FCC all for Net Neutrality

Good news! FCC Chaiman Julius Genachowski announced yesterday the initiation of a policy on net neutrality, based on four principles (pdf) which had been introduced in 2005 but never formalized.

Genachowski is also proposing the addition of two further principles:

• non-discrimination – broadband providers cannot discriminate against particular Internet content or applications.
• transparency – providers of broadband Internet access must be transparent about their network management practices.

Also, here’s some links to the beta versions of two government-operated watchdog sites, set up in the current spirit of transparency, to monitor the progress of the new broadband policy’s development – OpenInternet.gov and broadband.gov. Plus, some low-level network diagnostic tools you can run to keep tabs on your ISP here.

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