Are Supporters Of Net Neutrality Really Just Supporters Of Music Piracy?

from the those-evil-net-neutrality-supporters dept

One of the big problems with the net neutrality debate is that both sides are prone to misleading and hyperbolic arguments. This applies to both the astroturfing groups, which are shills for the telcos, and the Save The Internet crowd, which also has a penchant for propaganda. The latest absurd argument comes from Sonia Arrison, who works for a telco-funded think tank, who claims that supporters of net neutrality are really just supporters of piracy because of their opposition to blocking P2P networks. This ignores the fact that blocking or slowing down these networks doesn't stop piracy. It also buys into the myth that there's a serious bandwidth crunch that can only be solved by things like traffic shaping, which net neutrality supporters tend to be opposed to. Still, Arrison saves up her ultimate canard for the end of the column when she says that supporters of "net neutrality theory" should be opposed to Apple's plan to sell DRM-free MP3s from EMI because Apple's use of price differentiation (unprotected tracks will sell at $1.29 as opposed to the normal $.99) is non-neutral. Of course, nothing at all about net neutrality would imply that different prices for different products should be illegal. All this example proves is that Arrison either doesn't understand net neutrality or is willfully trying to distort the concept.