Julius Genachowski, the newly appointed chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), on Monday reiterated the Obama-administration’s stance over the issue of net neutrality, saying that the US government will persecute violators of the principle.
In a statement, Genachowski said that President Barack Obama is pushing for the neutrality in the Internet, adding that he did not “pussyfoot” last week when he was asked to comment over the issue.
However, the statements coming from the FCC only leaves users even more confused over the issue as to most of the users did not know what net neutrality means.
Free Press policy director Ben Scott, meanwhile, explained that net neutrality is one of the most common things that Internet users ignore or take fro granted every time they go online.
FP, a nonprofit organization that tackles communication issues particularly in the Internet, further explained that net neutrality simply means that there are no gatekeepers every time users login in their favorite websites.
“Users can use and be allowed access to all the contents of the websites without any discrimination or blockade from other networks,” the group added.
Scott, in his statement, was referring to the kind of pay-for-play scheme that cable, phone, and operator companies are implementing. The system also allows the firms to decide which online content will get preferential treatment.
“This is the kind of scenario that we are avoiding. But if the telecommunication giants will not give way, things could be very different for all the Internet users,” Scott added.
Companies who own the fiber optic pipes, to where the Internet information flows, can also dictate their own terms to each of the website that can be found in the World Wide Web.
The net neutrality issue is now subjected to debate as telecom companies stressed that they should have a profit over providers, which usually use heavy bandwidth contents like movies and other downloads.