Net Neutrality: MoveOn Told Us to Unite!
Published 12 May 2006
Hi! You've stumbled upon a blog post by a guy named Ryan. I'm not that guy anymore, but I've left his posts around because cool URIs don't change and to remind me how much I've learned and grown over time.
Ryan was a well-meaning but naïve and priviledged person. His views don't necessarily represent the views of anyone.
They’re probably not going to like what I have to say about it though. While I very much enjoy MoveOn.org’s use of the Internet as a tool for mobilization, they have proven themselves quite daft at technology-based initiatives.
‘Net Neutrality
The whole idea of Net Neutrality seems like an issue for markets to work out. With phone, cable and soon power companies getting involved in Internet service, as well as the countless wireless companies slowly lowering data rates, connections to the Internet are going to face increasing competition for price, speed, and service. I cancelled my Comcast Cable Internet soon after I ordered it, as I was so unimpressed with their service and its exorbitant price.
Faced with poor service or a frustrating product, I hope that Americans have not become such sheep that they won’t switch providers over such a thing as poor service. I love the idea behind Goodsearch, but its search results were just so bad, combined its lack of Maps and local search forced be back to Google for all of my search needs. Allow Americans to make intelligent choices about their services, don’t legislate the markets.
The only time I could see legislating Net Neutrality as a smart move would be with municipal wireless connections. If the government is going to provide Internet access (which I have some hesitations about as well), let’s make sure they do so fairly. Let the suits make their deals’they’ll only annoy and alienate them. As long as consumers have choices, they will work the situation out.
Taxing Email
MoveOn’s campaign to Stop Stop AOL’s
‘Email Tax’
is ludicrous. AOL is not planning on taxing anyone.
They just want to stop unsolicited and bulk email from getting to their
subscribers, unless the sender either
- Is recognized by the receiver,or that failing,
- The sender coughs up some cash.
Nowhere has AOL ever mentioned taxing every single email, or even stopping solicited messages. Essentially they want to do the same thing for their users that SpamAssassin does for me.