The butterfly effect was all the rage a few years ago - the idea that a butterfly's wings might create tiny changes in the atmosphere that ultimately cause a tornado to appear (or, for that matter, prevent a tornado from appearing).   It never really grabbed me (probably due some peanut my mother ate when she was pregnant) but this notion from chaos theory of sensitive dependence came rushing back to me yesterday when I read the news about how new life has suddenly been breathed back into the net neutrality debate in the US. 

You will recall the story so far.   The major carrier dinosaurs are desperate to lean on the levers of sector-specific public policy and regulation that they have been party to putting in place over the past several decades, to try and get a bigger piece of the action of the IP world by erecting some new toll booths to charge the likes of Google and Yahoo for 'fast delivery' of their bits over the internet.  Against this longterm, state-created distortion of the free market, those seeking to preserve net neutrality had only one place to go - to the US Congress and to get new protective legislation onto the statute book.  'Foul', cried the big boys - '...let the market determine what happens - we don't need more state intervention or legislation!'  And they got their way - 2006 ended with no net-neutrality protecting law being passed.

So what has this to do with a butterfly's wings?  Well, I regard the war in Iraq as maybe being the butterfly wings which will eventually make a massive impact in this crucial issue of 'INTERnet neutrality' - and closely allied issue of OPLANS and 'LOCALnet neutrality'.   There is little doubt that one of the key reasons why the Republican party were slaughtered at the mid-term elections, thereby delivering control of Congress and the Senate back to the Democrats, was disillusion with the US war in Iraq.

So here are the implications for net neutrality.  Firstly, on December 29th 2006, the US Federal Communications Commission finally approved the AT&T merger with Bell South with the condition that for at least two years, the new telecom behemoth will be forced to treat all online content the same, thereby providing a guarantee of net neutrality for the time being.  It's better than nothing, but not as good as the FCC doing what it should for end users namely, ensuring that on the information super-highway, net neutrailty is a fundamental rule of the road.  

But then, the butterfly flaps its wings.  Democrats have moved back into the majority in Congress led by Ron Wyden in the Senate and Edward Markey in the House say they plan to fight hard to pass a net neutrality bill, and they are already well on the way to reintroducing a bill, broadly the same as the one that failed last year.  Ed Markey, of Massachusetts, will be taking over a key sub-committee that handles Internet issues. He has promised to hold hearings to educate Congress and the public, and to reintroduce his strong net neutrality bill.  Now, given that I regard Massachusetts as my 'second home' and given the mission of the OPLAN Foundation, I am going to try and make contact with Mr Markey and offer my services to him in his efforts to "educate Congress and the Public".  I will keep you posted.

But even more interesting is the fact that at last, the link between INTERnet neutrality and LOCALnet neutrality may be beginning to be formed in peoples' minds.   Read this interesting article by Jim Duffy of Network World entitled, "Study: Publicly owned broadband can spur net neutrality"  which refers to an interesting study recently published by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR).  Now although I do not go along with the basic premise that local government and the public sector needs to build and own local open access infrastructure, it is encouraging that at least the underlying question of LOCALnet neutrality is now well and truly on the Agenda.  With the enlightened help of Ed Markey and others on Capitol Hill, maybe by the end of 2007, it will be blindingly obvious to everyone!  I and the OPLAN Foundation will do all we can to assist by being faithful to our mission of "opening minds to open networks".