I have been involved with the web in one form or another since 1994. I built my first web page in 1996 at the age of seventeen and am now a senior web developer with nearly sixteen years experience full time. I am also an avid observer of and participant in politics. It is particularly important to me to maintain a free and open internet, as I believe it to be the greatest tool for the promotion of freedom and democracy the world has ever known.
This proposal does quite the opposite. By creating a so-called "fast lane", this proposal inherently violates the spirit in which the internet was built - a rebirth of the marketplace of ideas, as Benjamin Franklin so aptly put it, with equal access for all to hear and be heard. No private enterprise has a right to change the basic function of the internet to prefer one voice over any other, whether for "mere" greed or any other more nefarious purpose - can there be any doubt that certain enterprises (specifically some near-monopolies in certain markets) might wish to stifle voices opposed to them?
Furthermore, and I think you well know this, this internet is no longer merely a plaything of the United States. Rather it is a worldwide communication medium, used for everything from trading cat pictures, to international commerce, to enabling freer political expression and organization throughout the world, everywhere from Iran to here at home. Already, we've seen the threatened potential of the NSA's overreach to balkanize the internet, and this proposal would do nothing to alleviate that grave concern.
The fact that this rule passed on such a narrow 3-2 vote should cause a great deal of hesitation on the part of the FCC and the administration in general. Under no circumstances should so significant a measure be passed by the barest of margins. That slim margin, coupled with the obvious far reaching impact of this measure calls for the highest scrutiny by all involved, from the President and Congress on down.
I therefore call on this proposal to be rescinded, and if Chairman Wheeler, et al should refuse to do so, I would call on the President to use whatever powers he has at his disposal to do so and to request their resignations, so great is the importance of a truly free and democratic internet.