Congress is considering allowing the big phone and cable companies that now control most of the broadband access in the US to do something they want to do, but that has never been done before: turn the level playing field of today’s Internet into a sort of class-system environment, in which packets sent by companies that pay more get preferential treatment. This is a lousy idea that, at worst, could entirely disrupt our basic assumptions about the open Internet.
The companies involved keep saying, “Trust us,we will only use these new powers for good,” but I’m sorry, I don’t.
The Save The Internet coalition is a good starting point to find out more and see what you can do. Farhad Manjoo’s Salon piece about AT&T and the Net is an in-depth look at the issue; it’s fair to both sides of the argument, but I think you’ll come away from it as I did, wanting to make sure that AT&T doesn’t get its way.
Also, a couple of weeks ago Kevin Marks presented the technological case for why these companies do not need the privilege they seek. Supposedly it’s to make it more feasible to deliver high-quality audio and video over the Net. But, er, they can do that now, in many different ways, as Marks says.
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