The other side of net neutrality

[Commentary] Forget fast lanes and slow lanes. Viacom has headed straight for the off-ramp from Phoenix-based cable operator Cable One’s broadband platform. The MTV and Comedy Central parent confirmed that it is blocking online access to its content by Cable One broadband subscribers as part of a pay-TV carriage dispute with the operator that has led to Viacom channels going dark on the system.

“Cable One has chosen to no longer carry Viacom programming and, as a result, it is no longer available to Cable One customers in any form,” Viacom said.

Fear of fast lanes (FOFL) comes in two primary flavors. Some fear that allowing paid prioritization will enable the biggest content providers -- Netflix, YouTube, the NFL ---- to pay for exclusive fast lanes, relegating everyone else inevitably to slow internet lanes. The other type of FOFL, expressed primarily by large content providers like Netflix and YouTube but echoed by others, is that permitting paid prioritization, particularly if coupled with unregulated peering policies, will leave them vulnerable to extortion by last mile ISPs. That is the essence of Netflix’s complaints about Comcast and Verizon: They shook us down for “interconnection” fees because they could. Given legal cover by the FCC, they fear, the shake downs will only become more common and more onerous. Those two propositions are not quite mutually exclusive. But they strongly suggest we’re not all talking about the same thing when we talk about fast lanes and slow lanes. In the former, it is Netflix we the rest of us need to fear; in the latter, Netflix is imagined to be powerless against ISPs.

But to see the danger of premature rule-setting you need look no further than the broadcast retransmission regime, which, as established by Congress and given full regulatory heft by the FCC. Those rules, as currently written, heavily favor broadcasters over pay-TV provider, leading to absurdly one-sided “negotiations” over retransmission fees that lead to ever-higher prices for consumers. As CBS made plain with its blackout of TWC broadband subscribers, in fact, broadcasters are more than happy to try to stretch their legally sanctified leverage in the pay-TV market into the nominally unregulated online market.

[Sweeting is Principal, Concurrent Media Strategies]