Obama’s Team Promotes Open Access, Net Neutrality

ILECs and cellcos might have more to worry about more than they thought when President-elect Barack Obama takes office on Jan. 20, since the two leaders of his FCC review team are well-known proponents of mobile open access and net neutrality.

Susan Crawford, a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, and Kevin Werbach, a Wharton professor, have made their open Internet ideas known in blogs and speeches, including the idea of Internet access as a utility.

The open-access debate in the wireless world, for instance, is bound to heat up. Here’s what Crawford wrote after the FCC’s 700 MHz auction ended in the spring and it was made clear that Verizon Wireless and AT&T Inc. emerged the clear winners: “Verizon has won spectrum it arguably didn’t even need, given its existing spectrum holdings. It retains the discretion to act as a traditional cellphone-model company — picking and choosing among applications and devices, underselling ‘open’ devices, and discriminating against traffic that undermines its business model. This isn’t great news for the Internet model of access.”

In the wake of the Google Android launch and the success of the first-generation iPhone, the cellcos this time last year moved away from lauding the walled garden, instead paying lip service to the idea open access. For instance, Verizon announced an open development initiative, while AT&T reminded users of the inherent openness of its GSM network. Sprint-Nextel Corp. for its part told anyone who would listen that its Xohm WiMAX network would be open to devices and applications. But in practice, open access is about as real as the jackalope.

Werbach has pointed out that very little progress has been made: “Along with Google Android/Open Handset Alliance, Verizon’s open development initiative, and the success of Apple’s App Store, this is good news for wireless subscribers in the U.S. For too long we’ve been stuck with a poor set of apps and features pre-selected by the carriers. However, a series of walled application stores is not the same as an Internet-like open platform. Developers still need to go through the bottleneck of Apple’s and T-Mobile’s (and soon, most likely, AT&T’s and Sprint’s and Verizon’s) certification process, pricing policies, and so forth. Not to mention that we’re just talking about the U.S. here. The U.S. is a big mobile market, but less than a tenth of the global handset total ... I’m pleasantly surprised how quickly the major U.S operators are backing off their policies of tightly controlling handsets and applications. The question is whether the shift will stop at walled markets, or move toward a truly open environment.”

These attitudes are in sharp contrast to the FCC of the past eight years when it comes to taking down the proprietary walls that protect carriers’ competitive positions. For instance, when lobbied by Skype to instigate an wireless open-access mandate, FCC chairman Kevin Martin attempted to get the petition dismissed.

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