The 21st century has ushered in a digital age of widespread internet usage, one in which millions of United States citizens rely on the web for information and connection. Knowledge that would have taken our ancestors months of ocean voyages to barely scratch the surface of is now accessible through a few clicks and keystrokes on any multimedia device. With that said, managing and regulating the convoluted system of wires, satellite transmissions, and network infrastructures that constitutes broadband technology is quite a complex and fascinating procedure. This paper will focus on and analyze an aspect of this regulatory procedure entitled net neutrality, which has been a heated topic of debate among policy makers and internet users over the past decade. It will begin by highlighting all the players interwoven in this multifaceted phenomenon, and then argue for why net neutrality regulations are unnecessary in today’s media environment. Overall, net neutrality regulations are unnecessary because they congest internet traffic, are inefficient for the consumers, and ultimately benefit giant media corporations and the government, which work closely together through lobbying.
Net Neutrality is essential to our everyday lives, and it is perilously close to being repealed on December 14th by the FCC; but if more people take a stand in support of Net Neutrality, we can preserve the free internet. Net Neutrality needs to be saved because it protects free speech, free trade of information and services, and the privacy of our data. This is an issue that concerns all citizens regardless of political affiliation, but lawmakers have made it a fight between the two parties. Most people did not care about Net Neutrality or even know what it is until fairly recently, but recent events regarding it's likely repeal have turned the public’s attention towards it.
When a person goes online they want to have total control over what websites they view. People expect their service provider to not manipulate their data and connect them to all the websites they want. When people use the internet they want Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality is a basic method that prohibits service providers like Verizon and AT&T from speeding up or blocking websites people want to use. Net Neutrality is the way the Internet works.
Net neutrality has been one of the hottest topics in the last few weeks, with talks of a repeal approaching. Many have gone as far as to call the repeal the end of the internet as we know it. Net neutrality is the idea that all data on the internet should be treated with the same priority. They believe that repealing net neutrality will result in a loss in privacy and slower internet speeds. By putting the power back into private companies rather than the government the opposite will occur instead.
Net neutrality is the principle which states that companies, especially Internet Service Providers(ISPs), must treat data/information in the internet the equally. This mean that they cannot discriminately charge more, block, or limit the speed of data being transferred from users, websites, and other factors. The Federal Communications Commission(FCC) have strong regulations to protect internet users, backed by the Title II of the Communication Act, which is currently being challenged to remove net neutrality. The result of removing net neutrality could be catastrophic to our society, that it may even be possible that the U.S. become fully controlled by these greedy company.
Every one of us living in the twenty-first century has used the internet or have at least known about it. The internet is crucial to our daily lives now, it not just a simple "fad" that gets forgotten in a week or two, but a tool that we utilized every day. The number of benefits that comes from the internet is uncountable, for example with the aid of the internet we now have instantaneous access to work, entertainment, medical, and countless more. Though that may change with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai proposing to end "net neutrality" or also known as the "open internet." Net neutrality was designed to keep the internet, open, fast, free, and safe from prominent Internet service providers (ISP) companies like Verizon, Comcast, and TimeWarner from trying to charge more for speed, and specific website access, something that is and should be free from the beginning. One author of the article "Net neutrality: needed or not?" states that "Net neutrality is about protecting the status quo that is the open Internet. On many levels, the term 'open Internet' is redundant. If it weren't open, it wouldn't be the Internet." He is right the internet would not be the same if everyone did not have equal access because of companies trying to profit. Others, however, are saying that there is no need for having net neutrality because it is unwanted and hindering the "markets" from being able to rise sufficiently. According to the study "The end of net
Yet at the same time, these two sets of companies compete for customers, creating a glaring conflict of interest. Whilst these issues seemed to be resolved by the middle of the twentieth century, the advent of the internet introduced a whole new set of problems. The term net neutrality, first coined by Tim Wu, Professor of the Columbia University Law School in 2003, came to represent a question that had long been perceived as being of relatively little concern – is unfettered access to the internet a right, or a privilege? (Cheng and Bandyopadhay 2011: 60) (Greenstein 2007: 61, 85) The debate around internet regulation and net neutrality first gained traction in 2002, when the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) controversially ruled that broadband internet was to be classed as an information service rather as a telecommunications service, and thus made it exempt from a considerable range of content and conduct regulations that it would otherwise have been subject to. For those Americans, as exemplified by organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who saw the internet as a space of uninhibited free expression that needed to be protected from the influence of corporate meddling, this decision was very frustrating. As promoted by Wu and others, net neutrality came to represent the belief that ‘internet data packets should move nondiscriminatorily’ – that is, the data (‘packets’ essentially being a technical
Throughout the last decade, the idea of Net Neutrality has been the topic of many debates. Net Neutrality is the idea that Internet service providers should not be allowed to block their users from any content regardless of its source. The Debate is still continuing in 2017 with the F.C.C planning to repeal Net Neutrality and allow internet providers to completely regulate what their users can see and charge the users extra for “luxuries” such as social media, messaging, email, and music. There are two sides of this argument, one side believes that Net Neutrality should be taken away, while others believe that it is unfair for the Internet providers to have the right to take away the access to any content. Internet providers should not be allowed to control what content one can view when surfing the internet.
What is Net Neutrality? Well Net Neutrality is the set of rules that prevents internet companies from forcing people to pay extra fees to use websites they do not support; as well as preventing the internet companies from not allowing people to view said websites. Saving Net Neutrality is important to have an equal internet, the repeal of the rules can create an onset of problems, and the opposition falsely claims that the repeal has improved the broadband deployment.
Net neutrality is the belief that the internet should always be equal playing grounds for all users on it. This means that big companies like Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, IBM, and many other internet providers and tech companies cannot control the internet, and everyday people will all have equal access to the web. This may seem like common sense, but recently there have been attempts to change the internet that we all know and love. America’s internet has always practiced net neutrality and free speech; however, there have been five failed attempts to pass a bill in congress to set these neutrality rules in stone, until 2015 when congress passed Title II which enforced open internet. This was a huge win for net neutrality supporters but the war for uncensored internet is not over yet. On April 17, two years after Title II was passed, one of Trumps administration, Ajit Varadaraj Pai, attempted to repeal net neutrality. Ajit and these big cable companies cannot be allowed to alter the internet just for their own monetary reasons.
Net neutrality is the reason millions of Americans have unlimited access to the internet every day. Net neutrality is the belief that the internet should be an open place where all data is treated equally. No specific website should be allowed to have priority over another. No internet service provider should be allowed to give priority to a specific website versus another.
With the increased access for individuals to allow their messages and ideas to be heard on a larger scale (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, etc.), more and more individuals are becoming more aware of the major events and milestones behind Network Neutrality. Large companies have invested a lot of money on the infrastructure that makes up the basis of what we know to be as the internet, and it makes sense that they should have some sort of say in what goes on. With the complexity and vastness of the internet, it is hard to create legislation that effectively protects the internet in what it is today, and not offend others in the process. The events in the most recent years have brought forth an increased amount of public and media attention on the subject, and has been the center of a large number of debates. Throughout all of these debates, the general public opinion has been that “Public opinion was overwhelming pro net neutrality” (KnightFoundation, 5). What this meant was that the general public was beginning to catch onto the general idea of Network Neutrality, and were starting to side with those much more for rather than
The article “Net neutrality is here. What it means for you” briefly describes what net neutrality is and the changes net neutrality has offered to many individuals. Net neutrality also known as network neutrality, means that many individuals are not restricted to having slower internet speeds or unauthorized access to certain applications, websites, or services meaning that the internet is open. The article describes the changes that net neutrality has brought. However, for the most part not a lot changed, many services that had been blocked before by large telephone and cable providers (ISPs) will now allow individuals to regain or gain access to blocked applications and services. Large internet services and websites like AOL, Facebook, Netflix,
Even though the term Net Neutrality has only been around since 2008, the principals and debate behind the term
Net neutrality is the principle that all internet traffic should be treated equally by the internet service providers. This policy is beneficial because all users of the internet will receive equal internet speeds and fair treatment. Taking away this equal treatment would defeat the purpose of an evolving system. This principle was created by Tim Wu in 2003 as an extension of of the common carrier concept which described the role of telephones in society. Net Neutrality towards applications and data has been one of the main reason for the Internet's success. It has granted the Internet's amazingly innovative and democratic nature. With net neutrality it is the internet's guiding principle, it is our safe guard and it preserves our right to communicate freely online. The internet without Net Neutrality changes the image of what the internet is today. Without net neutrality, phone and cable companies make the calls and decide which websites, content or applications succeed. Overall the government and all service providers should treat all data the same.