By: Kwami Ahiabenu,II
The
Internet revolution is making the world a better place. Since its birth in the 1950s,
the Internet has become a ubiquitous global system of interconnected computer
systems that use Internet protocol suites (TCP/IP) to connect billions of
devices worldwide and provide countless online services.
In recent
years ‘net neutrality’ is in the news. Professor Tim Wu coined this term in
2003, to express the idea that “internet service providers (ISPs) and
governments should treat all data transactions on the internet equally, not
discriminating or charging differentially by user, content, site, platform,
application, type of attached equipment or modes of communication. This is to
say that Internet users should enable access to all content and applications
running on the Internet irrespective of the source, and access to particular
products or websites should not be blocked as well.
When Net
Neutrality is respected, there is no blocking of content, no throttling
(intentionally slows down some content or speeds up others), and no paid
prioritisation where some services are stuck in a “slow lane” because they do
not pay a special fee.
One
Service, Free Basics (the new name for internet.org), is receiving a lot of
criticism from internet activists across the world, with India banning them for
the violation of net neutrality principles by offering free access to
selected online content and services and putting others to a disadvantage by
causing unfair competition. Free Basics, which is available in 37 countries
including Ghana, aims at increasing access for low-income customers by allowing
them to create a Facebook account on their devices and also access a limited
set of internet services at no charge. Both Wikipedia Zero and Google Free Zone
are other examples of zero rating services.
Some
benefits of not upholding Net neutrality
Price
differentiation, improving economic efficiency, increase in broadband
penetration, reduction in customer costs and the provision of essential
services to the poor who cannot afford access can all be stated as some of the
advantages of not upholding the net neutrality principle.
In
support of Net Neutrality
According
to President Barack Obama You “don’t want to start getting a differentiation in
how accessible the Internet is to various users,” “You want to leave it open so
that the next Google or the next Facebook can succeed.” Conventionally it is
not just possible for a smaller firm to compete with established companies such
as Facebook when they are able to offer services based on discriminatory data
tariffs. Furthermore this situation creates barriers to entry and a non-level
playing field for other players especially start-ups thereby stifling
innovation.
Throwing
net neutrality out of the window means a whole set of users (out of the same
window) because then, they are considered as spammers, scammers, and phishers,
with other “bad” Internet citizens excluded from sending mail through certain
web mails.
Also
violation of Net Neutrality can lead to an outright block of country-level IP
addresses, which affects countries in West Africa, including Ghana because of
the prevalence of “scammers”.
In many
emerging markets, a new generation of messaging apps such as WhatsApp are
threatening SMS revenues while Voice Over IP (VOIP) is eating away voice
revenue. <$> A predictable reaction is to break net neutrality principles
by setting up differential pricing in order to protect dwindling fortunes of
the operators but this does not serve the interest of consumers.
Is Net
Neutrality a Myth?
Some
persons argue that we should not be discussing net neutrality in Africa, or in
Ghana, because it is the preserve of persons with high speed internet access
who do not have the access challenges which are the bane of most users on the
continent. However, internet access is constantly improving; and net
neutrality will increasingly become more and more important an issue to grapple
with in Africa.
Conclusion
At the
end of the day, it is important not to create a two-tier Internet-one for the
haves and the other for the have-nots. Breaking Net Neutrality can lead to
control and censorship of Internet content which does not augur well for
openness on the Internet. When the principle of net neutrality starts to be
eroded, it should be of grave concern to everyone because it has the tendency of
creating walls instead and hindering open Internet as per its original design.
The writer is the Executive Director of
Penplusbytes.org - you can follow him on twitter at www.twitter.com/kwamigh; WhatsApp:
0241995737
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