German Chancellor Angela Merkel speaks out against network neutrality

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that some key services for the digital economy would require reliable transmission quality and should therefore be treated differently than other data. She called for a splitting of services, "one for free Internet, and the other for special services", adding that it was up to the European Union to negotiate how it would work. "An innovation-friendly Internet means that there is a guaranteed reliability for special services," she said. "These can only develop when predictable quality standards are available".