The Senate Commerce Committee passed the Advanced Telecommunications and Opportunity Reform Act, after striking a controversial Net neutrality amendment from the legislation.The Senate Commerce Committee approved on Wednesday an all-encompassing telecommunications reform bill with a bi-partisan vote of 15-7.
The bill, which was initially introduced by Committee Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), has been renamed the Advanced Telecommunications and Opportunity Reform Act. It addresses a wide range of communications-related issues, including municipal broadband services, interoperability funding and video franchise reform.
As it is written, the legislation does not provide an "effective" policy on Internet neutrality, according to several senators, consumer advocate groups, and e-commerce corporations.
"Right now under current law, there's nothing to stop the phone and cable companies from striking a deal to offer high-speed access to a company like Google and refusing to provide any deal at all to a different company like Yahoo," said Jeanine Kenney, senior policy analyst for Consumer's Union. "There's not even a rule on the books that would prevent them from blocking Web sites."
Senators Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) proposed an amendment to the bill to "ensure fair treatment of all Internet content." The amendment incorporated the following non-discriminatory principle: "to promote broadband deployment, and presence and promote the open and interconnected nature of the Internet, a broadband service provider shall not discriminate Internet traffic based on source, ownership, or destination of such traffic as part of any publicly available Internet offering." It was defeated in the Committee with a tie vote of 11-to-11.
"My amendment is not a solution in search of a problem…almost every other industrialized nation has enshrined a non-discriminatory philosophy and we should as well to dissuade American innovators from moving abroad," Snowe said. "And there should be no mistake—as this is the 2nd time that Congress is comprehensively re-writing our nation's communications policy since it was first instituted in 1934, what we do will be transformational with implications that will reverberate for decades."
Though response to the defeat of Snowe's Net neutrality amendment was mixed, it did incur strong reactions from both sides of the political spectrum. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) announced Thursday that he has placed a "hold" on Stevens' legislation until it includes clear rules regarding non-discriminatory Internet access.
"As a United States Senator who has devoted himself to keeping the Internet free from discrimination, from discriminatory taxes, and regulations…I cannot stand by and allow the bill to proceed," Wyden said. "Therefore I object to any further action on this telecommunications bill until it includes strong Net neutrality provisions that will truly benefit consumers and small businesses."
However, groups like Netcompetition.org, a forum funded by major players in the broadband industry, disagree with the pro-Net neutrality notion. They maintain that Net neutrality seeks to change the status quo by imposing regulations, and that it protects major e-commerce players like Microsoft, Google, and eBay from competition with the communications industry.
"E-commerce giants want to compete in communications but don't want communications companies to compete with them," said Scott Cleland, chairman of Netcompetition.org. "Net neutrality isn't neutral; it's a form of corporate welfare for dot-com billionaires. Net neutrality would kill the goose that laid the golden egg, and the goose that laid the golden egg is competition."
Netcompetition.org was created as an e-forum to promote competitive choices for consumers through an open discussion and debate of Net-neutrality legislation and regulation, according to its Web site.
"Net neutrality was one of the founding principles of the Internet, and it was in place up until last August," said a spokesperson for Sen. Snowe. "I think it's naïve for people to think you can just take [it] away and everything will be fine. With [Sen. Snowe's] amendment, the offer to maintain Net neutrality was to maintain the status quo of the Internet as we know it."
As media coverage on the topic increases, awareness continues to grow and the general public is also jumping on the Net neutrality bandwagon.
"It's certainly one of the hottest issues in the blogosphere, and once consumers learn about this they immediately understand," Kenney said. "Anything can happen on the floor of the U.S. Senate, so this is far from over. One thing that is a certainty is this will be a major issue on the floor, and if not resolved, certainly has potential to stall the entire vast telecommunications bill."
Consumers Union, a non-profit information organization, says it has begun reaching out to consumers as well, urging them to contact members of Congress to voice their opinions on the issue. The group says it has already seen about 100,000 letters sent to senators on Capitol Hill.
"We consider the vote a procedural tie, but a huge political win," said Adam Green, communications director for MoveOn.org civic action. "It really shows the momentum Net neutrality has gained in the past couple of months as constituents all across the country called on members of Congress to support Net neutrality."
MoveOn.org Civic Action is a non-profit organization geared toward education and advocacy on important national issues.
Online Media 
