This is bad news all around!  The Justice department said today they will allow internet providers (like Comcast and Verizon) can charge users a fee for which prioritizing web traffic.  It’s not how fast your connection is in general, but how fast a particular site loads.

This is very sinister because it allows them to control where you go.  Let’s take for example that Google buys out Comcast and decides it wants to destroy Yahoo and MSN.  Easily!  It’ll just squeeze the communication lines between all Comcast customers and those sites.  So we as a consumer can only go to Google because the other sites are too slow.  This is only an example and nothing against the fore mentioned companies.

If you haven’t heard about it already, the opposing for to this is an idea called “Net neutrality” that states that all the net should be free and a company like Comcast or Verizon doesn’t have the right to block any particular portion of the web.  (well, I would personally like the bandwidth of some of the porno site cut down a bit so it would free up some bandwidth for the rest of us.  But that shouldn’t happen!)  People should have the right to visit any site they please because that’s their free will to do so.

The Justice Department as an example, cited that “the U.S. Postal Service charges customers different guarantees and speeds for package delivery, ranging from bulk mail to overnight delivery.”  This is completely off the wall because this is not the same!  The post office is charging us based upon speed and distance.  This is a rational structure.  They would never charge us more for a letter to be sent to Peter who lives next to Paul.  But this is what the internet providers want to do.

Free up the web!