The US Federal Communications Commission is hoping to strike a balance between the wants and needs of consumers and the desire for internet service providers (ISPs) to charge online companies unfixed rates for faster internet speeds.
The FCC will soon announce a hybrid legal strategy that will give the government agency more control of ISP pricing, according to numerous reports.
The new approach would treat certain aspects of the internet as a public utility, thus giving the government a role in determining how pricing and usage is managed. The proposal would separate internet activity into two entities: wholesale and retail transactions.
- On December 14, 2017, the US FCC (Federal Communications Commission) repealed net neutrality rules, sparking an outcry among startups, NGOs, but also the public in general, in the US or abroad. VPNs can actually allow you to get around Net Neutrality controls set by ISPs. Here is a list of the best VPN providers we've tested.
Wholesale and retail internet
Wholesale transactions, which The New York Times defines as “the exchange of data from the content provider to the Internet service provider for passage through to the end consumer,” (think Netflix streaming) would be heavily regulated, similar to how telephone service is managed.
What the government is hoping to regulate is the ability for ISPs to cherry-pick how they provide service to digital companies, and namely, how much they charge each service.
Simply put: the government wants ISPs like AT&T to offer content providers like Amazon the same rates it would offer Netflix or Hulu. ISPs want to control pricing without government intervention.
Retail transactions, as drafted in the proposal, are defined as internet service that ISPs send directly to consumers. These transactions would be more loosely regulated by the government.
- Broadband deals: find the cheapest internet plans
The legal battle
Although the proposal has yet to be announced, it is expected to be made public some time next month. Unfortunately, we might not get any resolution on the matter for some time - the last two proposals made by the FCC were overturned by federal courts. However, those proposals sought to treat the internet as one ecosystem, rather than as separate wholesale and retail entities.
Either way, look for ISPs to challenge whatever proposal the FCC makes as the battle continues to be waged in Washington.
HP launched a very promising ultra portable XPS13 killer laptop — the 1kg EliteBook 635 Aero G11 is only available in Japan with seemingly no plans for a global launch, but why?
Intel finally brings its latest laptop CPU tech to other platforms but desktop users are shunned — Meteor Lake-PS architecture fuses Core Ultra and LGA socket, targets edge systems instead
