The FCC's Crusade to Keep the Internet Free

It's a slippery slope. The concept of an ISP granting some seemingly-trivial preferential treatment to its corporate partners can all too quickly turn into that same ISP effectively blocking access to content that it or its partners deem as "unnecessary" for you to see.

This is somewhat analogous to a bookstore deliberately blurring or cutting from books all passages with which their CEO or his wife happen to disagree. Sure, you're free to try to find another store that might sell you the whole book - but how do you know which other books that store may alter? And worse, you may not learn if your book is available at a given store until after you've paid an admission fee to walk through the door.

Some say this as a nefarious attempt by the FCC to "control the internet" for some ill-defined purposes. Others argue that unfettered corporate control of the internet would be a shining example of the free market in action and that somehow in the end it will magically all work out to the advantage of consumers. Hogwash.

I counter that there are already more than enough legal, gray-area and downright illegal provisions for the government to secretly monitor and control access. And the free-market system we have right now is quite sufficient, thank you. We don't need an ISP to "punish" us for making what they feel is a wrong decision in content.