Back in the day, the net neutrality issue was extremely polarized.  On one hand were folks who took an extremely laissez faire approach to the internet, and on the other were those who insisted that the large backbone providers must be subject to stiff regulation to ensure the “openness” of the internet.  Right around 2006, Atkinson and Weiser published a paper that proposed a “third way” to ensure net neutrality, calling for legislation that required broadband providers to disclose detailed information on how their networks work, and be subject to antitrust-like oversight by the FCC.  Of course, this proposal never made it to, much less through Congress (although the net neutrality debate is heating up again as a result of the stimulus bill in the current Congress).  Enter Google.

Google, New America, and PlanetLab have partnered to launch Measurements Lab (or M-Lab), a set of tools that allows users and researchers to acquire detailed information about speed, latency, and network structure of ISPs.   With enough data points, this could conceivably allow M-Lab to determine how various ISPs manage, delay, and potentially block traffic.

Information gleaned by this program could allow the digerati to act as external whistleblowers, much like the EFF and Free Press did with Comcast’s BitTorrent blocking.  Massive amounts of public information about ISP’s network architecture and practices could help keep ISPs accountable for their traffic management techniques, making the job of keeping the internet open much easier.