Kudos to the New American Foundation's Open Technology Initiative (OTI). Earlier this week, I told Geoff Daily that we would all benefit from some form of a truth-in-labeling requirement for broadband. This should be a no-brainer that both the FCC and FTC embrace because it will educate subscribers and allow them to make better, more informed choices - which is a requirement for a functioning market.
One day later it became apparent that I was too slow in my idea, because OTI already had a prototype. They even have a sample label and have come up with a great set of required disclosures.
To make sure the broadband service is clearly expressed, the Broadband Truth-in-Labeling disclosure should be standardized to comprise several typical elements as indicators of broadband service quality, such as minimum expected speed and latency to the ISP's border router (where the ISP connects to the rest of the Internet) and service uptime. These minimum assurances will be supported by the ISP as guarantees in the delivery of broadband services, backed by technical support and service charge refunds or credits. In addition to the description of minimums being guaranteed of the service, the disclosure should include all applicable fees, a common description of the technology used to provide the services, any service limits such as a bandwidth cap or the application of any traffic management techniques, the length of the contract terms, and a link to all additional terms and conditions. Requirements should be established for disclosing any highly objectionable or surprising terms such as arbitration restrictions or information or data selling.
