Net Neutrality Is Probably in Trouble

Brian Feldman, writing at New York magazine on Ajit Pai, the new head of the FCC:

The net-neutrality debate is about whether one class of private entities, ISPs, should be regulated in order to allow millions of other private entities, users and businesses operating online, to operate freely. Pretty much everyone agrees that they should — except for the ISPs … and Ajit Pai. Pai even wrote a 67-page(!) dissent when the order was adopted. Even Google and Facebook support the principle, in part because they often buy up the smaller startups that flourish on an unfettered internet. Imagine an internet where, rather than buying Instagram for $1 billion, Facebook instead paid for a fast lane and forced Instagram out by other means.

As the proprietor of a relatively small internet website with a razor thin budget, and as a fan of the open internet, I’m not super happy about this.