Newsmaker: Verizon says Net neutrality is overhyped

Verizon Communications' chief technology officer, Mark Wegleitner, often gets asked about his company's aggressive plans to deploy a high-speed fiber optic network to the doorstep of millions of Americans.

But it's not every day that he fields questions on hot political issues--particularly when it comes to the argument that the Internet should be kept open with little to no interference from network operators, a subject summed up under the rubric of Net neutrality.

As Congress looks at reforming the Telecommunications Act of 2006, supporters of Net neutrality are pushing for a new law restricting phone companies and cable operators from creating special tiers of service that favor one company's traffic over another. The debate has reached a fever pitch in Washington, D.C. In fact, some interest groups claim that without a Net neutrality law, the Internet could wind up dead.

We don't have any desire to create any shortages of bandwidth.

The hot button issue has divided the technology community in two. Content providers such as Google and Yahoo are lined up against the former Bell phone companies and infrastructure equipment makers, such as Cisco Systems. So far, much of the debate has focused on speculation that the phone companies won't continue to play nice with application providers running traffic over their networks.

Wegleitner sat down with CNET News.com to answer some questions and address concerns from Net neutrality supporters.

Q: We have heard so much about Net neutrality recently. It is clear to me that Verizon is opposed to any legislation that puts the Federal Communications Commission's principles of Net neutrality into law. But what is it exactly, that Verizon wants to be allowed to do? Do you want to charge differentiated rates to content providers who use the network?
Wegleitner: I think it's a leap to jump to the idea that Verizon wants to charge differentiated rates for service. Net neutrality is a phrase that is applied in a variety of circumstances.

First of all, let's talk about consumers getting access to applications. We see no reason to prohibit a customer from accessing any lawful Web site. And in fact, that is one of the FCC's principles, and we have no problem with those principles. We think the richest, broadest choice in applications provides a better broadband experience and makes for a happier consumer. We also think that some of those applications will come from outside parties and some of them will come from us. That's only natural.

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Net neutrality showdown

Network operators want to charge for tiered service, their opponents say that would give too much power to the Internet's gatekeepers, and factions in Congress are taking sides.

But getting an application to perform on a network involves a lot of things. How technologies might be employed on the network is another aspect of the Net neutrality debate.

So what's an example of the kind of service that Verizon might offer?
Wegleitner: There are ways for the network to provide more bandwidth for a short period of time. So if you're only a 768kbps-DSL subscriber, you can see a video in real time. There are ways to energize the loop to get more bandwidth for the two hours it takes to watch the movie and then drop the bandwidth down to the regular rate. But someone would have to pay the network provider or the content provider for that experience.

How close are we to having these kinds of services commercially available?
Wegleitner: We've demonstrated them and some people have tried to implement them commercially. But we are in a chicken and egg situation. You need a certain number of content providers and a certain amount of network infrastructure available in order to make a commercial endeavor viable. So while it's technically possible, it has not yet been achieved on a commercial scale, because the market drive hasn't been there. But it might be one of the applications that appear in the future.

Have any companies, such as Google or Yahoo, approached Verizon about providing a differentiated service?
Wegleitner: I can't pick an example out of the air. But content providers in general have discussed this with us. I think if a company is interested in offering a service to allow movies to be downloaded faster, then we can make more bandwidth available the instant the movie is being downloaded.

This idea has been discussed for years. It's not that much of a departure from what we have been talking about for a long time. In that regard, maybe some of this Net neutrality talk has been overblown as a concern. If a content provider wants a special capability in the network, then we are interested in providing that. That's our business.

I think a lot of people are worried about what happens to companies who don't choose to have their services differentiated. What happens to their traffic?
Wegleitner: The default method is a best effort delivery system.

More Newsmakers

[LarryLo]

Looking out for their users.... HAHahahahaha!

"The issue is that consumers at times want to do more things than their bandwidth subscription allows them to do. So do we let all the applications and users suffer as a result of the one request that put them over the top?"

If I paid for 768 K I can do what ever I want with it. Verizon or ANY ISP has no business limiting, interfering or ?Best Efforting? my packets. Doesn?t matter if I am doing voice, video or data. Its not their business, their job is to make sure ALL my packets get to and from my home as fast as they can, that?s it.

Lets call this what it is, forced tiered services, I sincerely hope if they ever get their way and actually implement these service tiers to their home DSL subscribers, Yahoo, Microsoft and Google ALL redirect Verizon Customers to a page explaining that they don?t want ?all the applications and users to suffer? as result of an inferior network connection, so they are blocking the service at this time.

Maybe that might get the Telco?s attention?

Finally, What's up with CNET's coverage of the Net Neutrality debate, seems to me they have become a Mouth Piece for the Telcos?

[LarryLo]

Looking out for their users.... HAHahahahaha!

"The issue is that consumers at times want to do more things than their bandwidth subscription allows them to do. So do we let all the applications and users suffer as a result of the one request that put them over the top?"

If I paid for 768 K I can do what ever I want with it. Verizon or ANY ISP has no business limiting, interfering or ?Best Efforting? my packets. Doesn?t matter if I am doing voice, video or data. Its not their business, their job is to make sure ALL my packets get to and from my home as fast as they can, that?s it.

Lets call this what it is, forced tiered services, I sincerely hope if they ever get their way and actually implement these service tiers to their home DSL subscribers, Yahoo, Microsoft and Google ALL redirect Verizon Customers to a page explaining that they don?t want ?all the applications and users to suffer? as result of an inferior network connection, so they are blocking the service at this time.

Maybe that might get the Telco?s attention?

Finally, What's up with CNET's coverage of the Net Neutrality debate, seems to me they have become a Mouth Piece for the Telcos?

[directorblue]

For the love of... can't any reporter ask these three questions?

Cisco is pitching new and ominous hardware that can help filter, monitor, and control packet flow for carriers. Because of this, I have crafted three simple questions that the carriers should be required to answer before they are permitted to violate network neutrality. They are as follows:

1) Will you use deep packet inspection to analyze and/or meter customer behavior?

2) Will you offer tiered or restricted (e.g., "gold", "silver", and "bronze") Internet packages to customers otherwise operating at the same bandwidth?

3) Will you monitor and/or block voice-over-IP (VoIP), peer-to-peer file transfers, or any other class of communication by customers based upon tier or service plan?

I believe the carriers should be forced to answer these three questions honestly and directly.

http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2006/02/network-neutrality-three-simple.html

[directorblue]

For the love of... can't any reporter ask these three questions?

Cisco is pitching new and ominous hardware that can help filter, monitor, and control packet flow for carriers. Because of this, I have crafted three simple questions that the carriers should be required to answer before they are permitted to violate network neutrality. They are as follows:

1) Will you use deep packet inspection to analyze and/or meter customer behavior?

2) Will you offer tiered or restricted (e.g., "gold", "silver", and "bronze") Internet packages to customers otherwise operating at the same bandwidth?

3) Will you monitor and/or block voice-over-IP (VoIP), peer-to-peer file transfers, or any other class of communication by customers based upon tier or service plan?

I believe the carriers should be forced to answer these three questions honestly and directly.

http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2006/02/network-neutrality-three-simple.html

[CagedAnimal]

Telecoms do their own overhyping

It is really an issue of whether ISPs should be allowed to to block or throttle packets based on port, or source and destination IP addresses. That is what any Internet favoritism really comes down to. ISPs really like to have this ability, and Net Neutrality legislation would probabably take it away from them.

Sometimes these filters may be well intentioned (like slowing the spread of a virus or cutting down on spam), other times, they are not (blocking VoIP, preventing customers from running their own servers, or using other services). Whatever the purpose, it is should not be the role ISP to decide what a subscriber does with their Internet connection and the bandwidth they are paying for. It is a shame their strategy is they try to present such legislation as a stumbling block that would make new business models infeasible.

Most interpretations of Network Neutrality would not prevent them from selling dedicated pipes to content providers. It would not prevent them from accomodating occasional traffic spikes to low bandwidth subscribers and charging customers accordingly; they could even have a system where content providers could take financial responsibility for those spikes. In short, they could still charge the high bandwidth users more for their use of the network, and have pricing plans appropriate to different usage patterns. They just could not do it on such discriminary terms.

So besides having to provide customers with true Internet connectivity instead of just a subset of it, what are they complaining about?

[volterwd]

Bandwidth Crunch?

How is it korea can provide so much more to their citizens and yet the telco's are complaining that the users are overwhelming their archaic system?

[CagedAnimal]

Telecoms do their own overhyping

It is really an issue of whether ISPs should be allowed to to block or throttle packets based on port, or source and destination IP addresses. That is what any Internet favoritism really comes down to. ISPs really like to have this ability, and Net Neutrality legislation would probabably take it away from them.

Sometimes these filters may be well intentioned (like slowing the spread of a virus or cutting down on spam), other times, they are not (blocking VoIP, preventing customers from running their own servers, or using other services). Whatever the purpose, it is should not be the role ISP to decide what a subscriber does with their Internet connection and the bandwidth they are paying for. It is a shame their strategy is they try to present such legislation as a stumbling block that would make new business models infeasible.

Most interpretations of Network Neutrality would not prevent them from selling dedicated pipes to content providers. It would not prevent them from accomodating occasional traffic spikes to low bandwidth subscribers and charging customers accordingly; they could even have a system where content providers could take financial responsibility for those spikes. In short, they could still charge the high bandwidth users more for their use of the network, and have pricing plans appropriate to different usage patterns. They just could not do it on such discriminary terms.

So besides having to provide customers with true Internet connectivity instead of just a subset of it, what are they complaining about?

[volterwd]

Bandwidth Crunch?

How is it korea can provide so much more to their citizens and yet the telco's are complaining that the users are overwhelming their archaic system?

[Rod Adams]

Reasonable technical arguments

I thank CNET for taking the time to find someone from a
network service provider that can provide reasonably
understandable technical reasons for their desire to be able to
more actively manage their network.

It seems that the kinds of traffic controls mentioned are roughly
analogous to HOV lanes, special bus lanes, timed traffic lights,
cloverleaf on-ramps, and limited access highways that were
implemented to make better use of the nation's road network.

Though many of us fight road traffic congestion every day,
imagine just how much more painful it would be if the standards
of the 1940s were still in place. No one would ever get
anywhere.

The Wild West days of undifferentiated Internet traffic worked
okay in a short lived time where the capacity of the network was
much greater than the traffic demand. That time has begun to
rapidly disappear (and I am doing my share of adding to the
network load by subscribing to a large number of podcasts).

Delivering email is one challenge - delivering large audio and
even larger video files is a completely different challenge that
will require different management tools that will certainly cost
money and require a lot of intellectual capital to implement and
maintain.

We should never forget that the Internet Protocol (IP) allows us
to SHARE a common network and still have our files and
messages reach their destination. Without better management
tools, that COMMON network will become less and less reliable
as traffic increases and the difference in size between large and
small files becomes even greater.

BTW - I have never worked at a network service provider and do
not own any stock in any companies that provide that service. I
do, however, own some stock in companies that will be
providing infrastructure components as the internet expands to
supply the new stresses on its capacity. I think some of those
infrastructure companies make excellent investment choices.

[LarryLo]

You are out of your mind?

I have worked at Service providers and I have run big networks. QoS is great for private networks, but it?s not so great for public ones. Your whole Traffic analogy is flawed in that when the government sets up all these special access features, their only interest is the timely flow of people in their cars or buses. They are not favoring one person in one car to get somewhere faster than the other because they paid an extra fee, they have no conflicting interests. The Telco's on the other hand have a clear conflict of interest, in that they will be providing a competing service and hence will want that service favored. Let?s be clear this is really only going to effect the lucrative Real Time Internet Services (Voice and Video). The Telco's are looking to monopolize these two services and or profit from the success of competitors through the levying of special access charges.

Folks if we allow the Telco?s or any ISPs to modify your internet experience just to meet their revenue goals, the US internet user is in for a very unhappy future.

[Rod Adams]

Reasonable technical arguments

I thank CNET for taking the time to find someone from a
network service provider that can provide reasonably
understandable technical reasons for their desire to be able to
more actively manage their network.

It seems that the kinds of traffic controls mentioned are roughly
analogous to HOV lanes, special bus lanes, timed traffic lights,
cloverleaf on-ramps, and limited access highways that were
implemented to make better use of the nation's road network.

Though many of us fight road traffic congestion every day,
imagine just how much more painful it would be if the standards
of the 1940s were still in place. No one would ever get
anywhere.

The Wild West days of undifferentiated Internet traffic worked
okay in a short lived time where the capacity of the network was
much greater than the traffic demand. That time has begun to
rapidly disappear (and I am doing my share of adding to the
network load by subscribing to a large number of podcasts).

Delivering email is one challenge - delivering large audio and
even larger video files is a completely different challenge that
will require different management tools that will certainly cost
money and require a lot of intellectual capital to implement and
maintain.

We should never forget that the Internet Protocol (IP) allows us
to SHARE a common network and still have our files and
messages reach their destination. Without better management
tools, that COMMON network will become less and less reliable
as traffic increases and the difference in size between large and
small files becomes even greater.

BTW - I have never worked at a network service provider and do
not own any stock in any companies that provide that service. I
do, however, own some stock in companies that will be
providing infrastructure components as the internet expands to
supply the new stresses on its capacity. I think some of those
infrastructure companies make excellent investment choices.

[LarryLo]

You are out of your mind?

I have worked at Service providers and I have run big networks. QoS is great for private networks, but it?s not so great for public ones. Your whole Traffic analogy is flawed in that when the government sets up all these special access features, their only interest is the timely flow of people in their cars or buses. They are not favoring one person in one car to get somewhere faster than the other because they paid an extra fee, they have no conflicting interests. The Telco's on the other hand have a clear conflict of interest, in that they will be providing a competing service and hence will want that service favored. Let?s be clear this is really only going to effect the lucrative Real Time Internet Services (Voice and Video). The Telco's are looking to monopolize these two services and or profit from the success of competitors through the levying of special access charges.

Folks if we allow the Telco?s or any ISPs to modify your internet experience just to meet their revenue goals, the US internet user is in for a very unhappy future.