Net Neutrality Fight Isn’t About Saving Internet Freedom, It’s About Saving Internet Commerce
http://www.alternet.org/media/net-neutrality-fight-isnt-about-saving-internet-freedom-its-about-saving-internet-commerce
John Oliver, host of Last Week Tonight, talking about net neutrality.
Photo Credit: YouTube.com
Net neutrality, as comedian John Oliver said on his HBO show, may be the worst-named cause ever. Besides being completely boring, it refers to all data being treated equally no matter who creates it and why the Internet is a weirdly level playing field.
Like many Internet activists, Oliver has been urging all conscientious citizens to tell the Federal Communications Commission to leave the net alone. Go file online comments before Friday's deadline, he urges, and dont allow cable companies to charge content creators different prices for sending data at different speeds, which might disadvantage a NetFlix or Facebook or Google.
Whats being proposed is so egregious that activists and corporations are being forced onto the same side, Oliver said. Thats basically Lex Luther knocking on Supermans apartment door and saying, listen, I know we have our differences, but...."
This is entertaining, but very misleading. It is a myth that Internet service is now free and open and equal and somehow utopian. Its notjust look at the varied packages sold to consumers. Look at what you have at home. If you dont like your DSL, you can pay more for cable or a fiber optic plan. Theres nothing equalitarian or utopian there.