Monday, June 27, 2005
Two bad decisions from Supreme Court
The Brand X decision seems, on first analysis, to negate the idea of Common Carriage in telecommunications. Now when telcos say, "level playing field" there will be no doubt that they mean, "as slanted away from the customer as the cablecos."
The Grokster decision seems, on first analysis, to reverse Betamax, so that even if there are "substantial non-infringing uses," of a service, in addition, the service must not show "unlawful intent." Whatever that is.
The consequences of Brand X will be more profound. Now the last thread of network neutrality hangs on the re-regulation of spectrum. Unfortunately, in this zeitgeist, I do not expect this thread to get much stronger. Perhaps dial-up Internet service will be the only nondiscriminatory service left.
Predictions of consequences (assuming the main points of these first analyses stand):
Grokster will mean that business models for recordings and other information goods will develop faster in other countries. Fortunately, we'll be able to see these apps develop, and have a chance of catching up (or riding along), except where advanced broadband is required (which will be hampered by Brand X consequences).
Brand X will slow the growth of U.S. broadband services even further; we will long for the day when U.S. ranked *only* 16th in broadband per capita among nations. Unfortunately, the CapEx will already have been exed, e.g., on Verizon's FIOS and Cablevision's captive "level" response, and, once we've understood the hole we've dug, it will take a long time to climb out of it.
The Grokster decision seems, on first analysis, to reverse Betamax, so that even if there are "substantial non-infringing uses," of a service, in addition, the service must not show "unlawful intent." Whatever that is.
The consequences of Brand X will be more profound. Now the last thread of network neutrality hangs on the re-regulation of spectrum. Unfortunately, in this zeitgeist, I do not expect this thread to get much stronger. Perhaps dial-up Internet service will be the only nondiscriminatory service left.
Predictions of consequences (assuming the main points of these first analyses stand):
Grokster will mean that business models for recordings and other information goods will develop faster in other countries. Fortunately, we'll be able to see these apps develop, and have a chance of catching up (or riding along), except where advanced broadband is required (which will be hampered by Brand X consequences).
Brand X will slow the growth of U.S. broadband services even further; we will long for the day when U.S. ranked *only* 16th in broadband per capita among nations. Unfortunately, the CapEx will already have been exed, e.g., on Verizon's FIOS and Cablevision's captive "level" response, and, once we've understood the hole we've dug, it will take a long time to climb out of it.
Technorati Tags: BrandX, Broadband-per-capita, Scotus, US Losing Lead
Comments:
I encourage all my American friends to come to Europe. We need more enterpreneurs here. Our broadband is getting cheaper and the bandwidth is increasing dramatically. They are investing in OPEN fiber networks. This means capacity is leased out to ISPs on an open, non-discriminatory basis. In Sweden, they pay 20 EUR per month for 10 Mbps. That's what people in the Netherlands (where I live) and Belgium will be paying soon. There's a massive price war in France, too. But, we need that American enterpreneurial spirit over here.
# posted by 
: 6/27/2005 3:58 PM
: 6/27/2005 3:58 PM
First effects of Grokster
http://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/spring05/cos491/writing/ says:
'Heres the first change that Ive seen due to the Grokster decision. Bonpoo is a service that lets you send large files to other people. It used to be general-purpose; you could send anything to your friends. Now, post-Grokster, they only let you send photos:
IMPORTANT NOTICE: At bonpoo we are constantly testing file transfers services that help people send legal files across the Internet. Given the recent Supreme Court decision we have suspended our free file transfer services except for photos. We apologize for any incovience. Please check out our professional product HeavyMail for an alternative to our prior service.'
By the way, Bonpoo's website is http://www.bonpoo.com and HeavyMail's website is http://www.heavymail.com
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http://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/spring05/cos491/writing/ says:
'Heres the first change that Ive seen due to the Grokster decision. Bonpoo is a service that lets you send large files to other people. It used to be general-purpose; you could send anything to your friends. Now, post-Grokster, they only let you send photos:
IMPORTANT NOTICE: At bonpoo we are constantly testing file transfers services that help people send legal files across the Internet. Given the recent Supreme Court decision we have suspended our free file transfer services except for photos. We apologize for any incovience. Please check out our professional product HeavyMail for an alternative to our prior service.'
By the way, Bonpoo's website is http://www.bonpoo.com and HeavyMail's website is http://www.heavymail.com
# posted by : 7/05/2005 1:40 AM
: 7/05/2005 1:40 AM
