The United States of America are trying to nail their feet to the ground when it comes to the Internet. And knowing their power and influence, and their spying and blackmailing, I wouldn’t be surprised if their ideas start spreading elsewhere. That’s the unfortunate reality of life on the Internet: I feel like I need to pay $10/month to the EFF and $10/month to the FSF in order for *them* to fight for *their* rights such that their problems don’t spread to where I live. Globalising the fight for our right!
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, here are two recommended and entertaining videos to explain it all.
Rap News covers Net Neutrality
John Oliver covers Net Neutrality
If you’re American, you can tell them how you feel. Or, according to FCC Establishes New Inbox for Open Internet Comments, you can send them email: openinternet@fcc.gov
FCC Establishes New Inbox for Open Internet Comments
Here’s what I sent, even though I am not an American:
Dear FCC,
Net neutrality, the principle that Internet service providers (ISPs) treat all data that travels over their networks equally, is important to me because without it users have fewer options. ISPs should not be the gate keepers to what we do on the Internet. As it stands, there is also precious little competition between providers. If I don’t like my service provider, what am I going to do? I cannot take my business elsewhere.
A pay-to-play Internet worries me because new services cannot compete. There is no such thing as a video startup with slow download speeds. We’re automatically favoring existing businesses and making life hard for future entrepreneurs and startups. And we gain nothing in return!
The Internet has the unique ability to make all of us authors. We can read and write, share and consume. By making a fast service more expensive, we’ll be limiting good quality to commercial ventures. We also want non-commercial projects to succeed. We want to download free software, for example. We want to watch our own videos, hosted on our own servers. We don’t want an Internet Apartheid. That is not the “freedom” I want.
Help us make the Internet into the thing almost all of us want, not into the Internet the ISPs want.
Sincerely,
Alex Schroeder
#Web #USA