Concert Rallies Against Internet Regulation

WASHINGTON -- Three rock bands and a crisp blue sky attracted several hundred young people to the west steps of the Capitol recently for a rally opposing a bill that would regulate Internet voice transmission like telephone service.

The bill's sponsors, Reps. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin, R-Louisiana, and John Dingell, D-Michigan, argue that their proposal would provide consumers a better choice among Internet service providers. House Resolution 1542, called the Internet Freedom and Broadband Deployment Act of 2001, has been making its way through Congressional committees.

Vested Interest in Voice

The rally was sponsored by a pair of admittedly interested players, two companies that market voice-over-Internet communications services as unregulated competitors to telephone companies. Pulver.com sells an Internet phone service as well as managing conferences; and Vonage is an Internet communications company that markets voice-over-IP, or VoIP, services.

Treating VoIP like telephone service is akin to "trying to put a round peg in a square hole," said Dan Berninger, a managing director at Pulver.com, at the rally last weekend.

"How do you take the old regulatory framework of the telephone system and apply it to the Internet?" Berninger asked. "You can't."

Jeff Pulver, chief executive of Pulver.com, organized a similar event last year to oppose an earlier House bill that would have assessed access charges on voice transmission over the Internet.

The bill would bring Internet voice applications under the jurisdiction of the Federal Communications Commission and the courts, where they would be treated as telecommunications, Pulver says in a notice on his company's Web site. He contends regulation would stifle an emerging industry that is good for consumers.

Lobbying Between Tunes

Sandwiched between the afternoon's six speakers from Internet and communications companies were three musical acts, including the popular band Stroke 9.

The Washington band Satellite Red was the most vocal of the day's performers in opposing the bill.

"If you remember anything from today," singer Maura Colleton shouted to the crowd at the end of the band's performance, "remember these four numbers and that they're bad," pointing to her shirt with the bill number 1542 with a red slash through it.

While Pulver acknowledges that much of the young crowd came for the music and probably wasn't aware of the cause before attending, he hopes that they learned something.

"I hope they go home and tell their parents to write their congressmen," Pulver says. "But even more than that, I hope they now know that there's legislation out there that will affect Internet regulation."

Pulver says he has been trying to get Congress to declare an Internet Freedom Day, but has met with little success. He said he plans to make the rally an annual event, claiming there will always be legislation that will affect the regulation of the Internet.