The US Federal Communications Commission has set a date for the first of many hearings the commission will hold in pursuing its commitment to net neutrality.
The FCC’s October 22 meeting will serve as a venue to discuss and possibly approve its plans. If implemented, the new regs would be the first to ensure protocol and bandwidth agnosticism in the United States.
The debate surrounding net neutrality heated up last week when FCC chairman Julius Genachowski announced his commitment to pursuing it. The chairman said that the evolutionary and open nature of the Internet should not stop the commission from ensuring its continued growth.
“I recognize that if we were to create unduly detailed rules that attempted to address every possible assault on openness, such rules would become outdated quickly,” he said. “But the fact that the Internet is evolving rapidly does not mean we can, or should, abandon the underlying values fostered by an open network, or the important goal of setting rules of the road to protect the free and open Internet.”
In light of the announcement, both the telecom industry and the GOP have mobilized to block efforts which they perceive to be unnecessary regulatory oversight. Congress also briefly entertained the idea of stopping the FCC, but has since backed down and decided in favor of direct communication.
For a complete overview of the FCC’s net neutrality plan, the commission has established the openinternet.gov website designed to explore the topic throughout its road to implementation.
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