Category Archives: IP over TV

Duopoly Helping Net Neutrality: By Obviously Subverting It

grinch.png With enemies like these…
Until recently, net neutrality was a difficult issue to explain at a dinner party. It was even more of a struggle to get anybody worked up about it. Now, thanks to the major Internet service providers (ISPs) Comcast and Bell-Sympatico, the stakes are crystal clear and the acrid scent of a smoking gun hangs in the room.

— How the Grinches Stole ‘Net Neutrality’ Internet service providers play favourites with video, large files and political sites. By Wayne MacPhail, the Tyee, Published: December 27, 2007

…it may seem we don’t even need friends, but we do.

A pretty good pro-net neutrality writeup follows. This is the gist:

Is it in the carriers’ best interest to allow upstart cheap phone companies like Skype or Vonage to suck up bandwidth with its inexpensive and excellent service? Nope, but in a free market and a neutral Internet, upstarts happen. The traditional players just don’t like it much and want the nonsense to stop.
You want upstarts? You want net neutrality.

That plus the duopoly wants to control content: Continue reading →

Global Media Consolidation

mediabrands.jpg In case you thought media ownership in increasingly fewer hands was a uniquely U.S. problem, here’s a handy graphic illustrating its worldwide scope. There are links to the research behind it.

-jsq

TV Band Internet

A group of companies wants to use unused TV bandwidth for the Internet:
The coalition, which includes Microsoft and Google, wants regulators to allow idle TV channels, known as white space, to be used to beam the Internet into homes and offices. But the Federal Communications Commission first must be convinced that such traffic would not bleed outside its designated channels and interfere with existing broadcasts.

The six partners — Microsoft, Google, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Philips — say they can meet that challenge. Today, they plan to give FCC officials a prototype device, built by Microsoft, that will undergo months of testing.

If the device passes muster, the coalition says, it could have versions in stores by early 2009.

— Tech Firms Push to Use TV Airwaves for Internet, Cable, Phone Companies Watch Warily, By Charles Babington, Washington Post Staff Writer, Tuesday, March 13, 2007; Page D01

Well, that’s an unusual combination of companies. But if it brings some competition to the telco/cableco duopoly, I’m for it. Continue reading →