N-TEN and the Innovation Funders Network, together with the Surdna Foundation and the funder affinity group GFEM, recently hosted a funder briefing with John Podesta, Ben Scott (Free Press), and Mike McCurry on Net Neutrality; laying out the main issues and helping funders understand the significance of the debate. The Chronicle of Philanthropy in its 6/30 issue features an overview of the call. The article is available to subscribers only - if you want to see the full copy, please contact us: Charities Urged to Monitor Congress Internet Debate.

A few excerpts:

The controversy involves "net neutrality" (short for "network neutrality") - the principle that phone and cable companies should treat Internet traffic that they carry over their broadband networks equally. In other words, they should not offer better service - faster speeds or dominant Web placement, for example - to companies that they are affiliated with or that are willing to pay extra.

The concept means that "no one who owns the network that you connect to has anything to say about what content you get to visit or whether there's a special deal that makes some content come to you at a higher quality of service than others," said Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press, a media-policy group in Northampton, Mass.

Opponents say that enforcing "net neutrality" could stifle the growth of the Internet, which they argue has thrived so far with minimal government regulation.

Helen Brunner, director of the Media Democracy Fund, a new nonprofit group in Washington that aims to increase philanthropy for media-policy issues, urged foundations to call their grant recipients together or at least send them letters to help them "understand what they have at stake in this new communications arena."

For a more amusing take, see As a Ninja, and for a good overview, see our compilation (courtesy of GFEM) here.