Can Google Save The Internet?

From my weekly column, The Blog Box (published tomorrow morning-- See sidebar link):

Which Came First: GoogleNet Or PayAsYouGoNet?

I confess. There's no such thing as PayAsYouGoNet (yet), and GoogleNet isn't the official biz subsidiary name, but the battle between these two mythical broadband beasts is heating up fast. Google has been quietly buying up unused fiber-optic cable and superfast connections on the East Coast, and they've piloted a free WiFi hotspot in San Francisco's Union Square shopping district. Why? Some possible reasons: either Google wants to save untold millions by bypassing the middleman (like Comcast) which links up with Google's servers via a wholesaler; Google is trying to stop (and thereby profit from targeted avertising revenues) Big TelCo's attempt to create a PayAsYouGoNet; or Big TelCo is trying to thwart Google's free WiFi, TV on demand, and digital video online endeavors and wants you pay more for the service you're already paying for.

At any rate, Big TelCo's big gun lobbyists are busy jawboning the Republican- controlled Congress today, hoping for a digitally tiered class system in America tomorrow. Common Cause has the blast-action congressional email link, Democratic Senator Ron Wyden (according to The Jeff Pulver Blog) is poised to introduce a stand-alone bill to preserve net neutrality, and Future Of The Book.org points out the obvious:

Broadband providers argue that tiered pricing (whether for services or bandwidth) will increase innovation. This argument is deeply flawed. Tier-pricing will not guarantee new and useful services for users, but it will guarantee short term financial gains for the providers. These companies did not invent the Internet nor did they invent the markets for these services. Innovative users (both customers and start-ups) discovered creative ways to use the network. The market for broadband (and the subsequent network) exists because people outgrew the bandwidth capacity of dial-up, as more companies and people posted multimedia on the web. Innovation of this sort creates new demands for bandwidth and increases the customer base and revenue for the broadband providers. New innovative uses generally demand more bandwidth, as seen in p2p, video google, flickr, video ipods, and massively multiplayer online role playing games.

Future Of The Book also quotes Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan, who addressed this issue on Tuesday:

''It is not a free lunch for any one of these content providers. Those lines and that access are [already] being paid for by the consumer.''

If all of this screams "To Virtual Arms!" to you, a good place to start is Mitchell Szczepanczyk's article, The End Of The Blogosphere? For what it's worth, my money is on Google, whose customer loyalty is second to none. Plus, it doesn't hurt to have the mysteriously ever-popular Colin Powell on your executive board, either.

If you want to nip this Republican scam in the bud, click on the Common Cause link above and start voicing your objections today. Tomorrow may be too late.

So you think you know Delilah?
Judges 16:19-- And she made him sleep upon her knees; and she called for a man, and she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his head.