It's interesting to note that this legislation was prompted because the incumbent telco (KPN) overplayed its hand. They publicly suggested that they would price traffic from WhatsApp higher to offset their loss in SMS revenue. A public outcry ensued, law makers got involved and this is the result.<p>Democracy doesn't always work, but when it does it's a beautiful thing.
In the broadest sense, net neutrality's an abrogation of companies' rights to set terms for their products and allow consumers to agree or disagree. It limits the pricing and service dynamic.<p>Specifically for the net, it's a concession that we need gov't to wield the ultimate authority over detailed aspects of the Internet and step into many disputes between private parties if the specter of non-neutrality is raised (and of course it will be). You might think it's in your immediate favor, but voting for net neutrality isn't really voting for equal packet treatment: it's voting for government control over packet treatment, which will be turned against you in ways you haven't foreseen.<p>Net neutrality is like saying I can't open a store w/out handicap access, even though handicapped folks have the option of a) passing by my store to another; or b) finding a way to shop at mine because it's closer and has lower prices. "Shop neutrality" would dictate that if I won't treat everyone equally - although it's clear in my terms - I just shouldn't exist. There are those who agree with this analogy, too, of course.<p>You suppose the government should be the ultimate arbiter of what options should be on offer, rather than the entrepreneur and the market of free people? A dangerous way to look at it, I think.<p>No, the telecoms aren't by any stretch unregulated as it is. But if that's your complaint, tackle it from that direction, not by badly regulating bad regulations.
I've always struggled a bit with the concept of net neutrality. Leigislation should improve/secure freedom of choice. If it is about keeping providers from throttling traffic based on the traffic-source ( = prohibition of choices) I'm all for it.<p>But what about my freedom to choose a slower connection? Or one without video chat capacities? I propably would be ok with paying half the price if my traffic has not the highest priority.<p>When I had less income, an internet connection might have been more affordable if I wasn't forced to buy traffic capacities I didn't need. I have a couple of friends who still struggle to afford internet (sadly, the more time passes without internet access, the harder it'll get for them to ever improve on their income).<p>Does the "net neutrality" concept differentiate between "intent of usage" and "interest of usage"? The first to me seems more important to be kept neutral.<p>(What I mean by the latter might be better expalined with the 19th century rail-pricing systems where you had 1st, 2nd and 3rd class passengers. 3rd class was dirty, packed and propably pathoenic. But more importantly, the "3rd class" could afford the ride. )
I'm proud of them, but the Internet is international - without broad acceptance, we run the risk of effectively having distinct National Internets with different rules and regulations. That scares me a bit, because the potential is still to have unhindered communications between anyone, anywhere.<p>Net neutrality should be built into the fabric of the Internet through better technology - legislation clearly isn't working.
Then why is BREIN allowed to force Ziggo to block access to TPB?<p>I'm glad Dutch ISPs are not allowed to throttle my traffic to specific websites. But apparently blackholing it is still allowed.
> The net neutrality law prohibits internet providers from interfering with the traffic of their users.<p>Censoring The Pirate Bay is interfering the with the users' traffic. Does that mean the court ruling of Ziggo and Xs4all being forces to censor that site, contradicts this legislation?
After it became apparent by parlement representitives they probably had to pay "chatheffing" - chattax, this law was reality quite fast.<p>It's pretty hopefull the law passed senate <i>unanimously</i>.
This is great step towards a global untapped internet where people can have their freedom of speech without the need of fear of being spied upon. I hope more countries follows this example; The Netherlands proves once again that they are one step ahead in integrity-politics.
actually the third country after chile and norway<p><a href="http://translate.google.com.au/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraaf.nl%2Fdigitaal%2F12089709%2F__Nieuwe_wet_voor_internetverkeer__.html" rel="nofollow">http://translate.google.com.au/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&#...</a>
How do people in the Netherlands feel about the notion of "common carrier"?<p><a href="http://www.columbia.edu/dlc/wp/citi/citinoam11.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.columbia.edu/dlc/wp/citi/citinoam11.html</a><p>Is common carrier a useful concept for society?<p>What do you think?