Regulatory classification

A California network neutrality bill that could impose the toughest rules in the country is being resurrected. The bill was approved in its strongest form by the CA Senate, but it was then gutted by the State Assembly's Communications Committee, which approved the bill only after eliminating provisions opposed by AT&T and cable lobbyists. Bill author CA state Sen Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) has been negotiating with Communications Committee Chairman Miguel Santiago (D-Los Angeles) and other lawmakers since then, and he announced the results today.

Comcast's Xfinity Mobile service is imposing new speed limits on video watching and personal hotspot usage, and the company will start charging extra for high-definition video over the cellular network. Videos will be throttled to 480p (DVD quality) on all Comcast mobile plans unless you pay extra, while Comcast's "unlimited" plan will limit mobile hotspot speeds to 600kbps.

Network neutrality may be dead, but questions remain about how seriously the Federal Communications Commission considered comments from the public. "To put it simply, there is evidence in the FCC's files that fraud has occurred and the FCC is telling law enforcement and victims of identity theft that it is not going to help," FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said in Dec. "Failure to investigate this corrupted record undermines our process for seeking public input in the digital age."

Initially, Tim Berners-Lee’s innovation was intended to help scientists share data across a then-obscure platform called the Internet, a version of which the US government had been using since the 1960s. But owing to his decision to release the source code for free—to make the Web an open and democratic platform for all—his brainchild quickly took on a life of its own. Berners-Lee’s life changed irrevocably, too.

It is a true honor to have the chance to speak before members of the relatively new Cloud Communications Alliance....During times of change, an agency must refrain from subjecting new technologies to old regulatory structures.At a minimum, an agency should not act unless it is clear that the agency has authority, that there is evidence of a market failure warranting intervention, and that the benefits of acting outweigh the costs. Otherwise, regulators risk suppressing further entry, innovation, and investment.

Lawmakers seeking to reinstate network neutrality rules are still 46 signatures short of getting the House of Representatives to vote on the measure. A discharge petition needs 218 signatures to force a House vote and 218 votes would also be enough to pass the measure. So far, the petition has signatures from 172 representatives, all Democrats. That number hasn't changed in two weeks. "We're 46 [signatures] away from being able to force a vote on the resolution to restore the Open Internet Order," Sen Ed Markey (D-MA) said.

Gov Bill Walker (I-AK) said in a letter to Alaska lawmakers that he would not issue an executive order to implement network neutrality rules for internet service providers that contract with state agencies. Lawmakers tried in the last legislative session to preserve such rules at the state level, as the repeal of such rules goes into effect federally, but the effort failed.

Public Knowledge leads a group of public interest and racial justice allies in welcoming net neutrality advocates from across the United States to Washington (DC) for a “Day of Advocacy.” Volunteers plan to express how important net neutrality is to their lives, schools, and businesses and why Congress should support the Congressional Review Act resolution to reinstate the FCC’s strong net neutrality rules. More than 50 participants volunteered to share their stories in scheduled meetings with their representatives on Capitol Hill.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai swung through Boise (ID) to meet with healthcare professionals at the Veterans Affairs hospital. Chairman Pai discussed “tele-healthcare” with VA officials on the tail end of his tour that touched 30 states. While his visit was not related to network neutrality, Chairman Pai said both were in line with his overall vision for how to connect America. “By the FCC’s standards, some 30 to 34 million Americans, disproportionately rural, don’t have high quality access to the internet, and that is a big problem,” Chairman Pai said.

The New York State Supreme Court's appellate division has cleared the way for the state to continue pursuing a lawsuit against Charter Communications over broadband speed claims. The appellate court ruled that the FCC's 2015 Open Internet Order's transparency rules did not give the commission the power to preempt the state's lawsuit and said the state's claims are actionable.