LuminousVoid

Sunday’s Washington Post had a very nice introduction to the issue of “Network Neutrality.” Wikipedia defines “network neutrality” as:

Network neutrality is a principle of internet regulation with particular relevance to the regulation of broadband internet access. It suggests that (1) to maximize human welfare, information networks ought be as neutral as possible between various uses or applications, and (2) if necessary, government ought to intervene to promote or preserve the neutrality of the network.

The basic idea is that whether I go to google.com or msn.com for my searching, the data that I send to the search engine, and the data that it sends back to me is treated the same no matter which search engine I use. Without network neutrality, an ISP between me and my search engine could speed up or slow down my traffic depending on the deals that they have struck with google or msn. I fear they might even go so far as to block traffic. How would you feel if you went to check on your hotmail email and then was told “in order to provide you with better service, verizon has partnered with gmail email service?”

The internet was designed to be decentralized — with decisions about content being made at the edges of the network: by you the reader deciding what you want to read, and by someone who hosts a website deciding what to put online. Now this is being threatened. The fight will come over the next year or so as Congress starts on rewritting the telecommunications act. Internet users should start preparing for this fight. The small consumer organizations are going to need all the help they can get. Thankfully they’ll have content providers on their side too.