Sunday, February 2, 2014

Speaking of Infrastructure...

We're About to Lose Net Neutrality... (by Marvin Ammori)

Net neutrality is a part of internet infrastructure that a lot of people aren't (very) aware of - it's the principle that disallows internet service providers from charging users for access, services, websites, etc. differentially. It's important to understand what the existence of the net neutrality principle means, because losing net neutrality could have an enormous impact on the internet as we know it. The wired.com article linked above provides a broad overview of what the loss of net neutrality might mean for internet users, but the main point is this: in the near future ISPs may offically have the power to block or slow down website or other service access via their internet service for any reason - or no reason at all. Harkening back to Star and Bowker's "How to Infrastructure," we may soon be looking at another case of "invisible" infrastructure invisibly limiting the accessibility of certain sites or services to certain people.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.