The Dutch senate has passed a net neutrality law that makes it illegal for ISPs in the country to filter the internet. The laws, which were passed unanimously earlier this week, means that all traffic must be treated equally and may not be blocked or throttled. The Netherlands is the first European country to adopt such a law, and the second country in the world to do so after Chile.
The move ensures that end users have

UK minister for culture, communications and creative industries, Ed Vaizey, delivered a bit of a shocker at the FT World Telecoms conference in London on Wednesday, calling for a tiered internet, where paid for traffic is prioritised.

Turns out Google and Verizon were up to something after all. Behind the scenes the two companies have been doing what the FCC failed to do – forge a compromise agreement on net neutrality. The only thing is that the wording of the agreement raises some of the same concerns that emerged last week when word of the deal was first heard.

The ongoing dispute over net neutrality was dealt a serious blow this week as a US federal court ruled that the FCC does not have the authority to force all service providers to treat internet traffic the same.

The chief of UK telecoms regulator Ofcom has said the authority will investigate web traffic control measures later this year as the net neutrality debate rumbles on.

Political posturing, macroeconomics and technological advances will, as always, have considerable impacts on the North American mobile industry in 2010. Because there are so many variables, there’s not much of a sure thing in the industry, but several trends bear watching.