Net neutrality, a term coined by Columbia Law School professor Tim Wu, is the "principle that network operators should not discriminate among network applications" (from Wikipedia) -- decrees that all websites, be it Joystiq or USA Today, are created equal. But what if net neutrality was disturbed? Take a look at the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act (COPE), which would diminish the network neutrality in the US. A recent episode of Halo 2-themed video blog This Spartan Life, entitled "Can't Buy Me Web," demonstrated what COPE could mean for the internet. And, oddly enough, Congress listened.According to This Spartan Life, their latest episode is being "passed around [Congressional offices] to galvanize the coalition fighting to get net neutrality written into law." We are very impressed, but at the same time very amused that Senators are watching one Spartan "stick it to the man" by blowing him up with a sticky grenade. The issue of net neutrality affects us all, and if you have a chance take a look at web sites like Save the Internet, Center for Digital Democracy, and Public Knowledge.
(Page 1) Reader Comments
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http://files.bungie.org/thisspartanlife/Blog05_S3.mov
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I mean I'm all for net neutrality, but I think this is clearly a case of one corporate interest winning out over another in Washington. The fact that they were in the moral right was secondary and, mostly, irrelevant.
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Thank goodness for Freenet! The last reliable place to get beast-porn.
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It makes no sense, and shows the scary future ahead of us if the telcos get there way.
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I don't particularly favor net neutrality because I think the market would slaughter the telcos if they tried their two-tiered crap. The problem there is that the telcos were given their monopolies by government regulation, so their hands are already in this.
The telcos are nothing but greedy. They've oversold their internet connections, and want to hide the fact by 'throttling' google video and youtube. The same thing happened when they oversold voice lines as being unlimited and free, and people started using modems, whose data was neigh-uncompressable. They're just trying to get someone else to pay for the necessary equipment upgrades because they squandered the billions in taxpayer money they were given for fiber lines to everyone's home, which seems to be noticably absent even in major cities.
I think it'd be funny to watch them buy thousands of site-specific throttling routers, walk up to MSYahoogle with a bandwidth bill, and be told "No". The problem is that if any one says, yes, it ligitimizes this childish drivel and forces everyone else to fork out money too, something that few can beat MS at.
So maybe net-neutrality law could prevent the scenario, but since we're dealing with politics, there's a high risk of someone changing the wording to "All your base are belong to Bell South" in the editing office after it's been passed. (Yes, that has happened.)
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Mark Cuban, the owner of the Mavericks and founder of broadcast.com wrote a good blog entry about the benefits of internet tiers a couple months ago:
http://www.blogmaverick.com/entry/1234000267073488/
Worth a read.
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3. Are you sure it was this video that changed their minds and not the millions of dollars Microsoft/Google/Yahoo! threw into lobbyists that did the trick?
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Hmmm. Changed who's minds? No doubt MS, Google and other powerful corporations are for net neutrality, but the net neutrality bill was dropped, so I am not sure what "trick" you are referring to. By far, the bigger lobbying effort is on the part of the telcomms. If this country didn't have such a stupid aversion to regulation, we might occcassionally understand that it is necessary to curb the more greedy excesses of what is erroneously called "the free market." Free like what? Aerospace? Telecommunications? The Gov't already is working hard regulating in favor of corporate greed, why not let it regulate a little in the other direction for once?
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