Posted on 02/05/2017 8:06:26 PM PST by entropy12
As I understand it, net neutrality means that the ISP cannot treat traffic related to certain web sites, applications, or services differently.
Let me make an extreme example - you’re on Time Warner (big Hillary contributor I believe) internet at your home and TW decides that Free Republic traffic is causing too much congestion. As I understand it, without net neutrality, Time Warner would have the legal grounds to slow or impede traffic to Free Republic to maintain, from their perspective, quality of service to all of their customers.
For me, the tough part about net neutrality is that I instinctively do not want the government telling any business what they can and cannot do, but we’re also talking about large media companies managing down on traffic they deem “problematic.” I also feel like ISPs are different than your typical brick and mortar company in that they are granted access to right of way, telephone polls, and perhaps licensed frequencies that are of limited supply, presenting somewhat limited options at any given endpoint at this point in time.
Personally, I can see companies like Google or AT&T, over time, using it to proxy out or slow access to certain web sites regardless of their bandwidth implications.
I see this less as liberals trying to freeload internet and more as large ISP companies wanting to favor certain traffic over others.
Look at this this way - net neutrality enables MORE companies (competitors) to make it into your home as streaming options, likely driving down the cost of their services. If there are more options for a consumer, they fight like hell for subscriptions and costs go down and quality goes up.
If AT&T or TW or Google has their way, all of these other competitors (especially streaming options NOT provided directly by the ISP) may run at half the speed into your home after said ISPs decide those services are problematic to network performance.
I’m cautiously for neutrality because it allows for broader competition between entrepreneur and consumer.
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