In his keynote at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler said for the first time mobile, or wireless Internet, will be covered in the new net neutrality rules approved late last month by the FCC. He also defended the rules, disputing claims that net neutrality stifles a free and wide open Internet.
“We are not going to impose the old-style monopoly regulations called utility regulation,” Wheeler said. “There will be no rate regulation, no tariffing, no unbundling, no requirements that we are going to come in and dictate how networks work.”
What the news rules do prohibit, he said, is blocking, slowing traffic, or for big companies to provide faster service in return for payment.
Wheeler said Sprint Corp., T-Mobile AG and Google Inc.’s fiber broadband project all support the new set of standards.
Net neutrality also encompasses wireless Internet, marking the first time wireless has been covered by FCC regulations. All wireless signals travel over the air via radio frequency spectrum, which is a valuable commodity for many digital companies. Wheeler said the FCC will conduct an “incentive auction” for 600MHz radio spectrum early next year, buying spectrum from broadcasters and repackaging it in an effort to keep prices down for carriers and to distribute spectrum more equally.
“(The FCC considered) how do you unleash the power of broadband?” Wheeler said. “How do we make sure we have ample and the right kind of spectrum? Because the Internet of the 21st century is going to be wireless.”
The FCC also considered national and public safety, and free and fair competition in net neutrality, Wheeler said. “Competition is the best protector a consumer ever had and the best friend that an innovator ever had.”
When referring to the 3-2 vote by FCC commissioners that authorized net neutrality, Wheeler quipped, “You call it a close vote, I say we had 50% more votes than they did.”
Wheeler also said the new standards have been an ongoing and developing policy, noting that he briefed the public policy committee about net neutrality several years ago at Mobile World Congress.
“The basic question comes to this: If the Internet is the most powerful platform in the history of the planet, which I think it is, can it exist without a referee?” Wheeler said. “There needs to be a set of rules that says activity needs to be just and reasonable and that we will throw the flag if it isn’t.”
Regarding the much-hyped 5G networks, the next evolution after 4G, he referenced a famous Spanish artist to explain his notion that there is no firm idea of what that network looks like.
“If you go to the Picasso museum and you stand in front of one of his paintings, you will see something different than what I will see,” Wheeler said. “It’s all in the eye of the beholder.”