What’s New with Wu

While I’ve long been sympathetic to the idea of MuniWiFi projects, today in Slate I write about why they aren’t working.

In the paper Wireless Carterfone I highlighted a policy that seem destined to get Verizon in trouble: its practice of deciding who gets to send mass text messages. The policy sets Verizon up for obvious violations of Net Neutrality.

Reality caught up as Verizon is now facing criticism for blocking mass text messages from NARA, Pro-Choice America, who Verizon’s policy blocked as too controversial.

This is a test case for what common carriage and net neutrality are all about. It shows the link between net neutrality and free speech: what we see here is a problem of private discrimination, not public. That’s not a concern for the First Amendment, but it has been a concern met with by rules of common carriage –

Declan McCullough, my friend and sometimes mentor in photography, has a recent story called

 TEN THINGS THAT KILLED NETWORK NEUTRALITY

While I appreciate Declan’s taste for drama, the premise of the story is completely false.  Declan seems to believe that, if there aren’t people marching on the streets, and if the rules aren’t being broken, that “Net Neutrality” is dead.

The truth is that AT&T is currently operating under Net Neutrality rules — and in effect, the whole industry has been abiding by net neutrality rules for the entire last year.

That’s why there’s no protests - the carriers aren’t misbehaving — though recent shut-offs by the cable companies may be a problem.

This example may make it clearer.  Say that, for some reason, everyone began obeying the speed limits.  Declan might say “the speed limits are dead” because no one is enforcing the law.  But the better view is that the rule isn’t being violated.

There are a mix of de facto and de jure net neutrality rules in this country that are currently being obeyed. The reason that there’s no protests is because, in effect, the net neutrality advocates won.