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You've probably heard all sorts of hype about "net neutrality". Big companies want it so they don't have to pay for the bandwidth and infrastructure that will allow them to build new applications that only power users would want to use. The cable and wireless companies oppose it because they don't want to have to bear the costs of developing the infrastructure to make Google and Amazon (and other companies like them) more profitable.
You and I are caught in the middle. Some consumers are "power users" -- bandwidth hogs who have been uploading and downloading large files (often illegally). Local nodes sometimes lock out low-bandwidth users when the bandwidth hogs take charge.
The Internet access providers have been struggling to manage their service loads through various means. One controversial practice was to stop the bandwidth hogs in their tracks, thus allowing the majority of users to continue accessing the Internet at a reasonable pace.
The Federal Communications Commission has once again demonstrated that the American government will place the interests of the few ahead of the interests of the many by proposing a new 'net neutrality' rule that prevents the carriers from blocking bandwidth hogs' activities.
Not only does this Net Favoritism rule make it easier for people to engage in illegal activity (violating intellectual property rights across the board) -- it all but ensures that the rest of us will be charged higher access fees in order to pay for all the new bandwidth that the hogs will want to use.
So-called "Pro Net Neutrality" companies like Google have been lying to the consumer, arguing that Net Neutrality would work for all of us. The truth is that Net Neutrality will simply pave the way for companies like Google to make free use of Internet bandwidth to increase their profits.
Consumers will be hit by double whammies -- we'll have to pay higher access fees to pay for all the new infrastructure Pro Net Neutrality companies are demanding AND we'll have to pay for access to many of those new applications.
Rather than just bundle the cost of infrastructure development into their capital improvements budgets, the Pro Net Neutrality companies want the consumer to pay the bill regardless of whether the consumer would even want to use those applications.
What's funny is that although the Republican Party has not championed the cause of the little guy much over the past couple of years, they do hope to block the FCC rule with legislation.
You should contact your Democratic Senators and Congressmen/women and tell them that you do NOT want to pay for the infrastructure that would increase illegal file sharing and add to the profits of large corporations at the expense of consumers (who would get nothing in return).
Net Neutrality is a lie. It is Net Favoritism and we as consumers need to stand up and say "Hell no! I don't want to pay for it!"
