The FCC’s broadband decision, which will place it within the regulatory framework of Title II and treat it like a utility, was passed without the votes of the two Republican commissioners. One of them, Ajit Pai, is continuing to battle the measure.
He is now claiming that it is hurting small business and rural broadband deployment.
He wrote, “When it comes to broadband, American consumers want greater competition, faster speeds, more deployment, and lower prices. But the FCC’s decision two months ago to adopt President Obama’s plan to regulate the Internet is already having precisely the opposite effect.”
He continued, “As I predicted in my dissent from the FCC’s Order, ‘Today there are thousands of smaller Internet service providers—wireless Internet service providers (WISPs), small-town cable operators, municipal broadband providers, electric cooperatives, and others—that don’t have the means or the margins to withstand a regulatory onslaught. . . . Smaller, rural competitors will be disproportionately affected, and the FCC’s decision will diminish competition—the best guarantor of consumer welfare.’”
He cited six examples of small internet providers, with subscriber totals ranging from 475 to 8,000 that are holding off or curtaining investment in their services due to the FCC’s decision.
Pai stated, “These examples shouldn’t surprise anyone. After all, the President’s own Small Business Administration warned the FCC last year that its proposed rules would unduly burden small businesses. And yet the FCC decided to treat each and every small, scrappy broadband provider as if it were an anticompetitive industrial giant.”
Pai conclude, “The FCC still has a chance to heed these calls and stay the effect of President Obama’s plan to regulate the Internet. But I doubt this will happen. That’s because moving forward with this plan isn’t about logic, the law, or marketplace facts. It’s about fulfilling a political imperative.”
RBR-TVBR observation: The companies cited in Pai’s critique represent a microscopic speck in the US broadband galaxy.
The six companies he mentioned serve a total 13,975 subscribers.
Regardless of your opinion on net neutrality, clearly the issue has to be about the impact on millions of subscribers, not dozens of subscribers.
From a business standpoint, the issue boils down to a battle between content providers and distribution platforms. Producers want strong net neutrality rules, distributors do not. Pick your side and state your case.
However, we believe it would be essentially impossible to deal with the huge issues inherent to this debate and at the same time focus on the unique problems faced by a rural ISP with 475 customers.
We would suggest that small-ISP exceptions could be added to whatever the regulations turn out to be after the courts get through with them. It’s been done before, and it will be done again, and it makes sense in this instance.
