What, you didn't like my propaganda? I thought "corporate shell game" was a sweet line. But you're the editor. ;-)

Seriously, though, you should care. The internet grew up on common carrier principles like the phone line, which meant that the phone company had no say over what you discussed and couldn't stop other providers from using their lines.

Imagine you have a favorite local pizza joint, Joe's Pizza. You call them up to place your order, and an automated voice buts in and says, "Please hold, while we fulfill orders for Domino's."

A non-neutral net would be like that, but more insidious. You'd have no idea why Saddle Creek's site Dl'd like dial-up but Corporate Music Shack's page was web lightning.

If content providers couldn't afford to cut deals with the ISPs, they'd be pushed into the slow lane. It would be as if the only paved highway led to the mall, but the road downtown was dirt. Pretty soon, people would stop coming downtown.

And, like with the consolidation of radio station ownership, you'd likely wouldn't notice until it was too late.

There's a free speech and anti-competitive side, too, which I don't have time to get into. . .

There's also a new "idea" around to charge different amounts for different bandwiths. Sweet, huh?

The Internet was designed to be neutral: theoretically, any given user can access any given resource with equal ease. Because of this, anyone with an idea and a web page can create content or new technologies. Now telecom companies want to be able to regulate access different sites. So if, say, my access provider had a relationship with the Post but not with the City Paper, they could make my connection to the Post faster and my connection to the City Paper slower or charge me to access one but not the other. They could do the same with YouTube, iTunes, Facebook, your Presidential candidate's page, whatever. That's not how the net is supposed to work. It stifles competition, locks out new technologies, and leads us towards a future where the Internet becomes a series of "walled garden" networks set up like AOL had back in the day.

Happy to help you if you can return the favor. Nearly two million people have taken action in support of Net Neutrality. You can join the fight too:

http://www.savetheinternet.com/=act