While Facebook and Google are still often referred to as "net neutrality supporters" here in the States, they were largely quiet during the latest round in the ongoing fight. That's in part because Google helped AT&T co-write the 2010 rules and was quite pleased that they contained ample loopholes, and given they didn't cover wireless, wouldn't impact Google's Android ambitions.
Both Google and Facebook also have a lot invested in zero rated apps (see
Facebook Zero and
Google Free Zone) and ensuring net neutrality rules don't prohibit them.
Such programs, more popular overseas, usually involve customers getting free, walled-garden access to a select number of content and services. Google and Facebooks efforts are framed as philanthropic efforts, though the focus is obviously reaching billions of new ad eyeballs in developing nations.
In India the net neutrality debate has heated up of late and Facebook's venture into zero rated apps isn't going so well, as previous supporters of the company's Internet.org initiative are jumping ship. Numerous companies have dropped out claiming Facebook and ISPs
shouldn't be in the position of picking winners and losers:
quote:
Facebook partnered with Reliance Communications to launch the app in India in February, the list of services on internet.org, which provides internet access to a limited portion of the internet for free, included a total of 37 websites or apps other than Facebook. Cleartrip posted on their blog that they had withdrawn their association with internet.org entirely, saying that it was against their core DNA, and that was impossible to pretend there is no conflict of interest.
Susan Crawford recently didn't pull any punches when explaining
why Google and Facebook's vision of the Internet is doing users a disservice:
quote:
"For poorer people, Internet access will equal Facebook. That’s not the Internet—that’s being fodder for someone else’s ad-targeting business,” she says. “That’s entrenching and amplifying existing inequalities and contributing to poverty of imagination—a crucial limitation on human life."
Here in the states, both AT&T and T-Mobile have tried to implement zero rated app systems (
Sponsored Data and
Music Freedom, respectively), but not without controversy. While Chile, Canada, Slovenia and The Netherlands have all banned zero rated apps under their net neutrality rules, the FCC so far has given every indication they'll support such models despite the agency's shiny new neutrality rules.
