title: Google as colluding surrender monkey. Again. link: https://onemoretech.wordpress.com/2010/08/10/google-as-colluding-surrender-monkey-again/ author: lembobro description: post_id: 128 created: 2010/08/10 18:19:39 created_gmt: 2010/08/10 18:19:39 comment_status: open post_name: google-as-colluding-surrender-monkey-again status: publish post_type: post

Google as colluding surrender monkey. Again.

First we had the stealth capitulation to Chinese censorship (and maybe worse).

Now capitulation to corporate domination of the Internet.

Ryan Singel say it all in Why Google became a carrier-humping net neutrality surrender monkey, published by Wired.

Compare and contrast, as Singel does.

From Google’s official blog in 2007:

The nation’s spectrum airwaves are not the birthright of any one company. They are a unique and valuable public resource that belong to all Americans. The FCC’s auction rules are designed to allow U.S. consumers — for the first time — to use their handsets with any network they desire, and download and use the lawful software applications of their choice.

And now the joint statement from Google and its corporate overlord, Verizon, on Monday. Something Singel refers to as “theiir bilateral net neutrality trade agreement“:

We both recognize that wireless broadband is different from the traditional wire-line world, in part because the mobile marketplace is more competitive and changing rapidly,” the joint statement said. “In recognition of the still-nascent nature of the wireless-broadband marketplace, under this proposal we would not now apply most of the [Net Neutrality] wire-line principles to wireless, except for the transparency requirement.

Like many others, Singel is justifiably disappointed in Google’s about face. But for those of us who never bought into the idea that any company could “do no evil” once it became as rich and powerful as Google, it is just confirmation of what we’ve come to know about the world.

As I pointed out to someone recently, Teddy Roosevelt was no knee-jerk liberal, no Marxist-Leninist, Socialist, totalitarian, anti-capitalist. But he was a progressive, what used to be called a “good government” type. He cared enough about the environment to establish the National Parks system. He cared enough about people to go after and eventually break up the corporate monopolies that were strangling them economically.

Here’s the thing. It is the job of corporate leaders to maximize profits and returns for their shareholders. They can’t be expected, or trusted, to look out for the public interest. That is the job of government.

It will be interesting to see if the current Administration will have the courage, and compassion, to rise to the occasion as Teddy Roosevelt’s did.

(Did I just intimate that “agreements” like this one between Google and Verizon reek of anti-competitive collusion? Damn right I did.)

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