I posted a doomsday picture of what the end of net neutrality would look like several months ago. Here’s that image: This image caused some panic in a recent D&D thread. I have felt somewhat guilty about posting such a sensationalist photoshop since it has no real basis in reality, and so I felt obliged to clarify why the image is so troubling. That particular model is unmarketable, not because the basic concept is unmarketable, but because we are already so used to having those basic services (YouTube, Blogger, MySpace, etc) that the consuming public wouldn’t stand for their sudden removal from the web. Those services would necessarily be turned into the internet equivalent of ‘basic cable’, like the weather channel or CSPAN. While that particular depiction is unlikely, the basic concept is extremely marketable. It is already how TV (and telephone services) operate, and consumers are used to paying for tiered services. That’s why the image is so uncanny and disturbing, because it is already so familiar. But there is a HUGE difference between a tiered internet offering a YouTubeHD premium package, and a cable service offering tiered TV packages. With TV, content is produced by a network or a consolidated media company, so you get high quality productions that cost a lot of money. To offset those costs, the companies strike deals with cable TV providers to offer their content at certain prices. In other words, the TV providers work in conjunction with the content providers, and this necessarily homogenizes and narrows the scope of media offered. On the internet, on the other hand, there are no centralized sources of content production. There are no networks or media companies that have control of the market. Existing media companies have to compete with small start-up companies, and the existing […]