More Save-the-Internet News

As I posted yesterday, my Rep. voted for the Markey amendment. Yay him.

Unfortunately, when the Markey amendment was defeated, Engel then voted for the let’s-kill-the-Internet bill anyway. Boo him.

MoveOn has a petition . Sign it.

11 comments

  1. Cathy says:

    Which is the “let’s kill the Internet” bill? Because so far I’ve seen everyone point to the Barton Bill, and I wouldn’t characterize it as such.

  2. deblipp says:

    Sorry, Cathy, I was writing in a hurry. I should have slowed down and posted more info. Busy day.

    It is the Barton bill (info here. It proposes to eliminate Network Neutrality which is essential to keeping the Internet the open forum for all information that it is today.

  3. Cathy says:

    I’ve read the bill 2 or 3 times and discussed it with my telecom professor, and just don’t see how it eliminates network neutrality. It doesn’t enhance it, granted, but it is not at all apparent that this is the bill to stop in order to advance NN. And that Save the Internet site does nothing to explain it either. Which is pretty unforgiveable, IMHO. I’m all for Network Neutrality, but its complete lack of explanation for why people should lobby in a certain way or not does not help the cause in the slightest.

  4. deblipp says:

    I agree the site could be more informative. I found this article helpful, but it still doesn’t break down exactly what the Barton bill says. The key, from the reading I’ve been doing, seems to be that the Markey amendment was rejected.

    Here’s a Kos story that has more meat.

  5. Cathy says:

    Here’s my brief take on why I don’t think the Barton Bill matters per se.

  6. deblipp says:

    Interesting. I’m influenced by the fact that the most, well, influential bloggers, across the full political spectrum, have come out to oppose the Barton Bill. Leading me to something of a ‘where there’s smoke there’s fire’ position.

  7. Cathy says:

    That’s exactly what they’re doing, but I think it stands them to lose a lot of credibility down the road. It’s got a lot of “boy who cried wolf” going on – which is not good as a long term political motivation strategy…

    If I’m wrong that the Barton Bill is not a threat then I’ll be happy to acknowledge it. But first someone needs to explain it…

  8. The Barton Bill…

    A lot of people are up in arms lately about net neutrality. As they should be, because it breaks the Internet when individual nodes can handicap (or refuse to deliver outright) certain content simply because they don’t like that content…….

  9. Cathy says:

    Someone whose opinion on these matters I trust.

  10. deblipp says:

    Interesting.