Will the richest 1% soon control our internet?

[DeathAxe]

It's called Net Neutrality and is a huge issue, little reported.

 

Companies want to be able to pay for priority over the internet, so that their data is prioritised over non-payers data. It goes against the principle of the internet being open for all - net neutrality.

 

http://www.savetheinternet.com/net-neutrality

 

On Jan. 14, 2014, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., struck down the Federal Communications Commission’s Open Internet Order.

 

In other words, Net Neutrality is dead (for now).

 

The open Internet rules, adopted in 2010, were designed to prevent Internet service providers (ISPs) from blocking or slowing users’ connections to online content and apps.

 

This ruling means that just a few powerful phone and cable companies could control the Internet. Without Net Neutrality, ISPs will be able to devise new schemes to charge users more for access and services, making it harder for us to communicate online — and easier for companies to censor our speech. The Internet could come to resemble cable TV, where gatekeepers exert control over where you go and what you see.

 

Without Net Neutrality, ISPs like AT&T, Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Verizon will be able to block content and speech they don’t like, reject apps that compete with their own offerings, and prioritize Web traffic (reserving the fastest loading speeds for the highest bidders and sticking everyone else with the slowest).

 

The tools ISPs use to block and control our communications aren’t different from the ones the NSA uses to watch us. Whether it’s a government or a corporation wielding these tools or the two working together, this behavior breaks the Internet as we know it and makes it less open and secure.

 

This already goes on in the UK and in Europe.

[rickiethecat]

It might be a blessing in disguise; the week when I was without my computer (because it broke down) was the most productive week I'd had in ages, I actually lived in the real world for a week.

 

Well said! The internet's great for passing time on forums or watching daft videos on youtube, but if we all logged off a bit more often and spent more time actually talking to our friends and co-workers we'd be a lot happier and a lot more productive!