I’ve been hearing a lot about something called net neutrality lately, but up until recently I honestly didn’t know anything beyond the peculiar name it was given. To my understanding however, the battle over net neutrality consists of the question of whether or not an ISP is allowed to control the content that you view. If an ISP has a “money deal” with a certain website/service, is the ISP allowed to make it so that your connection to that website/service is better than your connection to, let’s say, a “rival” of that service (search engines are a good example)?
I certainly think it’s totally wrong for an ISP to do something like that. I think one of the strongest things going for the internet over any other form of media distribution and content outlet is that the internet is more or less completely free of any sort of information restriction. Technically speaking, the internet as of this moment is a free-for-all in terms of information and content (I guess the harder part is finding that information easily), but if net neutrality disappears, then I think the heart of the internet itself will disappear with it.
In any case, I found the above video from ODL quite a bit of help in understanding the whole situation and making the main points much clearer. Certainly there are deeper issues involved, but this video is a good way of getting people to be informed and concered about the situation.
Find out some more information about it at Save The Internet, or do some research of your own.
UPDATE: Err, the House just rejected the net neutrality rules.
While the debate over Net neutrality started over whether broadband providers could block certain Web sites, it has moved on to whether they should be permitted to create a “fast lane” that could be reserved for video or other specialized content.
Still, I think EVERY part of the internet should be as accessible as any other. Geez.
Don’t worry, every part of the Internet will remain equally accessible. What might well happen is that some sites will be able to pay for faster delivery — primarily for video and audio. This will make those services more reliable, but that won’t hurt others. And besides, websites already load slow or fast based on all kinds of things. So insofar as everyone is equally accessible, some pages will always load more slowly.
I work with a company in the Hands Off coalition, so I’ve been studying up on this a lot. And there’s a lot of misinormation floating around about what the telcos would do. Thing is, it’s just not in their interest to tell you you can’t view a certain webpage. It would prompt a customer revolt at least and just the kind of
Don’t worry, every part of the Internet will remain equally accessible. What might well happen is that some sites will be able to pay for faster delivery — primarily for video and audio. This will make those services more reliable, but that won’t hurt others. And besides, websites already load slow or fast based on all kinds of things. So insofar as everyone is equally accessible, some pages will always load more slowly.
I work with a company in the Hands Off coalition, so I’ve been studying up on this a lot. And there’s a lot of misinormation floating around about what the telcos would do. Thing is, it’s just not in their interest to tell you you can’t view a certain webpage. It would prompt a customer revolt at least and just the kind of regulation they don’t want.