Verizon’s lawsuit against earlier net neutrality rules is about to backfire in a spectacular fashion. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Federal Communications Commission will propose new net neutrality rules that will reclassify ISPs under Title II of the Telecommunications Act and thus open them up to being regulated more like utilities.
“According to multiple people familiar with the agency’s plan, Mr. Wheeler intends to change the way both mobile and fixed broadband firms are regulated,” the Journal writes. “Rather than being lightly regulated information services, they would become like telecommunications companies, which would subject them to greater regulation on everything from pricing to how they deploy their networks.”
This would give the FCC the power to stop ISPs from blocking traffic from services that rival their own and from setting up paid prioritization schemes where they would charge money to Internet companies to ensure that their traffic got delivered faster than other companies who don’t pay up.
This of course has angered many service providers like Verizon and AT&T, who had hoped to make huge profits by charging large companies like Netflix more money to allow them faster connection speeds while limiting regular users.
I have to tell you as somebody who relies on the internet for my livelihood I welcome this news with open arms.
I currently pay through the teeth for my internet here in Alaska from GCI, and I really hope that these new regulations will help improve our overall access to bandwidth and also reduce costs.
By the watch to see which politicians start calling this government overreach, big brother tactics, and an attack on capitalism. Because those are the politicians who are in the pocket of big business.
