Net Neutrality

 

After watching everyone else's EOTO presentations, I was struck by the topic of net neutrality. I remember in 2014 when President Obama defended net neutrality. The principles of which include: no

blocking, no throttling, increased transparency, and no paid prioritization. This may have been the first time I actively researched and was aware of some kind of policy that was going on in the United States, since I was only ten years old but quite active in the Internet space. 

Internet Service Providers

I think it is ridiculous that some defend a lack of net neutrality. The principles of net neutrality are equal access for all, which should obviously be something that Americans defend. Net neutrality rules prevent targeted control of Internet access in the United States, which would give internet service

Examples of ISPs

providers (ISPs) more power than they should have. ISPs are already huge conglomerates, and there is no reason to restrict Internet access. Without net neutrality laws, ISPs would be able to charge users of their services excessive amounts of money on a tiered system. Large conglomerates and affluent customers would be the only ones with speedy Internet access on websites. 

The other issue, as well, is that many ISPs own their own websites, and a lack of net neutrality would make it so that carriers could block or throttle traffic to competing carriers. In fact, carriers could block or throttle anyone for any reason. This could be for reasons like the customer doesn't align with certain beliefs that the ISP has, the customer is criticizing the ISP, or any other reason, since they are all private companies. The ability to promote only themselves and others that are willing to pay large amounts only fuels the monopoly problem in the United States. 

CEO of Verizon, Kyle Malady

2013 - Verizon v. FCC

For example, Verizon has historically fought the FCC on net neutrality regulations. The Verizon v. FCC case in 2013 was an example of Verizon trying to fight the anti-blocking and anti-throttling regulations, and they ended up losing because of the climate of net neutrality at the time. Of course, this is because Verizon has also been suspected of rerouting online searches to websites that are often owned by themselves. 

2017 - Net Neutrality Repealed

In 2017, many of these regulations were repealed under the Trump Administration. At the time of writing this, net neutrality rules are not as powerful as they once were. Because of how intertwined corporations are with policy-writing, this is not surprising, but it is disappointing. Corporations do not need to be propped up more than they already are, and as someone who is very much in the online space, I am a supporter of net neutrality.