Net neutrality bill offered in Maryland

Not content to wait for Congress to act, a group of Maryland state legislators is backing a smaller-scale attempt at putting a Net neutrality mandate in place.

Delegate Herman Taylor, a Democrat who represents a county just outside of Washington D.C., introduced House Bill 1069 on Feburary 9. As of Friday, more than 20 of his colleagues had signed on as co-sponsors.

Net neutrality is the divisive idea that network operators should not be allowed to prioritize any content or services that ride on their pipes.

Taylor's proposal, which would naturally apply only to broadband subscribers in his home state, stipulates that any provider who offers such services to the public "shall not provide or sell to internet content, application, or service providers, including any affiliate of a broadband company, any service that provides, degrades, or gives priority to any packet sources over that company's broadband Internet access service based on its source, ownership or destination."

That language closely resembles a concession made by AT&T in order to persuade Democratic Federal Communications Commission officials to sign off on its merger with BellSouth late last year. AT&T has since said, however, that it still opposes legislating such a requirement.

A hearing on the Maryland measure, which appears to be closely aligned with what Internet companies like Google and Amazon.com and consumer advocacy groups have sought on a federal level, is scheduled for later this month. It's sure to generate renewed resistance from telecommunications and cable companies, which argue they need the right to explore new business models in order to offset their expenses.

The bill's introduction was previously reported by the liberal blog MyDD and the advocacy group Public Knowledge, which supports federal Net neutrality legislation and called the state-level approach "refreshing."