Subject: My Views on Net Neutrality
From: Atul Vaibhav
Date: 06-Apr-15 3:04 AM
To: advqos@trai.gov.in

Dear TRAI,

This is in reference to your "Consultation Paper On Regulatory Framework for Over-the-top (OTT) services, 27th March, 2015"

In my views TSP's should not be given the control of how OTT services are regulated.

Going through your paper I realized, this matter is all about the services provided by the TSP's and the revenue they get in return.

In past the TSP's were making a great profits but due to advancement of internet technology their expected traditional sources of revenue dropped significantly. So now to maintain their growing profits they want to control how end-user uses their resources to access 'OTT' apps/services. TSP's say that the demand of new technology and better resources are increasing day-by-day thus require more investments.

This is pure greed of money.

This is like Electricity Companies saying that they will charge different for electricity used by Television and different rate for electricity used by AC, because using AC puts more load and thus requires Electricity companies to use better technology/resources.
or, The Water Authority saying that they will charge different rates for water being used for cooking and water used for washing clothes!

The TSP's role in today's internet is to provide a network where Internet traffic can flow freely and fastly and in return they should charge accordingly but only for the resources they are providing. Why are they trying to increase their profit on accounts of increased usage of OTT services?

Among multiple outcomes which might occur if this step is taken, here are few which came to my mind:
1. Loss of privacy, as TSP will have access to the content accessed by end-user.
2. Drastic reduction in use of Internet services and Internet as a whole, which I believe is not a good sign for a developing nation.
3. Huge discomfort in general public for making things more complicated and costly.

--
Atul Vaibhav