Hold on to your keyboards, the Internet is about to change in a way you have never before experienced. Congress has the power to reshape the Internet as we know it and the results of which may not be to the benefit of the consumer. As it now stands, most users connect to the Internet via some sort of wire connected to an Internet service provider. Thanks to the Federal Communications Commission, regulations that required telecom companies to provide open access to the Internet were removed last year. This virtually eliminated competition from small ISPs as the large telecommunication and cable companies now compete to provide those services. These large companies provide 98% of U.S. Internet users with broadband services and control the wires that connect users to the Internet. Once connected it doesn’t matter if the user is sending e-mail, downloading information from a web site or watching a video of their favorite TV show. The role of the Internet provider is to deliver the connection and allow data to flow equally across that connection, for which they collect a fee. They are not to be concerned with what actually flows across the lines. This […]