This is it, the last day you can make a formal comment to the FCC about protecting net neutrality, so
here's your chance to do so, in your own words. And if you want to record that message, it might just end up on this
giant billboard Fight for the Future has parked in front of the FCC.
Here's some inspiration for your comment making from President Obama over the years.
- Here's Senator Obama in 2006: "Allowing the Bells and cable companies to act as gatekeepers with control over internet access would make the internet like cable. A producer driven market with barriers to entry for website creators and preferential treatment for specific sites based not on merit, the number of hits, but on relationships with the corporate gatekeeper. … We can't have a situation in which the corporate duopoly dictates the future of the internet and that's why I'm supporting what is called net neutrality."
- Candidate Obama in 2007: "Facebook, Myspace, ... Google, might not have been started if you had not had a level playing field for whoever has got the best idea. And I want to maintain that basic principle in how the internet functions. So as president I'm going to make sure that that is the principle that my FCC commissioners are applying as we move forward."
- And President Obama in 2009: "One key to strengthening education, entrepreneurship, and innovation in communities like Troy is to harness the full power of the internet. That means faster and more widely available broadband—as well as rules to ensure that we preserve the fairness and openness that led to the flourishing of the internet in the first place. … [T]he role of government is to provide investment that spurs innovation and common-sense ground rules to ensure that there is a level playing field for all comers who seek to contribute their innovations."
- An official White House statement in response to a net neutrality petition: "Absent net neutrality, the Internet could turn into a high-priced private toll road that would be inaccessible to the next generation of visionaries. The resulting decline in the development of advanced online apps and services would dampen demand for broadband and ultimately discourage investment in broadband infrastructure. An open internet removes barriers to investment worldwide."
- President Obama, August, 2014: "One of the issues around net neutrality is whether you are creating different rates or charges for different content providers. That's the big controversy here. So you have big, wealthy media companies who might be willing to pay more and also charge more for spectrum, more bandwidth on the internet so they can stream movies faster. I personally, the position of my administration, as well as a lot of the companies here, is that you don’t want to start getting a differentiation in how accessible the internet is to different users. You want to leave it open so the next Google and the next Facebook can succeed.
Make your formal comment to the FCC today, by midnight, and stay tuned for more opportunities to make your voice heard on net neutrality in the coming weeks. The FCC won't be deciding on the issue until later this fall, so we won't be letting up.