20 Maryland state representatives have sponsored a bill that says that broadband Internet providers in Maryland

“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.”

This appears to be a performance-oriented version of an interconnection access, or bandwagon requirement.

It’s lifted from the recent “concessions” AT&T made to get the FCC to approve the Bellsouth merger (concessions that apply only for two years, and not at all to AT&T’s IPTV network). It would be interesting if the same language became law, even if only in one state.

Anne Broache in C|net news.com Politics Blog calls this Marylane move “divisive.” Matt Stoller in MyDD calls it “a big deal.” Art Brodsky of Public Knowledge calls it “refreshing.”

Somewhat surprisingly, neither Hands Off the Internet (anti-net neutrality blog) nor Save the Internet (pro-net neutrality blog) seem to have noted this Maryland development.

-jsq