President Obama Calls to turn Internet into a Public Utility

This is a gaming website, we talk and write about gaming and the culture that surrounds it.  Because of that, as much as Id like to write about something easier, itd be hard to justify not reporting on something so significant, sobear with me, and lets look at the latest news shaking the internet world.

Chances are, if youre on this website, youre a left-leaning young person.  Thats not presumption on my part, its quoting statistics.  And while your opinion on President Obama might vary, theres a better than good chance you believe in the preservation of Net Neutralitywhich is basically a law that prevents internet providers from prioritizing one website over another, so, say, Amazon couldnt pay Comcast to be faster on your web browser than Ebay, or something.

Well, over the last few months, the FCC, whos in charge of overseeing and regulating the internet, had an open forum where Americans could speak out on the issue of Net Neutrality: and unsurprisingly, the public made their voice heard.  Over 4 million people asked for the preservation of Net Neutrality, opposing the lobbyists and lawyers from cable companies. 

And today, President Obama joined the 4 million, releasing this video to the public:



So theres some terms in there that could probably be elaborated on.

Basically, what President Obama is saying is that he wants the FCC (who has the authority) to re-classify the Internet as a Public Utility, like electricity or water, that would be protected as a necessity of American life.  Currently, the internet is legally labeled as an Information Service, along with several other websites online (such as Facebook and Youtube), which means that it suffers less federal regulationwhich can both be a good and a bad thing.

His full statement and opinion can be found here, but heres a good segment:
 

"If carefully designed, these rules should not create any undue burden for ISPs, and can have clear, monitored exceptions for reasonable network management and for specialized services such as dedicated, mission-critical networks serving a hospital.  But combined, these rules mean everything for preserving the Internet's openness.

 
This is a double-edged sword, as far as I can tellbearing in mind my experience with government doesnt extend beyond a few political classes in college and the Daily Showbecause while this could certainly protect the internet from the loss of net neutrality and overpricing, it means the internet, as Senator Ted Cruz (R) puts it, (would) operate at the speed of government."  And the government has, unfortunately, a well-deserved bad reputation when it comes to efficiency.

Voices are speaking up from both sides: Democrats, Firefox, and Netflix have all publically sided with Obama, while Republicans, Comcast and Verizon have sided against him. 

Fortunately, this is a democracy, so their voices as matter as much as yours.  Time to get our voices heard.