Net Neutrality Author Wu Adds to FTC’s Academic Fire-Power on Internet, Mobile Policy

"I like Tim Wu personally and respect him, but I am sorry to see the FTC hire him,” President Randolph May of the Free State Foundation told us by e-mail. “Basically, even in dynamic markets subject to rapid technological change, Wu’s default position is to assume the need for regulation."

Wu will start Monday as a special adviser on Internet and mobile competition and consumer matters in the FTC Office of Policy Planning, which helps develop and carry out long-range efforts “and advises staff on cases raising new or complex policy and legal issues,” his law school announced Tuesday. “Tim is an incredibly bright and creative thinker and the FTC can never have too deep of a bench,” said FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz. “Although he may be known for his work on net neutrality, here at the FTC he'll be working on issues at the nexus of consumer protection, competition, law and technology."

"I think there are critical periods in industry formation where there is a strong need for a public voice,” Wu said in the announcement, and “the FTC’s broad mandate of consumer protection and competition policy makes it an extremely important agency right now. The Internet platform has given rise to new and hard problems of privacy, data retention, deceptive advertising, billing practices, standard-setting and vertical foreclosure just to name a few. The FTC is the agency at the front line of these issues.” He declined to elaborate.

Hiring people like Wu and Felten is an “especially good move by the FTC, since its broad mandate to take on unfair or deceptive trade practices -- typically not further specified by law -- means it has to think carefully about what issues to take on and what to let slide in the rapidly evolving Internet space,” said Jonathan Zittrain, a Harvard University professor of law and of computer science. Representatives of the activist groups Free Press, the Media Access Project and Public Knowledge didn’t get back to us right away.

"It’s more than a bit ironic,” just when the president “is making overtures to the U.S. business community and initiating a new initiative to reduce regulatory burdens, that the FTC brings on board perhaps one of the strongest advocates in the United States for regulating the Internet ecosystem, and someone who firmly believes that the Internet is evolving into a set of anti-consumer monopolies,” said President Robert Atkinson of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.

Atkinson predicted that the “FTC and FCC will be heading in slightly different directions.” FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski “is focused on issues like making USF more market-based” after concentrating last year on net neutrality, he said. “With the addition of Ed Felten and Tim Wu, the indications are the FTC will be heading in the other direction, toward much more active intervention and regulation of the digital economy.”

"Technology policy is not just about the FCC,” said Kevin Werbach, an associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of business who worked at the commission during the Clinton administration and on the FCC transition after the 2008 elections. “The Obama Administration recognizes the expertise that academics can provide to enhance the policy process. … In the midst of the public policy process, it’s difficult for government officials and staff to think broadly about the total picture, which is what academics get paid to do. At the same time, it’s valuable for academics like Felten and Wu to see the challenges of taking thoughtful ideas and turning them into workable policies. It’s challenging -- some of my friends who went into the Obama Administration from academia burned out after only a few months.”

"The FCC has historically been much closer to a particular industry sector, which is the telecommunications industry,” Crawford said. “The FTC has a longstanding reputation as a truly independent agency.” Hiring Wu and Felten shows that “Leibowitz can attract very well-known academics to his side.” Genachowski also has recruited “high-quality people,” such as aide Steven Waldman, she said. But “the FCC has clearly struggled the past two years to find its way forward without upsetting too many apple carts,” Crawford said. Felten has concentrated on privacy and Wu on competition, and the FTC has broader responsibilities than the FCC for these matters, she said.

It will be difficult for Wu to get a great deal done if he stays at the FTC for only a short time during his leave from Columbia, Crawford said, but he may affect outcomes on immediate matters such as Google’s proposed acquisition of ITA. “It’s good to have a brilliant mind in your office for a few months.” Wu’s leave runs through July and he would need to seek an extension to return to the law school after staying away longer, a school spokesman said.

The work of Stuart Benjamin, a Duke University law professor who’s the FCC’s distinguished scholar in residence, shows the benefits of bringing academic experts into agency deliberations, said Blair Levin of the Aspen Institute, who ran the creation of the National Broadband Plan. “He played a wonderful devil’s advocate role,” showing how someone in this kind of position has the opportunity to “ask probing questions."

It’s clear that Wu and Felten “are very smart guys who know about the industry,” Levin said. What’s not as clear “is their ability to work in an institution,” as Benjamin has shown that he can, he said. If they can appreciate the agency’s problems, they “can be enormously effective,” Levin said.