like providing increased connectivity to underserved communities and more Spanish language programming. It seems like an interesting admission that this deal is risky for the interests of the rest of us that these kinds of conditions are included!

What do you think about the Telecom Industrial Complex buying the old peacock?

This could be a key move in the struggle over network neutrality or tiered pricing by content type.

"is that users can browse Facebook all day long and could click on any YouTube links to see the video. But if they click on a link to another video service, users can visit the site but won't be able to view the video. Facebook videos are also likely blocked as are streaming music services such as Pandora. [MetroPCS spokesperson Drew Crowell] said YouTube doesn't have a special relationship with MetroPCS. It was just one of the most popular multimedia sites among MetroPCS consumers so the carrier decided to allow unlimited access to it."

Does that sound fair to you? I must confess, when Google and Verizon made a joint announcement this Summer about Net Neutrality and excluded wireless from their support of it, I didn't think it unreasonable. (I was nearly alone in this, too, I think.)

I think I may have been wrong. Seeing a wireless network put tiered pricing into play makes me feel pretty ill. For some silly reason, I didn't think they would really do it. The prospect of paying $40 per month for mobile data access and only being allowed to view online video or listen to online audio from a selected list of sources is just repugnant though, isn't it?

Here's how GigaOm's Ryan Kim puts it:

These new plans, if they're allowed to stand, show us what the future of mobile broadband will look like if operators have their way. It could be a frustrating experience for users, recreating a walled garden. It's not surprising that MetroPCS is trying to push this agenda. Most operators would stand to gain a lot if they can get this type of plan to fly. Eventually, I expect MetroPCS won't be the only operator looking to lay down new toll layers atop the mobile Internet.

Related: British Telecom is working on something very similar, called Content Connect.

Under the rules, two years in the making, no provider may block another company's traffic, however, it may offer "faster" access to companies willing to pay more.

1) Transparency. Consumers and innovators have a right to know the basic performance characteristics of their Internet access and how their network is being managed.

2) No Blocking. A right to send and receive lawful traffic. This prohibits blocking of lawful content, apps, services, and the connection of non-harmful devices to the network

3) Level Playing Field. A right to a level playing field. A ban on unreasonable discrimination. No approval for so-called "pay for priority" arrangements involving fast lanes for some companies but not others.

4) Network Management. An allowance for broadband providers to engage in reasonable network management. These rules don't forbid providers from offering subscribers tiers of service or charging based on bandwidth consumed.

5) Mobile. Broadly applicable rules requiring transparency for mobile broadband providers, and prohibiting them from blocking websites and certain competitive applications.

6) Vigilance. Creation of an Open Internet Advisory Committee to assist the Commission in monitoring the state of Internet openness and the effects of our rules.

Politico notes the new rules ensure that "[t]raditional wired broadband providers may not unreasonably discriminate against any lawful traffic, though no such rule will be put in place for wireless providers."

On the one hand, those who believe companies have a right to govern how they offer their products to consumers may find this freedom to have been abridged by a government too eager to make new rules. On the other hand are those who see the two-tiered pricing structure as a de facto way to block unwanted traffic by increasing the efficiency of its competitors or simply by making it so slow in relationship to "premium" traffic that it cannot stay in business.

Both the concept of unreasonableness and the wireless exception may be seen by some as loopholes big enough to drive a truck through.

In April a lower court put aside an FCC ruling based on an "informal" attempt to promote net neutrality. It was hoped by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski (and the Democratic commissioners who voted with him) that this would be a light touch, net neutral for the most part and enforceable.

Regardless, it seems unlikely that a minute will pass after the first FCC action on this order before either the access or the content people file their first motions.

Read more ReadWriteWeb coverage of net neutrality.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski spoke briefly this morning at the agency's headquarters, outlining the proposal. He did not call for a reclassification of broadband as a regulated, common-carrier service, as was proposed earlier this year - something that would have certainly given the FCC jurisdiction over this area. However, calling net neutrality an "important milestone in our effort to protect Internet freedom and openness," Genachowski argued that the FCC's draft order would help consumers, entrepreneurs, and broadband providers.

In outlining the proposal, Genachowski touted three things:

1. Meaningful transparency: Consumers and innovators have a right to know basic information about broadband service, like how networks are being managed.
2. Prohibition of blocking "lawful content": "The proposed framework would prohibit the blocking of lawful content, apps, services, and the connection of non-harmful devices to the network," said Genachowski.
3. A level playing field: "No central authority, public or private, should have the power to pick which ideas or companies win or lose on the Internet; that's the role of the market and the marketplace of ideas. And so the proposed framework includes a bar on unreasonable discrimination in transmitting lawful network traffic."
4. Meaning flexibility: Broadband providers should be able to "manage their networks -- for example, to deal with traffic that's harmful to the network or unwanted by users, and to address the effects of congestion.

Although Genachowski may have the votes to get the proposal passed by the FCC, the proposal will likely face opposition from members of Congress who see this move as falling outside FCC jurisdiction. And these rules may also fail to satisfy net neutrality proponents either, who note that the principles listed above apply only to wired networks.

Also on the agenda for the December Meeting, a Notice of Inquiry seeking public input on how to transition the voice-only 911 system to include new communication tools, including text, photo and video capabilities.

This move could allow sites to pay ISPs to ensure that their content gets priority, making it very hard, for example, for new companies to compete with the deeper pockets of more established businesses, the latter of whom would have websites that were faster and more responsive.

But in his speech, Valzey argued that a "lightly regulated Internet is good for business, good for the economy, and good for people." He argued that ISPs already manage traffic and that there has been no "evidence of any impact either on competition or consumers from traffic management."

But the Guardian quotes Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group, as warning that "Removing net neutrality is likely to reduce innovation and reduce people's ability to exercise their freedom of speech."

The Guardian also notes, in an op-ed, that net neutrality has not been a major issue in the UK, but today's comments from Valzey may change that.

Speaking at the Web 2.0 Summit today, the U.S. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski reiterated his support for net neutrality, arguing that its existence helps to "maximize innovation and investment." But clear policies on net neutrality still faces an uphill battle in the U.S.

Photo credits: Flickr

Of course, statements about net neutrality's death hardly seem new. Its demise has been predicted for months, particularly after a Federal Appeals Court's decision this spring challenged the FCC's authority to stop Comcast from throttling P2P traffic.

Some analysis following last week's election has tried frame the Democrats' loss, in part, as a referendum on net neutrality, with Verizon going so far as tweeting that every Democratic candidate that supported the PCCC's net neutrality pledge lost their election.

But as Techdirt's Mike Masnick counters, these particular candidates were not incumbents and were largely running in Republican strongholds. Furthermore, some Democrats who signed anti-net neutrality pledges also lost their election bids. "Sorry," says Masnick, "net neutrality simply was not an important issue in this year's election." Rather, there were plenty of other reasons why Democratic candidates lost seats. ("It's the economy, stupid.")

If Congress Won't Do Anything about Net Neutrality, Will the FCC?

Regardless, net neutrality does remain an important issue. And while the Republicans will control Congress, Democrats do still hold a majority of FCC seats. "The ball is clearly in the FCC's court now," said Art Brodsky, communications director for Public Knowledge, a digital rights group supporting new net neutrality rules, in an interview with Computerworld. However, when the FCC published the agenda for its November Open Meeting, discussions of net neutrality did not make the docket.

So with or without the support of Congress, it remains to be seen whether the FCC will move forward to address net neutrality, or whether it will simply focus its efforts on its National Broadband Plan, something that seems less contentious and that has more bipartisan support.

It will be interesting to see in what ways how the recommendations from the Information Technology Industry Council will differ from the "policy framework" put forth by Verizon and Google last month that reaffirmed basic principles of an indiscriminate wireline Internet but made an exception for wireless.

Weighted toward a neutral Internet

Based on the ITIC's member list, we're expecting its proposal to be more - ahem - in the corporate interest than the one put forth by Google and Verizon, which at least called for enforceable neutrality rules. But there are a few companies in the group that could push the recommendations the other way.

ITIC includes cell phone handset makers Nokia and Research in Motion, which have an interest in a less-regulated wireless Internet, and Cisco Systems, which is likely to vote the same way due to its stake in networks that support wireless connections for objects and devices. Both companies signed a letter last year saying formal net neutrality regulations punish innovators, kill jobs and are generally more trouble than they're worth.

The group also includes Apple, which has an established fondness for restricted channels. Another member is Microsoft, which last year told the FCC that broadband access providers should be able to offer tiered services, as long as the market is competitive. "The adoption of unnecessary or insufficiently tailored regulations, such as a prohibition on all types of discrimination, could have 'the unintended consequence of limiting innovation and investment going forward,'" Microsoft wrote in a filing, citing the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.

The group also includes infrastructure owners Qualcomm, Intel and Ericsson.

Skype, eBay may push things the other way

But there are a few more populist companies in the group. eBay has supported legislation in the past that would prohibit network operators from "replacing the robust open Internet with 'Pay to Play' private networks that will force out and discriminate against content and service providers that refuse to pay new tolls."

Another member, Skype, has been called "one of the loudest voices for net neutrality from within the high-tech industry," advocating for rules that ensure users can get access to whatever content and services they want on the Web, unfettered.

Lobbyists for ITIC started developing their own recommendations after talks between the FCC and the industry stalled and Google and Verizon released their proposal.

What do you think? Will ITIC's recommendations end up being better for users than Google/Verizon's recommendations - or worse?

[Source: Online MBA Programs]

It is important for an American audience to understand that we have nothing like the First Amendment in France, and that freedom of speech is not granted in every circumstance; any kind of hate speech, for example, is illegal. Applying censorship to the Web to make it compliant with French laws would eventually censor millions of websites (not to mention lead to blind copyright enforcement).

The recently leaked report is supposed to guide the UMP, the country's ruling party, but politics in France are very fuzzy right now when it comes to the Internet.

September will likely see the French Senate approve the LOPPSI law, which allows for net censorship. Child pornography is ostensibly the target, just like in Australia, but it's already expanding to other kind of content, despite promises made by the State Secretary for Digital Economy made during the debate last January.

Other freedom-frightening bills could be on their way as well. UMP Senator Jean-Louis Masson is pushing for a piece of legislation that would make it mandatory for bloggers to register their identity before being allowed to express themselves online. UMP Senator Jean-René Lecerf wants new French ID cards to be embedded with a chip so that connecting to the Internet would be - according to his plan - impossible without proper identification.

Caught between democracy and the free market, the constitution is coming into direct conflict with the digital age. France is at a crossroads.

Net Neutrality and the 2012 Elections

Net neutrality's fate is now in the hands of a more progressive group of MPs who will start working on the bill in a few weeks. Lionel Tardy is among the very few in the right-wing UMP party who net citizens hold in high esteem; he strongly opposed the HADOPI law (which targets illegal file sharing) and understands the inner mechanics of the digital age. Hervé Mariton, who recently lead a working group on ethics and online interactions, has shown some interest in ideas coming from outside the anti net neutrality lobbies. Laure de la Raudière (right), who leads the group of MPs in charge of the upcoming net neutrality bill at the Assembly, is open to new ideas and also understand the Internet and its social impacts (a very rare characteristic among French politicians).

The French National Assembly, which used to follow whatever the government proposed during the HADOPI legislation, is now aware that the opposition among net citizens is very high.

Online publications such as Numerama and PCinpact, which strongly opposed the HADOPI law from day one, have seen a huge growth in their audience the last two years. The same goes for blogs like Korben.info and ReadWriteWeb France, which are also opposed to the death of net neutrality, and who have seen a significant increase in readership in the traditional journalism and political landscapes.

MPs now realize their own elections, which will take place in 2012, could be in jeopardy if they continue on the current path, and most Internet and political spin doctors (including former presidential counselors) admit that the way the government has handled Internet issues is catastrophic and could lead to a very serious problem during the 2012 presidential election year.

Will this be enough to prevent a digital civil war between a government that sees the Internet as its main source of problems and its netizens?

If net neutrality isn't dead yet, then free enterprise and innovation is hurting, and free speech - the American way - which has been enjoyed since the beginning of the Web 2.0 era by French netizens, will follow closely behind.

Lead photo by Taramisu; second photo D.R. Laure de la Raudière.

The September agenda is not available yet, but it's possible that the FCC might rule at the meeting to reclassify Internet communications under Title II "common carrier" regulations, which would give the FCC more authority to regulate free access and could mean stricter enforcement of net neutrality than would be allowed under alternative proposals such as the one Google and Verizon unveiled this week.

The talks broke down after Google and Verizon issued a proposal that received mixed reviews but many say is a step back for net neutrality. The companies' proposed legislative framework gives wireless Internet a pass, requiring only that wireless Internet providers be "transparent" about what traffic gets priority, and allows a loophole for "new services."

In 2002, the FCC classified cable, DSL, and other high-speed Internet services as "information services," subject to fewer regulations under Title I. In 2005, the agency issued a policy statement that said providers cannot restrict access to content, software or devices and users must be free to choose between providers. But a recent federal court ruling challenged the FCC's authority in enforcing those provisions, and the legality of restricted Internet access is now in question.

That question could be settled as soon as the agency's September meeting. But the issue is highly controversial and progress has been slow. In addition, members of Congress have been pressing the FCC to give them more time to consider and give their input on the issue.

[via Broadcasting & Cable]

Under the proposal, the General Accounting Office would report yearly to congress about how well it all is working. Verizon said the company was concerned that too many rules up front could infringe on its ability to optimize the network for performance, but that some rules are clearly needed and transparency is important. "There will be no prioritization of traffic from Google over the internet, period," Verizon's CEO Ivan Seidenberg said today. "No paid prioritization of traffic over the public internet."

On getting a return on investment in broadband: Verizon's Seidenberg said that Google has far more ideas about how to monetize and grow the public internet than Verizon had in its original understanding [of the internet, apparently].

Both companies are talking the innovation-talk, saying that fat, unfettered pipes will lead to more innovation that will make the pie bigger for everyone involved.

Press cynicism runs deep, though, and questions about loopholes and dark hidden intentions are still being asked. Probably rightly so, but executives on the call sound really annoyed that people are still looking for "conspiracy theories" while they believe they are offering good faith statements for the good of the internet.

There has been no mention yet of an internet browsing brain implant to be offered by either company. Wireless networks aren't included in the prohibitions, just wireline networks, though transparency would be required for all of the above. See Cecilia Kang's coverage at The Washington Post to read a perspective that says this is bad news. See also broadband expert Karl Bode's commentary on Twitter. Susan Crawford's analysis looks strong: that these two companies filled a vacuum that the FCC needs to step into and show leadership in. That sounds good, if you trust the FCC to do the right thing.

More analysis coming, the document is embedded below.

Verizon-Google Legislative Framework Proposal

Update: Google has denied that it is in talks with Verizon on its Google Public Policy Twitter account, saying "@NYTimes is wrong. We've not had any convos with VZN about paying for carriage of our traffic. We remain committed to an open internet." Verizon has also issued a statement saying the New York Times "is mistaken".

Net Neutrality is the concept that all information should be treated equally and delivered to consumers equally, disregarding content and source. So, whether you visit YouTube or the website for the local hardware store, information would be treated on equal footing and delivered the same. Net Neutrality has been under constant attack, with opponents of such regulation outspending proponents by more than four to one. This deal looks to go straight at the heart of that concept and this isn't the first time we've seen Google attempt such a deal.

According to the Times, a deal could be reached "as soon as next week" and Google would "agree not to challenge Verizon's ability to manage its broadband Ineternet as it pleased." Om Malik, founding editor of tech blog GigaOm, writes that news of such a deal should come as no surprise.

Google is trying to make Android a major player in the mobile world. One of the company's closest partners in this effort, in the U.S., is Verizon Wireless. It would therefore make sense that the two will come to some sort of an agreement.

What wouldn't make sense, however, would be how this supposed agreement would stand in contrast to Google's earlier pleas to the FCC to "keep the Internet open - and awesome!". In its plea, the company specifically says it supports "Adding a nondiscrimination principle that bans prioritizing Internet traffic based on the ownership (the who), the source (the what) of the content or application".

The Times points out that the agreement would only affect the two companies involved, as well as those using their services, but that "it could sway the opinions of lawmakers, many of whom have questioned the wisdom of the F.C.C.'s plans to oversee broadband service." The FCC is currently trying to regain its legal authority to enforce net neutrality by reclassifying broadband Internet services into the same category as telephone services, subjecting it to stricter regulation.