Some last-mile ISPs are playing “chicken” with the...

Some last-mile ISPs are playing “chicken” with the Internet, said Level 3 General Counsel Michael Mooney in a blog post Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1j4E3Mr). Contrary to popular belief, Internet access for the end-user doesn’t necessarily slow down simply because lots of people are using the Internet at the same time, Mooney said. It also slows down when “ISPs try to strong arm the content providers into paying” by “refusing to increase the size of their networks unless their tolls are paid,” he said. “These ISPs are placing a bet that because content providers have no other way to get their content to the ISPs subscribers, that they will cave in and start paying them.” Level 3 has in many cases “offered to sit with the ISP to hammer out a fair, equitable, scalable and resilient network architecture, but to no avail,” Mooney said. VoIP calls, online video and interactive Web browsing are all at risk, he said. “Some say network neutrality is a solution looking for a problem. We disagree.” The FCC should address interconnection issues as part of its net neutrality proceeding, Mooney wrote in a follow-up comment. “In the same way as last mile ISPs should not be able to discriminate directly against third party provided content, they should not be able to do the same thing indirectly by forcing content companies and intermediary providers into a no win choice of either paying the ISP arbitrary tolls or suffering through lower bitrates and degraded service quality for streaming video.” Netflix recently agreed to a paid peering deal with Comcast, and others besides Mooney want the FCC to address whether such pacts should be allowed (CD March 5 p1).