I knew I should have paid more attention in typing class. It seems like I’m always getting "fat fingers" and typing the wrong thing in the Internet Explorer address bar. www.cox.com usually ends up www.cox.con and so on. The good thing is that my Internet service catches these mistakes and sends me in the right direction.

Cox calls this Enhanced Error Results – but not everyone likes it. Some argue that it interferes with their Internet experience. Here’s how it works: when you type in a misspelled Web address or simply a keyword in your browser bar, the network attempts to find what you’re looking for online, but if the information you typed is not resolveable to a valid URL, you see a results page with choices. More often than not, the Web site you were looking for is right there, just a click away. This option is presented along with results from sponsors who pay to have their links provided alongside the search results. This is really no different than seeing sponsor ads when you Google “new movie releases.”

Because not everyone likes this service, Cox makes it easy for you to opt out – even providing step-by-step instructions online. Personally, I’m keeping it – it keeps my fat fingers from interfering with my Internet experience.

Congrats to CableLabs! It’s another sign that collaboration truly pays off. CableLabs, the cable industry’s non-profit research and development consortium, announced this week that its awarded “qualification” status to DOCSIS 3.0. What does that mean for the customer? This opens the door to even faster Internet speeds and a broader variety of services that can be offered over cable’s broadband network.

According to CableLabs experts, DOCSIS 3.0 specifications enable “downstream data rates of 160 Mbps or higher and upstream data rates of 120 Mbps or higher.” In the CableLabs release, Cox President Pat Esser is quoted as saying, “This DOCSIS 3.0 specification is yet another example of how cable is continuing to advance the power of broadband. This technology ensures that our customers will have access to the fastest and most robust Internet service available and allows us to introduce a new generation of advanced service offerings to our customers.” Click here to read the full CableLabs announcement.

Not unexpectedly, network neutrality is back on the legislative agenda. In response, two academics—David Farber from Carnegie Mellon University and Michael L. Katz from University of California at Berkeley—authored a thoughtful Washington Post column (“Hold Off On Net Neutrality”) on Friday. In it, they caution that unintended consequences could result from misguided legislative intervention.

The Internet needs a makeover. Unfortunately, congressional initiatives aimed at preserving the best of the old Internet threaten to stifle the emergence of the new one.... Network neutrality is supposed to promote continuing Internet innovation by restricting the ability of network owners to give certain traffic priority based on the content or application being carried or on the sender's willingness to pay. The problem is that these restrictions would prohibit practices that could increase the value of the Internet for customers.

Click here for the entire column. And click here, here and here for past posts in which we’ve expressed similar caution about network neutrality and argued that the marketplace—not legislation—should be the arbiter of what’s best for consumers and for the Internet’s future.

An impassioned post from Bill Moyers and Scott Fogdall about net neutrality comes on the heels of Moyers’ “The Net at Risk” documentary on PBS this week. While we disagree with Moyers on the need for net neutrality legislation and regulation, we can certainly get behind much of his message—namely, that the Internet is the “most democratic of media” and is rapidly evolving.

The phenomenal growth of the Internet certainly continues. This creates some serious challenges for network owners, complicated further by bandwidth-intensive multimedia, file sharing and other applications requiring huge amounts of bandwidth. ISPs are rightfully concerned that some proponents of network neutrality are casting such a wide net that the ability of ISPs to effectively manage the traffic on their networks could be impeded. For example, as the amount of traffic from VoIP telephone, gaming, digital video recorders and steaming video increases, ISPs must prioritize those demands in a way that best serves their customers. ISPs therefore need to maintain the right to manage their networks for the good of their customers.

From the Moyers/Fogdall post: "So the Internet is reaching a crucial crossroads in its astonishing evolution. Will we shape it to enlarge democracy in the digital era? Will we assure that commerce is not its only contribution to the American Experience?"
Our answer to both questions is an emphatic “Yes.” And we feel strongly that can and should happen without government-mandated net neutrality restrictions that would likely stifle competition by prohibiting network diversity and ultimately harm Internet users. That's something we can all support.