Very briefly, Net Neutrality is the principle on the Internet that allows it to be the wonderland that it currently is. It prevents Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from restricting, slowing, or prioritizing what kind of data you want to access. This principle is essential to the Internet, and would suffer greatly without it. The main arguments for Net Neutrality center around the fact that data is data, and you, as a consumer, should not be hindered in your attempt to access it. Further, ISPs cannot charge the content creators more money to send their data over their bandwidth because they could, then, restrict competition by favoring their content over other content creators. The main arguments against Net Neutrality focus on how government regulation is bad and Net Neutrality actually kills competition because it doesn’t allow ISPs to sell their content to consumers as effectively…. or something. Again, CGP Grey has a fantastic video on why Net Neutrality is awesome and you should totally play it in class! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtt2aSV8wdw
Obviously, I am a big proponent for Net Neutrality and actually participated in the FCC’s collection of consumer input on the topic. Because of the way Internet is currently available in the United States, maintaining this principle is incredibly important. Without it, ISPs would one hundred percent abuse their power and punish users for accessing content that they (the ISPs) do not create. Think about what kind of Internet is available in your area. Not that many options, are there? Opponents of Net Neutrality like to argue that, should ISPs do bad stuff, like throttle bandwidth for certain services, charge premium prices for services you currently get at no extra cost, etc., that consumers will simply switch ISPs. “Competition will stop these companies from doing bad stuff, surely!” they cry. What they fail to realize is that these companies all secretly coordinate with one another to not infringe on their localities, which is why Google Fiber is having such a difficult time gaining traction. If you live in a city, such as Omaha, Nebraska, you might only have access to one ISP, and if they recently implemented monthly data caps on all of their plans, well it looks like you have to move, even if you just moved to a new house. This is a real thing. A popular Twitch streamer, named Destiny, only has access to Cox Internet, which already provided spotty service, and now will have to pay large monthly fees for exceeding the monthly data cap. That’s why many proponents of Net Neutrality think it is essential; there already is a lack of competition among ISPs, so very minimal government regulation must be put in place to stop the ISPs from abusing their already powerful positions.
The simplest way to enforce Net Neutrality is to treat Internet data like a utility, such as electricity and water. The electric and water companies cannot tell you what to do with those services, they simply have to provide the proper amount to you. To my knowledge, neither of these services suffer from government over-regulation, whatever that means. Further, I fail to see how forcing ISPs to treat all data equally is putting unnecessary burden on them. These companies already have huge amounts of capital and probably are not in danger of going bankrupt (due to their coordination with one another not to compete). Lastly, Net Neutrality, not the absence of it, promotes innovation because it means anyone with a good idea can put it on the Internet, where everyone has equal access to it. Again, the Internet is such a wonderful tool, and allowing companies to restrict our access to it is a terrible idea. I highly recommend CGP Grey’s video because he explains these ideas much more eloquently than I can.
Brian Mann 