Net Neutrality in the United States

President Obama introduced certain net neutrality rules to prevent the big players in the ISP industry from abusing their power. The Republicans overturned these rules by pushing a bill called “Restoring Internet Freedom Act.” Nevertheless, in April of this year, the House, made up of Democrats, tried to reinstate these rules by pushing a new bill called “Save the Internet Act.”

Free and open internet is something every resident of the United State deserves. Everyone should have equal access to internet and protections have to be offered to both consumers as well as content providers. Yet many internet service providers’ comments about net neutrality suggest that not everyone is fine with it.

Establishing Net Neutrality is not exactly a decision that everyone would accept. However, many tech companies like Facebook and Google, as well as academic institutions support Net Neutrality strongly.

Today’s Internet Service Providers have grown into massive conglomerates by investing in content creation and distribution.  For instance, Comcast owns NBC Universal and AT&T owns Time Warner. However, in an aim to prioritize the content that they have created, they might block other content or start charging more for fast access. Net neutrality is the only thing that can curb such harmful practices.

Even if there is a chance that the Net Neutrality act of 2015 can make a comeback, there will be many obstacles it will have to face.

  • Although internet service providers may refrain from blocking traffic, they might start charging for faster speed. Many sites may not be able to pay for such expenses.
  • Thoughtless and offensive content might become easily accessible to internet users.
  • All those telecom companies that built platforms for customers to make free calls will have to close down their shops
  • Since the internet service providers may not be able to charge for their resource-intensive services, they might not be able to upgrade their networks, even if they wish to improve the quality of their services.

Since its inception, the internet has been growing at an outstanding pace and much of this growth is because of the protections and freedoms offered by net neutrality. Many novel products and groundbreaking ideas such as Google, Torrents, eBay, and even YouTube can reach where they are today, because of this. Many more start-ups, online stores, and ecommerce sites are making it big. They all need net neutrality to promote their creative expression.