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GUEST: Gigi B. Sohn, President and Co-Founder of Public Knowledge

Members of the SavetheInternet.com coalition joined legal scholars from the nation’s top law schools filed a petition and complain last Thursday against Comcast. The “Petition for Declaratory Ruling,” calls on the Federal Communications Commission to take action against Comcast for what they say is the cable company’s interference with subscribers’ peer-to-peer file sharing. The Associated Press recently uncovered that Comcast was hindering legal file sharing networks such as BitTorrent, Gnutella, and Lotus Notes. Internet advocacy groups say that such actions violate the FCC’s “Internet Policy Statement,” and are a sign of things to come if net neutrality is ended. Comcast, for its part, has claimed that it isn’t blocking file sharing and that its so-called “delaying” of peer-to-peer traffic was for reasons of managing its network. In the complaint against Comcast, Free Press and Public Knowledge are asking the FCC to fine the cable company 195,000 dollars for every affected subscriber. Comcast is the largest cable company in the nation and is the second largest internet service provider with nearly 13 million subscribers.

For more information, visit www.publicknowledge.org and http://savetheinternet.com