Goodbye to net neutrality: how could internet change for users

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the US telecommunications authority, has voted the measure on the so-called "net neutrality" that will modify the rules to be followed by internet providers and which will deeply modify the internet as we have known it so far. Let us immediately make it clear that only the provisions in the United States will change, since these rules are national and therefore Europe, is not involved. However, it is equally evident that if the wind changes in the US, the debate will spread to the rest of the world. Already in Europe, there is some hint of wanting to force the situation. Moreover, the business will ask to be able to enjoy the opportunities that open up. Because the choice to renounce the previous rules leaves ample opportunity for telecommunications companies, internet providers, to diversify the traffic by fragmenting the offer on the pay-TV model, making some priority content pay-per-view.

What is net neutrality? 

The "net neutrality" is the Internet as we are used to using it today, where all information, whether messages, photos, videos or music files, are treated in the same way: no service provider can be guaranteed a higher speed to get to the end user: Netflix, Spotify, and Youtube have the same speed as any other service. The basic idea is that the Internet does not follow the principles of money but the originality of the idea and the quality of the content. Without the net neutrality, the road to the domination of the companies, in particular of the content providers, willing to pay to have the priority for their own contents opens up.

What happened? 

On Thursday, the CCF met to vote on an agenda that aims to cancel the changes approved under the presidency of Barack Obama, who had imposed an obligation not to violate net neutrality. In the vote of three members against two, the provision was approved. With the consequence that will eliminate any type of regulation for TLC companies, those that provide bandwidth and access. Among other things, the president of the FCC, Ajit Pai, comes from the world of telecommunications, having followed the legal department of Verizon. Since taking office, Pai has reiterated that the regulation imposed at the time of Obama has had the effect of depressing investment in the sector, even if the data do not signal a fall. At the meeting, defending his proposal, the president reiterated that the rules on net neutrality held back expansion and innovation and that liberalization will allow the business to move forward.

What could change? 

With the end of neutrality will be paid content to get the better hand? To have Netflix, in addition to the subscription, you will have to pay an additional fee to the internet provider to have sufficient quality to see the movie. In the absence of rules that guarantee net neutrality, the flow of data and files on the internet will be decided by the negotiation between the big content and the big TLC, obviously transferring the costs to the end user. With the secondary result, but not for this less important, to clip the wings of innovation on the web.

If internet providers are free to do what they want, without any rules, it will probably not be long before they will ask for money to content producers, from Netflix to YouTube but also to Google and Facebook, to try and bring more traffic on their platforms. In fact, the big internet companies are not entirely against because they have sufficient liquidity to pay "preferential lanes" on the web that will ensure that the less wealthy competitors are put in a corner. But certainly the big winner of this provision are the giants of the TLC: in the US we talk about AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast.

Who loses? 

Normal users like us will be the losers. Probably it will not happen overnight, but in the United States, the broadband providers will begin to limit or slow down what you can see on the web, presenting offers to ensure we can see the sites and enjoy the services we normally use. The smaller Internet companies will also suffer, the ones that will not be able to guarantee an adequate compensation for the traffic and, above all, the startups that will not be able to experiment with new services on the web, in the same way they had done, in their own time, Google, Facebook, and Netflix.

What will happen? 

In fact, with this vote the FCC renounces its regulatory powers on the internet, abdicating in favor of the market. Following this past week's decision, the Federal Communication Commission is likely to be the subject of a series of lawsuits - formerly the attorney general of New York has announced an initiative on behalf of several states - which will rebuke the authority for having renounced what is written in its institutional mandate. And the result is not entirely obvious.