No, I Won't Shut Up About It...

Yes, I'm writing about the end of net neutrality. Again.

I'm directing your attention today to a few different issues. One is the subject of a recent article from U.S. News: Killing Net Neutrality Kills the Dreams of Young Entrepreneurs. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: net neutrality is vital for people running their own small businesses. Big places - WalMart, Amazon, Apple, Hitachi - can afford to pay big money for special care. They'll pay the ISPs top dollar so that you'll find them - and only them. Small businesses - particularly startups and independent artists - can't afford to spend that kind of money, so their accessibility will be severely limited. They will not be able to compete, at all. And that means we, the consumers, lose out on some awesome opportunities.

I'll also mention again that the end of net neutrality means terrible things for gaming, education, artists, and the poor. As Cory Doctorow's article puts it, Gutting Net Neutrality also guts innovation, fairness and democracy. One Graph Shows Exactly Why We Need Net Neutrality, using the recent attack on Netflix. The ISPs slowed Netflix downloads until Netflix decided to cave and pay extra - except, as the graph shows, those ISPs Netflix isn't paying extra are still throttling your download speeds.

Now we hear that Lobbying Efforts Intensify After F.C.C. Tries 3rd Time on Net Neutrality. Of course they do. The ISPs - who stand to gain a lot of profit with no effort on their part - are sitting pretty, and want to make sure they get paid.

And what's wrong with that? Well, let's look at it this way: I'm a librarian. My job is to allow you access to books. But what if I decided my salary wasn't enough? What if I decided to arrange three tiers of library book access? So, you can check out any of the nonfiction any time you want, for three weeks - that's standard. But fiction - well, you could still have it for three weeks, but you'd have to wait one week to check it out, unless it's written by one of our Special Authors, those that have paid me extra to - um, to let you check it out. And that doesn't cover graphic novels - those, you won't know we have at all, unless it's by a Special Author and you're a Special Patron. Oh, and those authors will also be charged per day you have the book out. Is that okay with you?

None of this, please note, has anything to do with my own work, or the real availability of the books. The books will all still actually be there, I'll just be throttling your access, because I can and because I can make money doing it.

This is what the ISPs are planning (as they clearly showed with Netflix). They will artificially throttle your access to information - not because of any real availability issues, but because they can make money doing it. And please note, the ISPs aren't needing more money - unlike me, they make much more than a comfortable salary.

So - what are you going to do about it? You can contact Chairman Tom Wheeler and the rest of the FCC to let them know you're not happy about the decision. You can also hope that President Obama stands by his promise to support net neutrality.

Links!

• Happy birthday, Sir Terry Pratchett! I adore the Discworld novels; in fact, I'm rereading them presently. Right now, I'm in the middle of Witches Abroad, and this one is very special to me. My mother and I read it together years (and years and years) ago, and I can still remember giggling over some of the funnier bits. Anyway, Terry Pratchett is (Supposedly) the Most Shoplifted Author in Great Britain for a Reason. TL;DR: He is awesome, not just as an author, but as a person. 
• Hemingway's work goes digital for the first time: Yay!
• Need a book? Google can show you bookstores and public libraries in the U.S.
• Concerned Idaho citizen calls police over public banned book giveaway to high school students: It's not enough that they banned the book in the school, now they want to prevent people giving the book away? Craziness.
• Wait, there's going to be a Jem and the Holograms movie?? Awesome!
• Over 200 Girls in Nigeria Kidnapped Because They Attended School
• Warning: Religious and Political Post - Sarah Palin: “Waterboarding Is How We Baptize Terrorists”: Seriously? This is so offensive on so many levels. It's bad enough that so many are conflating nationalism and religion - that is a dangerous road, folks - but when you take a holy sacrament and conflate it with a form of torture... She's a terrible politician, and just the idea of her in government makes me ill; she's also a horrible "Christian." The rest of her speech is also pretty infuriating. 
• Here's a much better speech: listen to the Prosthetic Medic's speech from the Moving Forward Group!