Hard though it may be to take a pink site seriously, if you care about the future of internet access, you owe it to yourself to read David Weinberger’s broadside against the telecommunications industry, “Delamination Now!” David worries that “the incumbent carriers” are trying to turn the Internet into cable television, with a pricing model that will allow them to charge different amounts for different types of data or favor one content provider over another.

Network neutrality, the flipside of the current carriers’ model, would treat a bit as a bit, and nothing more. Payment to wholesale providers would be made for bandwidth used, while a new breed of ISPs could compete by offering different services: anonymity from one, outrageous connection speeds from another. David’s piece is passionate, heartfelt, and sure to provoke debate.

One wonders, as well, how the recent FCC decision regarding the upcoming auction of the 700 mHz spectrum - soon to be freed when analog television signals are “switched off” - will affect the discussion. Google had asked the FCC to do, essentially, what David Weinberger is asking for: require the winner to sell access to the network on a wholesale basis to rivals. While many media outlets are lost in a half-empty / half-full debate over who came out best in the ruling, Wired’s Charlie Sorrel is excited at the prospect of Google purchasing the whole thing and eventually building a free, ad-supported wireless network.

It’s hard not to root for optimism in the face of statements from those such as Steve Largent of the CTIA, the trade association of the wireless industry: “We remain committed to the principle that wireless consumers and American taxpayers are best served when such a valuable commodity is auctioned in a fair and competitive manner with no strings attached.” That sounds to me like a disingenuous way of saying that once a bone has been tossed to the notion of competition, the winning company will be free to monopolize their prize as they please. Delamination now, indeed.

(P.S. I realize that David’s page is pink because of the recurring motif of the princess phone, but still.)