Net-neutrality is probably nothing new for folks in the US, but it’s only starting to heat up here in the UK. And for me, I have absolutely no idea what it was until a couple of days ago while flipping through comp magazines, trying to find myself a laptop bargain.
So what is net-neutrality? According to google, net-neutrality is the principle that Internet users should be in control of what content they view and what applications they use on the Internet. It is about equal access to the internet.
The issue now is some ISP providers like Virgin Media are planning to charge content providers a premium so that their content will be delivered faster to internet users. The ISPs will have the power to decide on which content gets delivered faster based on which content provider paid more, and other will be ’stucked’ at a slower transfer rate.
So for a person like me with majority of internet activity concentrated on anime, otaku and Japanese stuffs, does it mean that I would have on average a slower connection? If that is true then, wouldn’t it be unfair for me to pay the same amount as other people?
What’s your take on net-neitrality and how would it affect the otaku industry?
Yeah, we’ve been dealing with this for a couple years in the US. Luckily we’re pretty much at a stalemate, which means net neutrality stays for the moment, though we’ve heard things such as Comcast throttling torrent traffic, for example, which may show the first signs that the companies may be willing to actually implement something like it.
Interestingly enough, Net Neutrality goes both ways too. For example, ESPN has a web thing called ESPN 360, except only the ISPs who pay ESPN the $$$ are allowed to access it, so in that case it’s a website charging ISPs to allow them to access their site instead of the other way around.
I almost wouldn’t be surprised if more places started doing that in response to ISPs trying to charge for bandwidth priority.
“You’re gonna make Yahoo pay more so people can get to it faster? Well then, your customers just won’t get Yahoo then and you can listen to them complain about it.”
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personally, I don’t think net neutrality works.
You can get around the Comcast throttling by encrypting. Easy to do. That’s not to say I don’t mind Comcast doing it in the first place …
To me, it sounds like a further continuation of connection speeds. As connections plans prior to cable become a thing of the past and cable becomes increasingly cheaper as technology becomes better, how can companies milk more money out of us?