ISP Guarantees Net Neutrality, For a Fee

greedyturtle writes "Ars Technica has up an interesting article on the first ISP to guarantee network neutrality. It's called COmmunityPOwered Internet, aka Copowi. The offer of neutrality comes at a higher price — mostly due to uncompetitive telco line pricing schemes — $34 for 256K DSL, $50 for 1.5 Mbs, and $60 for 7 Mbps. The owner claims to need only 5,000 subscribers to move his ISP into the national arena from the 12 Western states where it now operates. Would you be willing to spend the extra bucks for network neutrality?"

Comments

But wait a minute

[Billly Gates]

I was promissed by the telecom industry that this would never happen. They told us we would have cheaper rates with more bandwith. Its not like they lied to us just so they could rip us off on tax payer subsidized lines.

ah

[Anonymous Coward]

[mob voice] That's a nice internet you have there... would be a shame if anything happened to it... say me and my pals here will make sure no "accidents" happen... for a fee- what do ya say? [/mob voice]

Re:Well, but if they offered more . . .

[dwye]

> Like anonymity, no record retention, agreement not to tap
> or packet inspect ever?

Illegal. If you want them to be able to do this, lobby Congress. I am sure that organized crime will give you support for your position (which is another reason why it will never happen, btw :-). Until then, accept that any time someone in the business wants to look at your stuff, they can, whether it is because of a court order, being cooperative with law enforcement agencies, or a sysadmin wanting to monitor your unencrypted traffic to feed his delusions of godhood. They might be punished afterwards, but there is the problem of the bell that cannot be unrung.

If you want to be secure from any monitoring, there are ways, but you probably want to live a more normal life.