Battling the Future — Big Business Weighs In
September 25 2008 / by John Heylin / In association with Future Blogger.net
Category: Technology Year: General Rating: 3
Comcast has been showing up rather frequently in the news as of late due to the issues they are having with users hogging large amounts of bandwidth.
Just recently, the FCC laid down a ruling against Comcast’s practice of limiting the speed of certain websites (torrent sites in particular). “The FCC voted 3-2 in early August that treating certain types of Web traffic differently violated its “net neutrality” principles, which state that all Internet traffic should be treated equally.” Of course Comcast is appealing the decision, saying they should be able to regulate their own business.
Comcast is just trying to stop progress. At some point, another company will come up with unlimited usage which will either force Comcast to take the caps off their connection or chance falling into obscurity.
John Smart, President of the Acceleration Studies Foundation, put it this way, “It is very profitable for large companies to limit innovation and sit on their IP as much as they can. Big cable companies and their lobbies have greatly slowed down the arrival of internet TV, and will continue to do so.”
Stringing out technology is the best way to insure profits long-term, but companies may soon find themselves by-passed by competitors.
