Subject: Protect Net Neutrality
From: "Y0urOwnDad ." <mohitkaushal05@gmail.com>
Date: 07-Apr-15 7:09 PM
To: advqos@trai.gov.in

  1. Subject - Protect Net Neutrality
  2.  
  3. Response to Question 1 :
  4. It's way too early to establish such framework for OTT. Doing that will hamper nation's growth. It should be postponed for like 10 years. Let it mature and flourish in our country first.
  5.  
  6. Response to Question 2:
  7. NEVER because it will hamper consumer choice, stifle growth of new kinds of products and services, and impede India’s economic progress. For example, if airline companies decide to offer online customer service through voice chat, an already heavily taxed and loss-making industry should not have to take another license.
  8.  
  9. Response to Question 3:
  10. Radio channels cannot tax television channels for reduction in revenue. Even if OTT players are impacting the traditional revenue streams of TSPs, the TSPs cannot tax OTT services. Market forces should allow TSPs to reach a profitable price-point. TSPs need to invest in the quality and expansion of their existing products. TSPs need to explore outside their traditional revenue streams. India’s economy needs to favour innovative companies’ not outdated incumbents with vested interests.
  11.  
  12. Response to Question 4:
  13. OTT players should NEVER pay TSPs for anything that can entail the violation of principles of Net Neutrality.
  14.  
  15. Response to Question 5:
  16. The Internet IS a levelled playing field for everybody. In today’s world, OTT players do not operate solely in the virtual world but, on the contrary, interact with “REAL” world products and services, and result in creation of innumerable jobs. In an ever more connected world, any law or regulation which breaks this ‘FLAT’ and ‘NEUTRAL’ nature of the Internet would harm economic growth.
  17.  
  18. Response to Question 6:
  19. This question requires a completely separate debate in itself. First and foremost, governments and all companies should respect and uphold the consumer’s Right to Privacy. If we lose privacy, we lose freedom itself because we no longer feel free to express what we think. India cannot be allowed to become a complete surveillance state which taps every OTT service which a consumer accesses. Second, OTT services should be allowed to freely combine and bundle online communication services within applications, and shouldn't be forced to keep data records. For example, an online vegetable ordering service should not be forced to save online communications between a buyer and seller.
  20.  
  21. Response to Question 7:
  22.  All OTT services should adopt state of the art security standards in online communication. And they should keep consumers informed about the right privacy and security choices. In fact, the government should be proactive in making companies aware of such practices.
  23.  
  24. Response to Question 8:
  25. As already answered, NO regulatory framework is required which violates Net Neutrality.
  26.  
  27. Response to Question 9:
  28. Net neutrality should be strictly enforced with the bright line rules as mentioned above and as proposed by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). There is no need to fear surgeries getting affected because some users are hogging all the bandwidth.
  29.  
  30. If tele surgeries were to happen, the concerned hospitals will take dedicated 1GBPS fiber lines which ISPs will specially install to those hospitals. No need for TSPs to worry about such surgeries happening over iPads or iPhones.
  31.  
  32. Response to Question 10:
  33. The only forms of discrimination or traffic management practices that are “reasonable” are network wide measures. Say, if it is a major game day and everybody wants to watch a video live, then everybody’s viewing experience gets affected. That’s it.
  34.  
  35. Response to Question 11:
  36. The TSPs should not be allowed to adopt “traffic management techniques.” That should be defined as illegal and should lead to the cancellation of licenses of said TSPs.
  37.  
  38. Response to Question 12:
  39.  
  40. TSPs are businesses. It’s not the consumer’s headache to worry about how to make any business profitable. Nobody asks an airline user: “who should bear new airplane purchase costs?” Let the TSPs worry about how to “invest in network infrastructure.”
  41.  
  42. CAPs will innovate and grow without the TRAI having to worry about them.
  43.  
  44. Response to Question 13:
  45. The answer is ‘No!’
  46.  
  47. Taking the various non-price based discrimination of services options available to TSPs, here’s a more detailed response.
  48.  
  49. Restrictions undertaken in response to legal obligations are obviously okay. However, restricting specific types of traffic should not be allowed nor should differentiating between providers of types of content or applications.
  50.  
  51. Congestion management, network security and integrity can be legitimate reasons for TSPs to implement temporary restrictions but these should not be long term and TSPs should be legally bound to disclose these temporary measures to customers and the TRAI as well as detailing what steps they are planning to take to ensure there is no network congestion.
  52.  
  53. Providing a congestion-free network is the TSP’s responsibility — if it promises 10 GB data plans or ‘unlimited’ data plans, then it should come up with a network where it is able to standby that promise without resorting to choking, throttling and so on.
  54.  
  55. Zero-rating is acceptable as long as no competitors are complaining about collusion or predatory business practices. If Flipkart gets together with some TSP, it should not lead to problems when the TSP’s customers try to access Amazon or SnapDeal.
  56.  
  57. Application-agnostic congestion management, prioritization, and differentiated throttling as non-price based discrimination of services can all be allowed with adequate regulatory oversight and when TSPs resort to these, all this should be fully disclosed to consumers on their websites.
  58.  
  59. A technique like differentiated throttling should not mean the consumer suffering on an ongoing basis for a prolonged period of time. Hence, terms such as ‘unlimited’ should be clearly defined by the TSPs if they choose to offer them. The ‘Fair Usage Limits’ should be well defined and every TSP usually has them and that is only ‘fair.’
  60.  
  61. TSPs should never have the option to block anything. They should only be allowed to block sites after the appropriate courts issue an order to that effect.
  62.  
  63. In summary, the TSPs should only have access to these discrimination of services for limited periods of time. If these measures are made routine, they will be abused. So, the TRAI should spell out the narrow set of circumstances when such practices are acceptable.
  64.  
  65. If TSPs choose to abuse the limited power they have to go for discrimination of services, their licenses should be liable for cancellation.
  66.  
  67. Response to Question 14:
  68. No.
  69. Again, DO NOT violate the principles of Net Neutrality.
  70.  
  71. Response to Question 15:
  72. No.
  73. ALL data on the Internet is EQUAL. ALL bits are bits, NO need to segregate OTT players. TSPs need to focus on improving their existing products and quality of service.
  74.  
  75. Response to Question 16:
  76. Let the market decide. It’s not the regulator’s domain.
  77.  
  78. OTT apps are not critical defense hardware such as nuclear weapons or missiles. Hence, no need to worry about their ‘indigenization.’
  79.  
  80. Response to Question 17:
  81. Not Applicable (N/A).
  82.  
  83. No need to adopt the ‘Chinese model’ or the ‘French model.’
  84.  
  85. Again, NO regulatory framework required. NO segregation of OTT players required. NO traffic discrimination required. ALL bits are bits. DON'T hamper industry growth. Uphold Net Neutrality.
  86.  
  87. Response to Question 18:
  88. Do Not go down the road of the License Raj. You start with asking whether the OTT communication service players should be licensed and then ask if there is a need to regulate subscription charges for OTT communication services.
  89.  
  90. One set of regulations leading to another set and yet another.
  91.  
  92. Response to Question 19:
  93. Government need not bother itself with the regulation of non-communication OTT players. “Let the buyer beware” should be the governing philosophy.
  94.  
  95. If people choose to opine to the world or share ideas or keep up with friends and do a million other things with millions of apps, it’s not the government’s business to tell people what to do with their lives. It’s inconceivable that the government can even think of ‘regulation of non-communication OTT players.’
  96.  
  97. Response to Question 20:
  98.  Uphold Net Neutrality. Uphold an Open Internet. Uphold the citizens’ Right to Freedom of Speech.