Brett Glass, wireless small-businessman and net reg foe, to testify at net-neutrality hearing

Brett Glass, who runs a small wireless company, will testify at a net-neutrality hearing on Tuesday. 

The hearing before the House Judiciary Intellectual Property subcommittee will also include Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn, a proponent of net-neutrality rules, and TechFreedom fellow Larry Downes, who opposes them. 

Glass is known for spearheading a one-man campaign to educate reporters and policy officials about the potential harm of net-neutrality regulations, which he sees as unnecessary and poised to hurt his business.

He expresses his views on tech blog comment boards (including this one), in official FCC dockets, on call-in radio programs and on Twitter. 

Glass's hallmark is a strong suspicion that anyone who sees merit in broadband rules might be receiving funds from Google, which has lobbied aggressively for net-neutrality rules over the last decade but backed off the issue in recent months.

Committee Republicans likely tapped Glass in order to hear from a small-business voice who opposes net-neutrality rules, rather than just major telecom and cable companies. Glass advertises his business as the first wireless Internet provider in the world. It is based in Laramie, Wyo.

Glass's policy efforts have caught the White House's attention on Twitter and won him recognition by an FCC commissioner during a monthly meeting. Glass did not respond to an e-mail about this hearing.

The hearing at the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday will focus on the antitrust dimension of net neutrality. 

Republicans have long contended that any hypothetical net-neutrality regulations could be regulated through competition laws rather than through new rules at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

The FCC passed net-neutrality regulations in December over the opposition of two GOP commissioners and Republicans in Congress. 

Proponents said the rules will ensure that Internet startups remain an attractive investment because telecom companies will not be able to block high-bandwidth apps.