Topolski, who seems now to be in the employ of the lobbying group Free Press (Gee, I wish I was a big money lobbyist with the cash to hire just one person, let alone dozens, to lobby in DC — but instead I’m doing something productive with my life), has fired back, with a response that comes across as rather petulant and whiny, at http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035161.

The Nation Cable & Telecommunications Association (a cable providers’ industry group) has filed a very good comment noting that every top tier university in the United States restricts or filters P2P; see http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035296. (And thank Heaven that the schools do it; research would grind to a halt if they did not.)

Free Press lawyer Marvin Ammori and MAP lawyer Harold Feld met with Kevin Martin’s office and encouraged the FCC to stick it to Comcast.. (Gee, where do these two corporations — actually, they’re three corporations, because Free Press is composed of two corporations as a way of circumventing the tax code — get the money for all of these lawyers? We small ISPs, as legitimate businesses with budgets, can’t afford them.) See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035356.

MediaCom points out that its own AUP also prohibits P2P and the operation of servers, and that this is appropriate and good for quality of service. See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035357

Ammori visited with Commissioner Copps’ office, undoubtedly providing unsolicited advice on how to strangle Comcast. See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035358.

The CWA chimes in to support Free Press, demonstrating that the entire issue is becoming polarized along party lines: Democrats and unions on one side, Republicans (except for Kevin Martin?) and corporations on the other. And the actual small ISPs like me who can provide competition? I don’t get to speak to the Commissioners; I’m lucky if I can get a few minutes with their aides. See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035467.

A law firm hired by Comcast fires back with a brief refuting the recent submissions by the lobbying lawyers of MAP and Free Press. See http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035474

And so it goes. All that money flying about, and no one considering the actual issue of what’s best for citizens. Well, about all I can do is go out and climb onto another rooftop (I’m installing for another rural resident this afternoon whom we’ve just freed from having to use dialup.) If the FCC won’t let me and people like me make a difference (and if they regulate us, we won’t be able to), they’re hurting our country.

By the way, I was gratified today to see one single submission in the docket that wasn’t from a lawyer, a paid lobbyint, or the Free Press astroturf “spam generator.” It’s from the host of this blog, Richard Bennett, at http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/retrieve.cgi?native_or_pdf=pdf&id_document=6520035605