If ever there was a time

From almost the first time a dial-up modem was used to access data services over the phone lines, the Internet community and the telecom industry have been at odds with each other. For long periods of time, negotiated settlements create an uneasy peace, but those moments of quiet are temporary harbors. The next battle always looms.

The Net neutrality debate is really only the latest such skirmish, although it has taken on the characteristics of a holy war. Viewed in the perspective of the longer conflict, however, it becomes obvious that this conflict must be settled as past issues were, not with regulations or political policies but with what both sides can understand best: better technology and solid business negotiations.

There is a track record here that should not be forgotten. For example, when the Web first took off, people used dial-up modems to go online. But the local phone network couldn't handle a sudden flood of very long phone calls tying up local switch ports. Consumers howled when they got big phone bills for dial-up modem calls that crossed invisible LATA boundaries or local measured service limits.

That could have been the end of the Internet as we know it, if some clever folks hadn't figured out how to engineer an ISP network to create local points of presence that consumers could dial into and if the competition for customers hadn't shifted the business model very quickly into flat-rate Internet service. Network investment matched the continuing demand, and innovation gave birth to broadband.

All that data traffic then began to clog transport networks, and companies such as AT&T, MCI and Sprint faced a nightmare of network congestion. That could have been the end of the Internet as we know it, but instead, some clever engineers determined ways of using DWDM to squeeze more bits onto existing fiber lines. An interconnectivity model emerged that used peering in new ways, and the Internet continued its phenomenal growth.

Now we once again face The End of the Internet As We Know It, according to dire predictions. And telecom players again are digging in their heels against the “Internet should be free” thinking.

If ever there was a time for a technological answer to this dilemma, this is it. The same bright minds who have solved previous conflicts are, no doubt, hard at work on this one. Bandwidth won't be free — nothing that valuable ever is or should be — but by providing more bandwidth, issues of contention can be addressed without, heaven forbid, an act of Congress. Because, as history also teaches us, danger lies ahead in that direction.