Pro Net Neutrality Documents There's nothing fair in Net neutrality By Scott Cleland Philadelphia Inquirer September 27, 2006 Craig Newmark's twisted sense of "Internet fairness" in his Sept. 12 commentary on Net neutrality ("Heed the threat to Internet fairness") cannot go unchallenged. Newmark's claim that Net neutrality is about "fairness" is bogus. Is it fair to assume people are guilty until proven innocent, as the proposed legislation does in punishing all broadband providers, not based on any proof, only on hypothetical allegations? Is it fair to take from consumers the wonderful diversity of competitive choice, customization and personalization they enjoy today, and replace it with one regulated "neutral" choice for all? Is it fair to force the average American, who uses relatively little bandwidth, to pay higher prices to subsidize the voracious bandwidth-hogging appetites of dot-com billionaires? Is it fair to apply monopoly regulation to free services, small companies and "persons" with no market power, as the proposed legislation does? Finally, in the interests of fair disclosure, Newmark conveniently omitted the fact that Craig's List is 25 percent owned by eBay, which is leading the lobbying for, and has a large financial stake in, the outcome of Net-neutrality legislation. Scott Cleland Chairman, Net Competition.org President, Precursor LLC McLean, Va.