Tryin’ to explain Net Neutrality
Filed under Entertainment, Technology, World & Business.
I know a lot of people have asked their selfs, what the hell is Net neutrality? It’s all over the news, you see commercials like this. I’m gonna try and clarify this as simple as possible.
This is the theory:
If I pay to connect to the Net with a certain quality of service, and you pay to connect with that or greater quality of service, then we can communicate at that level.
Basically what this means is that every internet user should pay for content received from the Net in different levels, apposed to paying your ISP for delivering an internet connection.
The net neutrality debate is divided into two camps:
- Fighting against net neutrality are the telecom companies and cable providers, who provide Internet access to consumers. Net Neutrality would give them the ability to charge content providers to use their bandwidth and, in essence, have access to their subscribers. The telecoms claim that they need revenue to make necessary updates to Internet infrastructure and wouldn’t receive funding.
- Opposing them are content providers like Google, Amazon, and non-profits like MoveOn.org. They think the internet in not “neutral” in that way and should receive revenue.
I’m with the telecoms on this, even though they screw you up here in Belgium.
Two main voices have emerged, each supporting one side of the issue. HandsOff.org, or “Hands off the Internet,” is in favor of the telecoms. In favor of Net Neutrality is SavetheInternet.com.
Now I’ve only scratched the surface of Net Neutrality, it’s a lot more complicated. When you hear something in the news, you can at least understand it.
Sources: Google, Wikipedia, SavetheInternet.com, HandsOff.org, Howstuffworks
