Rep. Cox Urges FCC Chairman Powell to Protect Against Government Regulation of Internet Telephony
Title: Rep. Cox Urges FCC Chairman Powell to Protect Against Government Regulation of Internet Telephony
February 9, 2004
Mr. Michael K. Powell Chairman
Federal Communications Commission
445 12th Street, Southwest
Washington, D.C. 20024
Dear Chairman Powell:
I write to express my support for Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services, and for your leadership in ensuring that the FCC does not become the Federal Computer Commission. The largely unregulated software market and computer industry have a history of innovation that the highly regulated telephone market cannot match, and therefore I share your reluctance to bring 1930s-era telephone regulation into these hi-tech industries. The heavy regulation of telecommunications that began in the age of analog scarcity and dominant carriers does not fit well with software services on the open platform of the Internet in our era of digital abundance.
There is robust competition in today's market for voice software applications. In fact, a number of securities analysts recently testified to Chairman Upton's Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee that the cable industry, the traditional telephone industry, wireless companies, and numerous stand-alone software firms are all competitive in this rapidly evolving market of both voice and video.
Many of the leaders in this rapidly-changing market do not even own any direct connections to the customer. The most revolutionary of these services allow users to come together on the Internet, without relying at all on the traditional communications firms.
Put simply, the rise of VoIP is a signal that the era of the dominant carrier is over. A packet of digital data bears little resemblance to a traditional telephone call. Bouncing as it does through servers in various states, it represents the very essence of interstate commerce. This packet might contain voice, a web page, an email, video, an instant message, or any other application. It is not controlled by a monopoly, but by customers who freely choose from a range of services on the global Internet. This packet doesn't need government to set interconnection rates as it travels around the globe -- free men and women on the Internet are efficiently setting those rates every day.
Therefore, rather than deciding which outdated regulations from the telephone industry should be imposed on the Internet, I strongly urge the Commission to recognize that outdated telephone regulations have nothing to offer consumers in a market where competing technologies offer so much consumer choice.
Sincerely,
Christopher Cox
U.S. Representative