Net Neutrality

Net neutrality has been an ongoing debate for the last decade. Recently it has been decided by the FCC to keep the Internet open and free. The idea of Internet neutrality is to make it so consumers can make their own decisions about what applications and services on the Internet they use, and are able to decide what content they want to access create and share. It also makes it possible for anyone to create and share their own applications and services with others. This creates an open competition environment for anybody, not just the companies or people that have more money. To make it clear I am in favor of Internet neutrality, a free and open Internet.

Without net neutrality Internet service providers or ISPs would have control of what you can and cannot view on the Internet as well as creating fast and slow lanes. They could slow down their competitor’s content or block content that the ISP does not want you to view. In my opinion this would destroy the open Internet. President Barack Obama pledged support for net neutrality to protect a free and open Internet in 2007, and has continued to show support through his presidency. “I am a strong supporter of net neutrality what you’ve been seeing is some lobbying that says the servers and the various portals through which you getting information over the Internet should be able to be gatekeepers and to charge different rates for different websites and I think that destroys one of the best things about the Internet” –Barack Obama. In 2010 the FCC introduced strong protections that said ISPs cannot block websites or impose limits on consumers. In 2011, a few weeks after the FCC adopted those rules, Verizon communications filed a federal lawsuit that would eventually overturn such rules. As of January 14, 2014 a federal appeals court finally strikes down the FCC’s rules from 2010. This is where the real fight for Internet neutrality begins. The day after the court struck down the FCC’s 2010 rule a user created a...