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Homework Week 5
For the new vocabulary this week, please see the glossary.
Network Neutrality
Network Neutrality is the concept that there should be no restrictions by governments or Internet service providers on what pages you can access online and what equipment you can access it with. It has been getting a lot of attention lately because supporters of network neutrality want Congress to pass laws to ensure it. Without it, Internet service providers may try to get consumers to use their services - like video streaming, search engines, and equipment - and block their competitors' sites and content. They might also set up much faster services only for companies that can pay a lot leaving smaller companies and private citizens at a disadvantage.
I think it could affect me by narrowing the options of the content I see and businesses I use. If larger companies have more of a web presence and more power, they might put smaller companies out of business and narrow my range of choices. Things could also take a political turn and if ATT&T is my ISP they might try to censor any unflattering news about themselves or just steer me to their products.
This article shows two examples of Network Neutrality. One is how Comcast is upset over Netflix streaming video content. They want them to pay more to do that but Comcast customers are already paying for a certain bandwidth so it shouldn't matter what kind of info they're getting whether it's emails or video streaming. Netflix feels that since customers are already paying Comcast to deliver the content charging Netflix more would be essentially charging twice for the same content.
The other issue is how the Egyptian government shut down internet access this week to try and keep the protesters from organizing. This is an extreme example of of a non-neutral network.
I would like to be able to choose which content I view and not have an ISP or the government choose for me.