A few weeks ago, we talked about Dutch mobile phone carriers planning to charge for the use of different kinds of application, such as Skype, WhatsApp, and so on. They would check people’s data traffic using deep packet inspection, and charge accordingly. This led to a massive outrage here in this glorified swamp – and this outrage has had its effect.
Our parliament stood up to defend the concept of net neutrality, and as such, motioned the government to have it added to our telecommunications act. Not only will this prohibit carriers from forcing customers to pay additional fees for specific types of data, it also prohibits them from blocking certain types of traffic – something the Dutch branch of Vodafone is already doing by blocking VoIP services. This applies to regular internet service providers as well.
Our current minister of economic affairs, Maxime Verhagen, has complied, and is currently writing the actual amendment. Adding net neutrality to our telecommunications act needs to be tested against regulations from the EU. Luckily though, Neelie Kroes, European commissioner for digital agenda, is against blocking or throttling certain types of data, and has started a pan-European investigation into the matter. She plans to ‘name and shame’ those carriers that employ these tactics later this year. She even went as far as saying she might prohibit blocking and throttling altogether.
“I will specifically monitor all cases of unannounced blocking or throttling of different types of data and misleading information about internet speeds,” Kroes said, “If I am not entirely satisfied that consumers can counter this by voting with their feet and easily change providers, I will not hesitate to take swift action. If rules to encourage competition will not lead to providers offering real choice to consumers, I will be ready to ban the blocking of legitimate services.”
I have to admit that, as sceptical of politicians and governments as I am, I did not see this coming. I have to say I’m actually a little proud that the Dutch parliament has taken such a clear stance on this matter, and that net neutrality will now become an integral part of our telecommunications act. This is a great win for the free and open web, but as some have already noted in the Dutch media, a lot will depend on the actual wording of Verhagen’s proposal; if the wording is vage or ambiguous, carriers and ISPs might still be able to abuse loopholes.
In the meantime, however, the carrier that started all this, KPN, has stated it’s simply going to push forward with its plans – the law be damned. They’ll of course have to await the actual wording of Verhagen’s proposal, but for now, they see little reason to cease taking preparations to introduce the new types of contracts this summer. Vodafone, which has been blocking VoIP services since 2009 and also uses deep packet inspection, is still working on its official response. T-Mobile, the last of the three mobile carriers in The Netherlands, previously said it was thinking about following KPN and Vodafone, but has now backtracked from that, stating they have no plans.
UPDATE, June 8th 2011: The Netherlands Second Country to Codify Net Neutrality After Chile. More info and commentary at the link.
Your “glorified swamp” is one of the last strongholds of common sense in the world. In more ways than one.
“meanwhile, at the Legion of Doom…”
That’s what that reminded me of, since the Legion of Doom was in the swamp and all…
I have a love/hate relationship with the Dutch. On one hand, I can go to Amsterdam and smoke weed in coffee shops while doing some window shopping so that’s definitely a place I’d want to live, but on the other hand, somebody needs to teach them how to make subtitles optional when they post movies on P2P and Usenet instead of always hard-coding them
At least they don’t dub the audio like the french or the germans 😉
LMAO, touché… especially on pornos
they dub porn? what…they moan in french?
Oh man, I’ll never forget the time I watched Miami Vice dubbed to German. it was awesome.
That’s nothing compared to “Wargames” with russian talk-over (so you can hear the original voices in the background), with three voice actors (two male, one female) doing all the characters of the movie. 🙂
And Iceland, which is currently throttling air traffic to Amsterdam
Edit: That was supposed to be a reply to above, I am really not with it this evening.
Edited 2011-05-26 18:31 UTC
I wish we imported a few more of our laws from there rather than from our neibours south of the border.
Only right, being the 51st state and all.
Say, I have a question.. why is the white house painted white?
Not sure why you asked, but I think this is the best explanation I could find:
http://www.snopes.com/language/colors/whitehouse.asp
Edited 2011-05-26 23:11 UTC
Prior to the fire it was the Mauve Mansion.
Ha. Nicely played sir.
Are you saying that it should be colored brown now because of Obama?
What if Obama would divorce and re-marry, would that make her the 2nd lady?
Edited 2011-05-27 01:56 UTC
How exactly do you make the jump in thinking from “why is the white house painted white?” to some ratial or current US politics spin?
If you take better care of your straw men, they will last longer. Just a friendly tip.
Pretty wicked sick news Thommy boy.
Congratulations, this is another example of the Dutch having the most progressive and enlightened legislation. Okay, sometimes they fuck up, but that’s still better than here in Germany where they seem to fuck up every time. Cheers! 🙂
Or Belgium, where they have turned ‘fucking up’ into an art form.