Newish tech companies like Netflix, Tumblr, and Vimeo are lobbying in favor of federal regulations on net neutrality. In the past, giant content providers like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have supported some sort of net neutrality regulation.
Bloomberg News has an interesting story about other companies supposedly quietly pushing for more regulation:
Network giants like Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T, meanwhile, are lobbying against it. This fight promises to be lucrative for lobbyists.
The companies deny lobbying for the rules, but the Bloomberg report suggests the evidence is strong that they are backing the rules.
Meanwhile, some write as if big money is only on one side of the fight. Sen. Bernie Sanders, D-Vt., for instance, frames the net neutrality push as a way to “stand up to the army of Comcast and Verizon lobbyists.” Sure, but — if the Bloomberg report is true — you could use the same framing to say the pro-regulation push is about “standing arm-in-arm with Bank of America.”
San Francisco Chronicle columnist Jon Carroll similarly says the pro-regulation side is a way to “rein in special interests.” Carroll is correct, but passing the regs also amounts to protecting the profit model of other special interests. Carroll accuses opponents of the regs of trying to “get on the gravy train.” Do Ford and Bank of America not have their own gravy trains?
This is Washington. There’s money on both sides.
