The importance of general purpose PCs and neutral networks
The general purpose computer has been really important in fostering the huge amount of innovation that has accompanied the growth of the Internet. Many (most?) exciting new Internet applications have come about not because big companies invented them, but because ordinary people or small “niche” companies decided to experiment with something new. This experimentation has been made possible by the existence of two circumstances:
- general purpose personal computers that can run any applications
- a “neutral” (Internet) network that carries data from any application
There is no guarantee that these conditions will remain in place, and in fact we must constantly be on the lookout for efforts to change these conditions.
The prevalence of mobile phones, PDAs, iPods, Internet TVs, and a million other consumer devices threatens the “general purpose” PC model. People are increasingly accessing the Internet directly or indirectly through these proprietary “appliances”. These devices for the most part only run applications allowed by the device manufacturer / distributor. If a company such as Skype wants to have their application on one of these devices, they usually must negotiate with the device maker. They may have to pay that company a fee. This not only prevents people from writing their own applications for the devices, but it limits peoples’ ability to run innovative third-party applications. Jonathan Zittrain warns in a Harvard Business Review article of the dangers accompanying this shift from general purpose PCs to proprietary devices.
The importance of network neutrality has been discussed at length elsewhere, but the basic argument is that it would put a damper on innovation if the broadband providers (the telco & cable companies) are able to pick winners in the Internet service and application market. If Time Warner decides to limit the bandwidth alloted to VoIP from any company not paying Time Warner a bribe, for example, then only companies able to pay Time Warner that bribe will be able to gain traction in the VoIP market. (Time Warner customers would be unable to access innovative new VoIP services at competitive speeds.) Time Warner and other cable / telco providers have in fact been making noises about their desire to implement such policies.