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>> they sought comment on a variety of different approaches so i think given the complexity of the situation and the politics and questions involved in this, i think they did a pretty good job and asked the right questions. it is absolutely appropriate that so many people are writing in and commenting. this is important. >> host: matt wood is with free pre press. he is there policy director. what do you think? >> guest: we think that path isn't going do do anything for the rest of us and will not work. the fcc chairman wants to use authority to reinstate section 706 of the act and the court case that was issued in january in the washington, d.c. circuit

said if you want to use section 706 you will have to allow for individualized bargaining and discrimination right there in the text of the court case saying the fcc has some short under the statute but not to prevent discrimination and blocking. we appreciate the fact he is asking but we think his answers will not prefer the discrimination and blocking. >> host: randolph may, what is your opening statement? >> guest: i am glad to be here. thanks. i have a different perspective. the bottom line is my preference would be at this time the commission not move forward to adopt any new regulations. now, at this time, they just

proposed rules and what i prefer to see is for the commission to watch the marketplace, see how it continues to develop, remember the internet space is a dynamic space. it is changing rapidly and this is the key point. in its notice and previous attempt to adopt rules the commission hasn't identified a market failure. in other words, it isn't saying this market failed and consumers are being harmed at this time. there are an awful lot of coulds and mights in the notice about things that might and could happen to consumers and i agree if they did happen then the commission in that case should take some action. but the commission itself says

explicitly that it doesn't -- in its view, the need for adopt these regulations isn't dependented upon whether there is a market failure or in other words a lack of competition or whatever. right from the beginning from my perspective that is the wrong approach to take. i am sure what we will get into will be let's assume the commission is going to adopt rules in one form or another. it isn't just going to -- as i would prefer it to do, to watch and wait and defer to congress. then there is a very big question and i think kevin alluded and matt to this as to what course of action the commission should take. there are two different proposals. one that matt prefers, i think, is for the commission to classify the internet providers

as common carriers. that is referred to as the title two approach. and the other approach would be to adopt a commercial standard under which their practices would be judged to see whether or not they are lawful or not. i will just say at this point i think we will get into a lively discussion about these two different approaches. the title two approach, and i think matt will agree with this, that is essentially the same common carrier model that was first adopted, actually back in 1887 when congress adopted past the interstate commerce act to regulate railroads which were thought to have monopolist power. it was incorporated word for

word in the communications act when it was adopted in 1934 to regulate what was thought to be the monopolistic telephone system. what we called bob bell at the time. if we put the two acts together, the interstate commerce act and the communication and title two on the other side, after studying them, they are essentially the same and what they do, it was their purpose to do, was to establish, really strict regulatory controls on these entities to prevent the abuse of market power and i would submit that now, at this time, in this digital age, we have a very different situation and we don't want to apply these types of regulations to

telephone companies. >> host: did randy may address your answer? >> guest: these are not really new rules like he said. it is the continuing principles we have always had. so the notion of there is no market failure ignores the fact we need an open platform available to everybody even as the technology changes. i use the cellphone example here. common carrier regulations can apply to monopolies and utilities and other situations where you have more than one choice. no body would thing it was okay for verizon not to pick on verizon: for verizon wireless to knock my numbers just because i could switch to at&t or spinto or t-mobile. these principles are just as

valid, yes telephone and broadbrand are different but we want the rules to say the person use giving me my service doesn't say how i can use it. i should be able to use it however i wish once i pay my bill. >> host: would the internet be in title two? >> guest: not the internet. there is internet access which is the wires we use and the spectrum we use to get online. the internet content should be free from regulations especially if not totally from the fcc regulations. as susan crawford said it is like confusing the converation for the sidewalk. we want the conversation to be free and unregulated and the fcc has no place regulating the content online. today we have a regulated phone system or the vestige of a phone system. the fcc doesn't regulate what i

say when i call you but make sure the pathway and open, affordable, and there for everybody to use not just the few the phone company might favor. >> host: kevin werbach you have been listening it the conversation. >> guest: i want to jump in and say let's make sure we understand what the debate is about. we are getting into the details which are important but what is at issue here is had openness of the internet and the internet is the most extraordinary engine of opportunity, innovation, economic growth, freedom that we have ever seen. the broadband platforms and systems we are talking about are the information infrastructure of the 21st century. they are the ways we will communicate with each other and the ways we will do business. it is crucial to think about whether those platforms remain

open the way they have historically. the internet has grown up as a network where anyone can communicate and get online a. tiny company with get access to the network and become a huge business like google or facebook. and it is vital that not change as the internet evolves. we are moving more into a broadband world and randy is right saying the internet is evolving and it should not be fixed in place. but everyone agrees the values are important. we have been fighting about net neutrality and open internet rules for more than a decade in the united states and there has been a shift. you had people when we started ow like the ceo of at&t saying things like no one can pick up the pipes.

there is an agreement about what is going to happen. but that has to be the started point and while i share some of randy's view on this, the starting point of saying well we don't think anything happened so we should not adopt anything is problematic because once we lose the openness of the internet and move into an environment where it is closed and we don't have that investment and venture c

capitalist don't fund things that has a vicious cycle. we have to avoid that happening and in order to avoid that happening we have to have a cop thon on the beat and that is the role the fcc has historically played and should continue to play here. we have this debate about the best way to do it and quite frankly i don't think in practice it would matter all that much between title two and the 706 process that chairman wheeler is proposing. again we are talking about hypotheticals and there are some forms of telling the traffic a part that are legit. every isp blocks spam and service attacks and no one is saying they should not be able to do that. companies allow you to pay more

for higher capacities and no one is saying that is not legit. but as the models develop and services are tried what is the scope the fcc should take off the table and there is a debate going on about whether the fcc should totally preclude what is called paid priorty and that doesn't go to the title two issues. so whichever set of rules the fcc picks there can be some limits. they are more constrained on prohib prohibiting these deals but it can allow for some degree even under the common carrier rules as long as they are offered under the same terms. we will get into the weeds no matter what happens here. but i think we need to start with the recognition of moving forward and getting something adopted that is in place and

that is getting through the courts and then we will have to fight about lots of details. >> guest: i agree with quite a bit of what kevin said particularly about the values that he articulated. innovation is important as well and not only innovation at the edge, the content and application providers, but also in the network because innovation can take place there. but to move this forward i want to sume that the commission is going to adopt some new rules and i differ with kevin, i think in this sense, that he menmiinid the difference between the title two and the section 706

commercial reasonableness approach and said it might not make much difference. i think there is a significant difference and i am not sympathetic to the section 706 approach. but i did say the day it leaked it had certain merits so i wanted to try to move it in that direction. i was in the general council office and i understand what is in title two and where it comes

from. and there are -- there is a lot of regulatory baggage that comes with it. under one theory, and i am not going to get too deep in the weeds but there is a theory that the commission could adopt this title two regime and for bear from applying these different requirements and they have to do with things like allocating cost among services, valuing property and getting the fcc's permission for when you have a director that is in common with a director of another company and things like that. and by the way, also, interconnection with networks in a traditional public utility style meeting. there is a lot of baggage. it would not necessarily be easy

for the commission to get rid of the requirements nor could it be done in the short time. aside from the ridgedness there is practical problems. if there is some action, that is far preferable. if it is implemented properly and it would have to be in this way because the court said the commission cannot in effect, assuming it doesn't reclassify, it can't impose a regulation as a practical matter and that is just like common carrier reg lareg -- regulation -- so the key is to make suefficient flexibility for the internet providers to

experiment with new models and just to presume that absent showing of consumer harm or market failure and possibly there could be that. but at least go in with the presumption that the practices are going to be reasonable unless there is evidence to show they are not and place the burden on the party to show unreasonableness. and then you would have a regime that perhaps to get past the issues that has been with us over a decade that we could live with and see if that works that way. >> innovation can occur in the middle of the network and that is true. but i am unsure of claims that my innovation is blocking your innovation which is the way the phone companies and cable companies phrase these. so when at&t says allow us to

prioritize or manage traffic in a way we find suitable that will make our network more efficient we take it with a grain of salt. >> it is the regulators review and potential misjudgments in having the -- that is just the nature of regulations. you can talk and make judgments and i would rather wait and see whether there is an actual marketplace problem and consumer harm before trying to stop something in advance. >> and i am not attributing ill

will to at&t or comcast, although some days i might. the reason at&t, comcast and verizon -- although verizon is quiter, embrace 706 and i believe there is a meaningful difference and understand title 2 the fcc could keep the network open and prevent blocking and monatizing of their network that i think the big companies want to do. they should be allowed to monatize networks but not by saying we are going to charge you more based on how you use them. meaning netflix cost one thing and amazon another thing. and the problem with putting it

on the internet user is these companies are saying everybody on the internet is now a customer of the isp. if i come to cspan.org and visit with my broadbrand connection, c-span is now a customer of my internet service provider and can be charged for the privilege of reaching me and that is the discrimination and priortization that is out of bounds to us. we will not what we are loosing out on once that person is in the driver seat and saying only certain sites will relationship you reach you based on the relationship.

>> guest: a lot of the debate we are having can be on any telecom issues. there is always a reasonable why we should not regulate ahead of time and why we should regulate ahead of time. the question is what is is going on and how are things likely to evolve. part of what is new is realizing how little we actually know. there are all of these relationships inside the internet and most of it is dark. because the fcc hasn't chosen to address the internet core market, there is no transparency about a lot of these interconnection agreements. even in cases like netflix and comcast and it has been reported that netflix is paying comcast. the deal isn't public. one piece of the open internet rules that survived the court

review was a transparency mandate and that is more important than people give credit to and i hope the fcc takes it and runs with it. we need to understand what is going on and might be going on in terms of network management and other practices. and the other piece is we started to talk about something that is not necessarily part of net neutrality but should be in the same debate and that is interconnection. the open internet rules only apply to practices on the access provider's network. so the deal between comcast and netflix isn't subject to the open internet rules regardless of the theory we are talking about. i think it should be in the same basket and we should think about the issues in the same way basically because of what matt described. if an access provider can use terminating access monopoly and

there is multiple transit providers on the internet, once an access provider has enough market power than it can potentially use that to extract holes from other companies across the internet and that is something we should worry about. i would agree with randy saying we don't know that is going to happen and we shouldi

>> over two 3rds of the internet connections are through wireless device and they are not even largely covered by the net neutrality rules. >> i don't think the wireless carriers realize that. >> and most of investment in the last several years has again to the wireless side and that may

tell you something about whether regulation matters. here is the point i want to make, though. if we didn't have any competition then consumers wouldn't have a choice and if a provider did something that is harmful and consumers didn't like it they would not have a place to go. but when you have alternatives and choices, it isn't perfect, but consumers can move to another provider and that is important in this debate. >> there are sump some things we don't want to be blocked on and one is who block and discriminates the least. we feel like looking at the court case after the fcc's loss in january, no matter what they tried to do, whether it was alternative dispute resolution

or stakeholder gatherings that the cop on the beat, if they use section 706 authority they will not be able to prevent bad things from happening. chairman wheeler says that is not true but we think he can't do that. we talked about not seeing market failure today but we have several instances of at&t, comcast, verizon and different areas whether it is the netflix agreements or not. but things like not allowing certain video or chat applications to work on your mobile device. at&t blocks first and allows only later after pressure. so we have seen instances where the carrier retains the control on who gets the services and how they can use them so that is why we feel we need to maintain the

core communication principles for broadbrand and other networks. >> host: when should we look for action by the fcc on this proposal? >> guest: the deadlines are set. everybody thinks they want to do something this year. but deadlines are july and september so it would be speedy to get them tone done a couple months. >> if you want to add your comments to what the fcc is proposing you can go to openinternet at fcc.gov and make your comments. i hope you will come back. unfortunately we are out of time. kevin werbach joining us from

philadelphia, matt wood and randolph may with the state foundation. this was the communicators. c-span, created by america's cable companies 35 years ago and brought to you as a public service by your local cable or satellite provider. here is an update on the mississippi gop senate primary from the hill. state senator chris mcdaniels campaign is continue to fight their loss in the mississippi runoff raising the idea of a new election to settle alleged inaccuracy. his lawyer was surprised at the amount of evidence that continues to come forward that shows there has been election fraud in this case. they are moving forward with legal challenges to the v