On Tuesday May 27, 2008 between 11:30 am and 1:30 pm, the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic at the University of Ottawa, and other prominent supporters such as Michael Geist, will be sponsoring a Net Neutrality Rally on Canada’s Parliament Hill.

The net neutrality rally is intended to foster greater Internet competition, innovation and consumer rights:

1. Canadian Competition:

  • To stop vertical market leveraging at the expense of new entrants
  • To prevent incumbent cable/telco duopoly control of the Internet

(see, for example Geist’s Bell’s Throttling Plan a Threat to a Competitive Net)

2. Canadian Innovation:

  • To promote an environment conducive to the development of new and innovative content and web services by Canadian entrepreneurs

3.  Canadian Consumer Rights:

  • to promote ISP transparency
  • to promote consumer privacy
  • to demand that ISPs provide the advertised Internet access services that Canadian consumers pay for

If you live in the Ottawa/Hull area, please participate.

For more information see my net neutrality topic on my iMedia law blog. For a good primer, see Prof Ed Felten’s ‘Nuts and Bolts of Net Neutrality‘.

Dale Dietrich is a Toronto-based technology, video game, and interactive media attorney. Read more at The Daleisphere.