We Win One

This is a significant victory for those of us who desire a free and open Internet:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of the Federal Communications Commission said Thursday that he would recommend that Comcast, the nation’s largest cable company, be punished for violating agency principles that guarantee customers open access to the Internet.

The potentially precedent-setting move stems from a complaint that Comcast had blocked Internet traffic among users of a certain type of file-sharing software that allowed them to exchange large amounts of data.

“The commission has adopted a set of principles that protects consumers access to the Internet,” the commission chairman, Kevin J. Martin, told The Associated Press late Thursday. “We found that Comcast’s actions in this instance violated our principles.”

That's George Bush's FCC Commissioner, just so you remember.

At the Save the Internet blog Tim Karr calls this a win for organized people over organized money. Clearly Comcast tried everything they could to prevent accountability on this, including stacking open FCC meetings with sleeping seat warmers. Ultimately, common sense and the principle of net neutrality prevailed.

But it needs to go beyond principle or even precedent and become codified into law. Virtually every Democratic Senate challenger supports the concept of net neutrality and legislation like the Internet Freedom Preservation Act, so we'll have more votes in the Senate for this after November. For now, let's leverage this victory.