Say goodbye to net neutrality

Another genius Tory Scum wheeze: let ISPs determine the speed of access to certain sites based on whether they've been paid to do so.

This is very nerdy, but stick with me.

The idea's been kicking around corporate headquarters for a long time. BT, for instance, could be given a bug fat cheque by Sky to give download priority to visitors to its site. People wanting to visit a BBC site would have to wait a lot longer for access - despite paying for the same internet access as the Sky viewer. It makes a lot of money for the ISP, which can operate an auction, but it severely damages free and fair competition, and punishes the subscriber for not following the herd.

Net neutrality is key to the web as we know it: whatever you choose to view, your ISP doesn't discriminate against you. The smallest shop, fansite, news outlet or even blog opens on your screen as fast as the biggest. Nobody thinks 'I'll go to Sky News, their page opens faster'. Now, the big boys will hog the bandwidth and the rest will wither away.

The Tories think this is 'freeing the market' but like all things, it will lead to powerful corporate monopolies. Something else to lobby against. I'm so tired of fighting their evil plans…

Update
Here's my friend Jim's explanation of how these decisions are reached. He's chair of the Open Rights Group, which campaigns on such issues, so he knows whereof he speaks:

This is actually the same evil plan as Labour, I'm afraid. It went like this:

BIS Official: "The EU's got a plan to change Telecom's regulation and what ISPs can do. What do we think?"

BIS Official 2: "Ask Ofcom?"

Ofcom Official: "Err .... let's ask BT"

BT: "We should be able to do what we like. The market will resolve any problem."

Ofcom Official: "ISPs should be able to do what they like. The market will resolve any problem."

BIS Official: "ISPs should be able to do what they like. The market will resolve any problem."

BIS Minister: "ISPs should be able to do what they like. The market will resolve any problem."

UK MEPs: "ISPs should be able to do what they like. The market will resolve any problem."

EU law: "ISPs should be able to do what they like. The market will resolve any problem."