The Internet Is A Series Of Tubes
Laws affecting Internet neutrality have been a much-discussed issue in the blogosphere for a while now. It essentially boils down to whether or not those companies (i.e. the telecos and cable companies) who provide the fat pipes through which everyone gets their internet access, can favor delivery of some content over other content. That type of a delivery scheme would have an obvious negative effect on "the little guy" by unlevelleing the playing field, as it were. Here’s a "What is Net Neutrailty?" discussion between Vint Cerf and David Farber.
By restricting the dissemination of information, such laws would have an obvious deletarious effect on democracy itself, as well. It’s important. That’s why it is also so important that the people in charge of passing laws that affect the Internet have a sound grasp of the technology itself.
Republican Senator Ted Stevens, Chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, is not one of those people. He recently gave a much and deservedly ridiculed speech that likened the Internet to a series of tubes. The speech demonstrates a breathtakingg and frightening misunderstanding of how the Internet works. The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart hilariously lampoons Senator Stevens’ ignorance (from movieman21 at YouTube):
As if to demonstrate the dangers of allowing powerful corporations to control the distribution of content online, MySpace recently disabled the account of a user who had put up a page critical of Senator Stevens, complete with his own satirical song. The user infringed no copyrights on his page and apparently not run afoul of any user agreements. MySpace did reinstate the Ted Stevens Fan Club page after their actions became public.
MySpace.com is, of course, owned by Rupert Murdoch’s NewsCorp, which, as a major media company, has an obvious stake in being able to favor it’s own content, such as that found on Fox News, over that of its competitors.
- …a series of tubes – A blog that ridicules Senator Stevens
- Save the Internet – How you can fight for Internet freedom
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