Qwest CEO Speaks Out Against Net Neutrality

Telecom News Editorials Reports Glossary

7:30 am on September 6, 2006 | Category: Business, Web Services, Internet, Regulation

Dick Notebaert, the CEO of Qwest Communications, made claims last week that the concept of net neutrality is “really silly,” and could ultimately stifle competition and cost customers more.

“Competition is good, makes us better and makes us more creative,” the CEO commented. “That’s why when they talk about net neutrality, bad idea. Really silly. What we’re talking about has no basis in anything. It’s a nice move to make the consumer pay for everything.”

Notebaert went on to say that passing net neutrality legislation would be like telling FedEx that it can’t offer overnight service is UPS doesn’t.

In making this childish comparison, however, he’s avoiding the central issue under question. Internet service providers are free to cater to the needs of different subscribers by offering faster and more expensive packages to some customers than others.

What the majority of sensible net neutrality advocates oppose is allowing ISPs to let some sites load more quickly than others for all users. Giving this privilege to service providers would allow them too much control over the internet, ultimately allowing them to collect “bribes” from high traffic websites in exchange for preferential service on the information superhighway.

Internet content providers already shell out a significant amount of money for web servers, hosting, and monthly bandwidth, while internet users pay their ISPs for the use of a connection. By charging websites for bandwidth, service providers would only put roadblocks in the way of normal and productive internet use, causing the entire medium to become too biased and restricted.

This approach of spreading the cost between consumers and content providers might chip away a bit at the cost of an internet connection, but it would also severely degrade service quality by making it difficult or impossible to access websites that refuse to pay ISP bribes.