Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Rural communities could get shortchanged as FCC moves to erode Internet network neutrality

Network neutrality, or "net neutrality," prescribes equal treatment for users of the Internet; there is no "fast lane." Companies cannot pay extra to have their web pages load faster, but that could change, and wouldn't be good news for rural America, Edyael Casaperalta writes for the Daily Yonder.

The Federal Communications Commission said last week that it consider "new rules on Internet traffic that would allow broadband providers to charge companies a premium for access to their fastest lanes," as The Wall Street Journal reported. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said the FCC won't vote and release the rules until May 15, but would act with transparency, and Internet providers would not be able prioritize certain content or block any legal content. Some groups are not too confident the results will be favorable. The Daily Kos is even asking people to sign a petition. "The FCC will consider this "pay-to-play" rule on May 15th, so let's nip it in the bud now," the Daily Kos reports.

The Washington Post noted in February that the agency has "a trump card" to hang over the head of Internet providers: reclassifying them "as regulated utilities under Title II of the Communications Act. Doing so would entitle the FCC to reinstate all the old rules about traffic blocking and discrimination that were just eliminated by the court."

Net neutrality matters, but not many rural people have joined the discussion, which may be because rural and Native American communities still comprise the majority of those who cannot access telecommunications services, Casaperalta writes. Of the 19 million Americans who do not have access to fixed broadband networks, 14.5 million live in rural areas, and almost a third live in tribal lands, according to the FCC's latest Broadband Progress Report.

"Net-neutrality advocates fear that without rules in place, big companies like Netflix, Disney, and ESPN could gain advantage over their competitors by paying ISPs to provide preferential treatment to their company's data," writes Brad Chacos for PC World. The net neutrality debate has been going on for years. In 2010, the FCC passed rules that earned them criticism from both the liberals and right-wingers. The Daily Beast's headline said that that ruling "boils down to one fact: there will soon be a fast Internet for the rich and a slow Internet for the poor."

Meanwhile, the FCC also announced last week that it was planning to raise the standard download speed that can be called broadband to 10 megabits from 4 megabits. "This is a great step! But there’s a chance weaker net-neutrality rules will compromise the ability of rural communities to enjoy these faster speeds. What good are faster speeds if the information rural people want is stuck in the cheaper slow lane?" Casaperalta writes.

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