4 Signs Net Neutrality Isn’t Dead (Despite an FCC Proposal You’re Not Going to Like)

[eridani]

http://www.nationofchange.org/4-signs-net-neutrality-isn-t-dead-despite-fcc-proposal-you-re-not-going-1400599374

3. Reclassification remains on the table.

The senators that wrote the FCC this May aren’t the only fans of reclassification. The move has emerged as the holy grail of the movement to keep the Internet fair and open.

The problem is that, back in 2002, the FCC classified broadband as an “information service” rather than a “communications service” under the 1996 Telecommunications Act. While communications services are protected as “common carriers” that the FCC is authorized to regulate substantially, information services are not. That's why the the commission has been smacked down in court over and over again when it's tried to enforce its own net neutrality rules—which happened most recently in January.

Wheeler’s main argument against reclassification is that it would take too long. “I do not believe we should leave the market unprotected for multiple more years while lawyers for the biggest corporate players tie the FCC’s protections up in court,” he wrote in a blog post dated April 29.

Yet Wheeler also said that “all options for protecting and promoting an Open Internet are on the table,” including reclassification. That’s an opening that proponents of net neutrality will be working hard to make the most of as the commission collects comments in the coming months.