Updates to this story
Verizon is reportedly close to tying up a deal with Google, which it claims could bring an end to net neutrality, a source has told the Associated Press.
If the the deal, which has been discussed for around 10 months, goes ahead it will mean that Verizon and potentially other companies will be able to decide the order and the speed of which online content is delivered to wireless and broadband users.
According to the source, the deal will form the basis of new legislation and will be supported by the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which has long been it talks with major internet companies and mobile and broadband service providers on deciding the future of online media content.
The deal would work by giving some customers priority traffic. For example, according to The Guardian, YouTube, owned by Google, would pay a charge to an internet service provider (ISP) in return for its content being fast-tracked to consumers.
The catch is, internet users would have to pay more for premium services from ISPs looking to make a profit on expensive investments in broadband networks.
Speaking at the same press conference, where he announced the closing of Google's Wave service, Eric Schmidt, Google chairman and chief executive, said: "I don't want to announce things we haven't announced yet.
"We have been talking to Verizon for a long time about trying to get an agreement on what the definition of net neutrality is."
He said people got confused over the term "net neutrality" and wanted to makes sure that everyone understood what it meant - through the Google Gospel, of course:
"What we mean is that if you have one data type, like video, you don't discriminate against one person's video in favour of another. It's OK to discriminate across different types...There is general agreement with Verizon and Google on this issue. The issues of wireless versus wireline get very messy...and that's really an FCC issue not a Google issue."
*Update Cub tech reporter Josh Halliday at The Guardian has said that, after talking to Google, it says reports are "Quite simply wrong".
"Net Neutrality" has been bandied about by every Tom, Dick and Sally, politician and pundit, as being the very thing that it is in fact the opposite of, and vice-versa twice before.
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Julius Genachowski, the FCC chair, is seeking to adopt guidelines that would ensure telecoms companies provide equal treatment of traffic travelling over the networks.
A deal between Google and Verizon could severely undermine FCC attempts at settling the issue.
Google has consistently expressed a desire to keep "an open internet". In a statement submitted to the FCC hearing earlier this year, the company laid down its support for "a non-discrimination principle that bans prioritising internet traffic based on the ownership (the who), the source (the what) of the content or application".
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Schmidt's statement that is "OK to discriminate against different types..." ((the what) of the content or application), seems to me a reversal of the little guy's fortunes. And we have one more apologetic statesmen of a compromising kind, Such as: "What d'ye call him--Thing'em-bob, and likewise--Never-mind, and 'St--'st--'st-- and What's-his-name, and also You-know-who--
The task of filling up the banks I'd rather leave to you."
Windows 7 allows the man to take ownership (with apologies to The Who).
So now your ISP says that the expensive broadband service that you've contracted with them will be augmented with fiddle-dee-Fee if you 'Cl-- 'cli--' 'cuss' on a link for downloading Zip files, RAR, r-r-R-r, MPEG-4, 'ST-- 'STREE streaming audio video + world + dog; and expect to do it without stuttering.
And it's OK, you see, because we're all in this together, keeping up with the Jones', and you better get yours in to us as soon as Bob's your mother.
Now don't you get snarky with us, Mr. Starkey! or your ringo will never work in this town again! We told you about the fool on the hill, he's living there still and well here's another place you little people can go Where everthing flows.
All you audiophiles are alike!
Data is data, frak the bloody telcos, if they fear traffic so much cap and price accordingly (as disgusting it may sound) but claiming that if I want to use VOIP I have to pay 30% more because that is the old business model of a telco is a form of extortion.
And while I understand why Google is doing this (net neutrality support basically is DOA in congress, plus the FCC had its initiative killed by a corporate judge) the 180 is shameful, pretty much is like saying "yeah, we wanted net neutrality but short of that we'll settle for priority for _our_ content".
This is the dawn of all out corporatism, and now I wonder if like Mussolini's version the camps will soon follow...