Sustainability, R&D Key for Internet Future, FCC Workshop Told

Broadband deployment must be seen as an ongoing process, not a one-time conversion, said David Clark, professor and senior research scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab. A plan that addresses sustainable broadband will affect a much larger part of the population, he said, urging focusing on uptake not buildout. Internet isn’t a fixed and final technology: The need for better security, manageability, new sorts of computing devices are driving changes of the Internet, he said. As a result, the industry structure that creates the Internet will change as well, he said. While facilities ownership seems to imply a certain stability, proposals like virtual Internet could potentially split the traditional facilities-based provider into two layers which will shift both the economic structure of the industry and the facilities providers’ ability to implement policy objectives, he said.

Too many people involved in broadband policy conceive of the Internet as a “static, immutable” thing rather than a system and technology that needs to evolve, Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation said. Toward that end “we need legal, regulatory and research policy framework that enables and spurs Internet innovation at all levels, not one that locks into place the current system,” he said.

A core challenge for moving forward is the development of a more robust broadband and Internet research program, Atkinson said. He proposed an increase in government support for research in broadband. That would include increasing support for networking R&D by at least $50 million per year at the National Science Foundation, with additional increases at the Department of Energy and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Additionally, NSF should fund a major upgrade of “campus cyber-infrastructure,” he said. The federal government should also spur more inter-firm and industry-university collaborative research, he said. “We also need to fund small team efforts,” outside the research establishment, he said. This is particularly important in helping to create new architecture and give them access to the research test beds and opportunities to confer, he said.

Atkinson urged the federal government to step up and help create the incentives for “more exploratory and risky research” in telecom and IT technologies if the U.S. is to maintain its role as an innovation leader. Unfortunately the federal government is going in the other direction, he said. In contrast, some European and Asian countries have focused more extensively on broadband and telecom R&D, he said.

It’s clear that we need a new architecture, Atkinson said. The Internet of the future has to support multi- homing, multi-tasking and rapid mobility, he said. Innovation will fall into the hands of end users with the use of more open source software and virtual networks, said Scott Shenker, professor of computer science, University of California Berkley. The future Internet should be robust and realizable, and the Net’s performance behaviors should be predictable, said Taieb Znati, division director with the National Science Foundation. Atkinson envisioned rich audio- visual media for a variety of applications like home monitoring and control, smart grid maintenance, interpersonal communications, distance learning, conferencing and entertainment experience.

Regarding the Internet itself, there may not be a most productive path, but a multiplicity of separately designed and managed networks with common data interchange formats, Atkinson said. It’s also vital to clarify the rules on permitted and non-permitted forms of network management, he said. Relying on “vague, service-stifling generalities, overly prescriptive minutiae, or outright bans, as some legislation proposes, will limit needed research and innovation in the network, he noted. He proposed developing rules for unlicensed and secondary use of spectrum.

Video is perhaps the biggest driver of broadband consumption, officials agreed on a panel on Internet TV. But to ensure a healthy video ecosystem, FCC policy should promote openness and competition, said Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn. The FCC should restrict ISPs from blocking competing Internet TV providers that deliver content over ISP pipes, and ban exclusive deals between ISPs and content providers, she said.

“Disruption is a key engine for positive change,” said Vuze CEO Gilles BianRosa. However, incumbent companies have a “vested interest in preventing the emergence” of potentially competing services like P2P video, he said. The FCC must be “vigilant” to ensure incumbent’s don’t interfere with the delivery of P2P services.

Online video content should be separate from the networks it rides on, said Sezmi President Phil Wiser. “There are regulations that were created in the analog multichannel video era that should not, absolutely not be applied to broadband delivery of video,” he said. ISPs “don’t have to be a dumb pipe, but they do have to compete fairly with the things that make the pipe smart.”

Cable operators have no incentive to restrict customer access to online video, said CableLabs CEO Richard Green. “It’s very important in a competitive world … to make sure customers are happy,” he said. “It’s incorrect to think that cable operators would do something on the broadband platform to in some way disadvantage customers for the advantage of some other part of their business because this part of the business is very important to them.” Content providers and network operators should work together to provide an optimum experience to the customer, he said. Increased video consumption doesn’t have to overwhelm the network, but technical people from both sides of the equation need to join forces, he said.

Conversations need to include more than just big ISPs and major production studios, said Sohn. Much Web video content comes from users and independent film makers, said Sohn. “If it is just … these dark and smoky rooms with the big ISPs and Hollywood, there’s great opportunity for collusion” and other anti-competitive activities, she said. BianRosa agreed, saying if competing video providers like Vuze aren’t included, “we might just get squeezed out.”