Google-Verizon should prompt FCC to demand Net Neutrality

[Commentary] Candidate Barack Obama told America that he believed in an open and "neutral" Internet -- one where the owners of the wires didn't get to pick and choose which applications would run on the network. Soon after Julius Genachowski was appointed as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, he outlined a clear and ambitious plan to turn that commitment into a reality.

But now Verizon and Google have struck a deal for a legislative template that would allow Verizon to be the gatekeeper for services running over its Internet Protocol pipe, and Google to be the colorful, well-branded winner. The outcome of this negotiation between Godzilla and Shamu may be good for them, but it would destroy the promise of a neutral network. The FCC needs to assert its authority if the chairman's and president's promises are to be kept. The most serious issue is wireless. Smartphones are beginning to replace computers across the nation. These companies have agreed that wireless, too, should be an oversight-free zone, which could divide the Internet up into pieces based on how a consumer connects. The template they've proposed helps these companies' business plans. But it would weaken competition in the wireless markets and place a single access provider in charge of the plans of any wireless entrepreneur.

Our country has learned hard lessons about the dangers of allowing industries to write their own rules. Policymakers must look beyond the narrow interests of particular companies and do much more to protect consumers.

[Susan Crawford is a professor at Cardozo Law School, , and Tim Wu, Lawrence Lessig is a professor at Harvard Law School and director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics, Barbara Van Schewick is a professor at Stanford Law School, Tim Wu is a professor at Columbia Law School]