The Low Down on Net Neutrality

What they heck is it? Most people don’t know it past the slogan .. and that’s what it is, a slogan. Net neutrality does not mean ‘left alone”, there’s nothing laissez faire about it. It does mean oversight, more oversight of the Internet than currently exists.

The advocating net neutrality want all data to be created equal. This means that Internet Service Providers ((ISPs) can not discriminate between certain data types or feeds. They oppose the creation of ‘fast lanes’ by ISPs that will have some traffic flowing freely but restrict speeds on other types of traffic. For instance, movies versus text/image websites.

Opposition to net neutrality state that they system has worked fine so far, so why do we need legislation in the first place. ISPs discriminate against data all the time to ensure certain quality of service standards, and it has little to no effect on the consumer. Additionally, it appears that you would want ISPs to be able to fast lane certain traffic. Why does it always have to be a negative thing? Why couldn’t this benefit the consumer? My videos may come to me faster than a text website, I’m fine with that. And don’t we already fast lane our data – ISPs have different speed packages. You pay more, you get more speed… sometimes.

So which side are you on. It appears that everyone would want the Internet just to be the Internet, stop fussing with it. But if ISPs are dead set on limiting my user experience (not sure why they would be) I’m certain there will a piece of technology ready to fill that demand gap. Personally, I’m not very worried if they don’t enact net neutrality. I’ve been looking for a great reason to dump my ISP anyway.

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