Here we make a survey of the evolution of the congestion controls that govern all Internet traffic. The goal and effect of these techniques differs from the historically coveted flowrate fairness of TCP, provoking some in the technical and policy community to question the appropriateness of such deviations, and feeding debates over network management and network neutrality. To appropriately evaluate emerging trends in congestion control, it is useful to understand how congestion control has evolved in the Internet, both with respect to its intellectual history within the technical community and with respect to the changing traffic/industry environment in which the Internet operates.
