The big Internet backbone providers (the guys who run the lines on which we all communicate) want to start a racketeering group where if you publish content on the Internet you have to pay them a fee or “suffer the consequences”. There’s two petitions to sign if you think that is a very bad thing:

• This one

• And this one

  Here’s the details: AT&T, Verizon, and Bellsouth want the power to charge companies like Google, Yahoo, Movietickets.com, blog sites, etc, for “priority access” to their Internet backbones. It sounds OK in theory: If you want to guarantee the best speed/latency on their network, you can pay more. Only it doesn’t work like that. The problem lies in the fact that when you prioritize one kind of traffic, you de-prioritize it for everyone else.

  So lets assume the “big guys” start paying for this access. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. That means that if their packets are moving across the network, your packets will have to wait. It will degrade your Internet performance as well as any competitor to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. Also, there’s no limit to how much they can prioritize or discriminate. Not to mention the fact that the companies that pay for this access will pass on that cost to their customers creating a negative impact on the economy.

  So if Verizon starts offering voice-over-IP (VOIP) service, they could make it so that all Vonage packets moving in their network are slowed so much that they effectively make Vonage service useless. Since all three backbone providers in the U.S. plan to do this (yes, they really do) there isn’t even a competitor to switch to. If your ISP uses AT&T, Verizon, or Bellsouth for it’s backbone connection (or your traffic needs to go through their network) you must subscribe to their VOIP service or you won’t get VOIP at all.

  That is just one example. Others include slowing Internet traffic to competitors, or even censoring sites that they don’t like. Without Net Neutrality, there’s no limit to what they can’t cut you off from.

  So sign those petitions, or we could allow America to fall into a dark age of Internet access.