Network Neutrality andQuality of Service
What a Non-Discrimination RuleShould Look Like
Barbara van Schewick | June 11, 2012
Network Neutrality and Quality of Service:What a Non-Discrimination Rule Should Look LikeBarbara van Schewick
ABSTRACT
Over the past ten years, the debate over "network neutrality" has remained one of the centraldebates in Internet policy. Governments all over the world, including the United States, theEuropean Union, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, have been investigating whetherlegislative or regulatory action is needed to limit the ability of providers of Internet accessservices to interfere with the applications, content and services on their networks.Beyond rules that forbid network providers from blocking applications, content andservices, non-discrimination rules are a key component of any network neutrality regime. Non-discrimination rules apply to any form of differential treatment that falls short of blocking. Policymakers who consider adopting network neutrality rules need to decide which, if any, forms ofdifferential treatment should be banned. Network neutrality proponents generally agree thatnetwork neutrality rules should preserve the Internet’s ability to serve as an open, general-purpose infrastructure that provides value to society over time in various economic and non-economic ways. There is, however, a lot of uncertainty on how to get from a high-levelcommitment to network neutrality to a specific set of rules.The decision for a non-discrimination rule has important implications: Non-discriminationrules affect how the core of the network can evolve, how network providers can manage theirnetworks, and whether they can offer Quality of Service.
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Often, it is not immediately apparenthow a specific non-discrimination rule affects network providers’ ability to offer Quality ofService. At the same time, it is unclear which forms of Quality of Service, if any, a networkneutrality regime should allow.This paper proposes a framework that policy makers and others can use to chooseamong different options for network neutrality rules and uses this framework to evaluate existingproposals for non-discrimination rules and the non-discrimination rule adopted by the FCC in itsOpen Internet Order. In the process, it explains how the different non-discrimination rules affectnetwork providers’ ability to offer Quality of Service and which forms of Quality of Service, if any,a non-discrimination rule should allow.
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While the original Internet provides a single best-effort service for all packets (i.e., the network does its best todeliver data packets, but does not provide any guarantees with respect to delay, bandwidth or losses), a network thatprovides Quality of Service offers different types of service to different data packets.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.............................................................................................................................iv
INTRODUCTION..........................................................................................................................................1
A FRAMEWORK FOR EVALUATING NETWORK NEUTRALITY RULES................................................7
PROPOSALS FOR NON-DISCRIMINATION RULES...............................................................................11
Scope of Non-Discrimination Rules...................................................................................................11
All- or Nothing-Approaches.................................................................................................................13
Allow All Discrimination (or “No Rule Against Discrimination”)...........................................................13
Ban All Discrimination.........................................................................................................................14
Case-by-Case Approaches..................................................................................................................16
Ban Discrimination That Violates an Antitrust Framework.................................................................17
Ban Discrimination That Is Anticompetitive or Harms Users..............................................................22
Ban Discrimination That Is Unreasonable..........................................................................................24
Problems with Case-by-Case Adjudication.........................................................................................25
More Nuanced Rules............................................................................................................................32
Formal Approaches: Ban Discrimination That Is Not Disclosed.........................................................32
Substantive Approaches: Protecting the Application-Blindness of the Network.................................38
Ban Discrimination Among Like Applications and Classes of Applications, but Allow DiscriminationAmong Classes of Applications That Are Not Alike and Application-Agnostic Discrimination........40
Ban Application-Specific Discrimination, But Allow Application-Agnostic Discrimination...............52
THE FEDERAL COMMUNICATONS COMMISSION’S NON-DISCRIMINATION RULE..........................59
ENDNOTES................................................................................................................................................65
REFERENCES...........................................................................................................................................96
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