A Series of Tubes: Infrastructure, Broadband, and Baseline Content Control

February 11

The late Senator Ted Stevens famously said in a 2006 committee meeting that the “Internet is not something that you just dump something on; it’s not a big truck. It’s a series of tubes.” While he was ridiculed widely at the time, Senator Stevens’s remarks actually reveal an interesting hortatory description of what the Internet should be (though given the rest of his comments, apparently not one that he intended). What Stevens’s metaphor suggests is that the physical conduits of the Internet should act like nothing more than non-judgmental conduits of the rest of the world’s traffic. We will see this week, however, that this is not a true reflection of how the tubes work, and we have strong debates as to what the government's role should be in ensuring that large enough "tubes" reach all those who would like to be online. The big questions for this week: What are the “tubes” of the Internet? Should the tubes have a role in controlling the throughput content? What is the role of government when it comes to developing and regulating our Internet-tubes?

Readings

Understanding and measuring Connectivity

• Ethan Zuckerman & Andrew McLaughlin, Introduction to Internet Architecture and Institutions

• The Berkman Center, How Do We Connect To The Internet? (about 7 mins., watch all)

• Yochai Benkler, Next Generation Connectivity (executive summary and introduction only)

What is the role of government?

• Wikipedia, Net Neutrality

• Susan Crawford, We Can’t All Be Google’s Kansas: A Plan for Winning the Bandwidth Race (Wired)

• Adam Thierer, More Confusion about Internet “Freedom” (Tech Liberation)

Optional Readings

• Sam Biddle, How to Destroy the Internet (Gizmodo)

• Dawn Nunziato, Virtual Freedom (Chs. 1 & 7) (pending)

• Ed Felten, Taking Ted Stevens Seriously

Assignment 1

Assignment 1 is due before class today (i.e., February 11th before 5:30pm ET). You can submit the assignment here.

Class Discussion

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