The case against tiered broadband: It’s a drag on the economy!

I would prefer to not be saddled with tiered broadband from my access provider, but the market dictates that that is what I will have. Unfortunately the Pols want to respond with more regulation instead of opening the market. Without adequate competition, more regulation could easily turn the present broadband duopoly into the broadband Soup Nazi. Just imagine “no Skype for you“! Give us competition and let the duopoly try to hang onto their tiered structure if they can!

Om Malik eloquently makes the case against tiered broadband for another reason, it stifles innovation and imposes a drag on our economy:

It should come as no surprise: Incumbents are beginning to act like incumbents. But while the cable companies are the first ones to jump on the tiered broadband bandwagon, they won’t be the last. Their argument for limiting bandwidth and data transfers based on price sounds like a good idea, especially as a way to get bargain hunters to buy. In the long run, however, tiered broadband is a terrible idea that will bring the innovation inspired by flat-rate broadband to a screeching halt.

Flat-rate broadband – however cheap or expensive (depending on your point of view) it might be – inspired the formation of Skype, YouTube, Facebook, Apple’s iTunes and MySpace, amongst others. It allowed us to freely experiment, to embrace both the applications and the ideas they represented, such as VoIP, online video, digital downloads and social networking. (GigaOm)