Consumers Deserve Protection

In a more perfect network, the telephone and cable companies would be investing in more capacity in order to render these issues moot. In a more perfect marketplace, there would be 4 or 5 high-speed broadband competitors offering consumers ample choice and providing a market-based check on violations of Net Neutrality – so consumers could pick a provider that respected the open Internet and didn’t interfere with open access.

But we all live in an imperfect world with a gross lack of capacity and competition. As a result, we need a referee to ensure networks remain open and the incentives to innovate and invest will continue to exist. Ceding this role completely to the network operators to decide will result in a different, more closed, and less useful kind of Internet.