The Internet has been a relatively unregulated zone of international freedom the entire time it’s been used by the general public. In America, we take this freedom for granted as the Internet has always been that way, we invented it, and in America, it’s fairly safe to say we wouldn’t imagine it any other way as freedom is what this country was founded upon.
But what if the Internet were no longer free?
What if international regulation sought to charge a website owner when the site was simply browsed from a visitor residing in another country or even taxed based on actual clicks and/or traffic?
What that would likely entail is the beginning of the separation of the International Internet that we know today, into segmented Internet factions or cooperatives. For example, the US, Canada, and UK may have one free Internet they agree to let be open among their countries, while other nations may group together into different factions.
What if all this was planning on being implemented at the end of 2012?
What if we told you this could very well happen?
A recent eye opening Wall Street Journal opinion piece The U.N. Threat to Internet Freedom, by Robert M McDowell, a commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission, discusses the impending regulation and charges the International Community is seeking to impart on the Internet by the end of 2012, the ramifications of which would be far reaching.
Tell us what you think (and remember, this is a family-friendly blog) and what actions you personally might take now to help prevent this outcome…as well as what you might do differently in the future if it indeed comes to pass.
Then people will make their own, and it will be preferred. It will have its own set of policies and be guarded by those to sustain exactly what the Internet offers now. Organizations will try to control this, but they will have no say in it. It’s past the point of no return for this kind of stuff. It’s here to stay, one way or another.