You’ve been reading about it for a while now, but “GoogleFi” has finally gone public—and folks are putting it thru it’s paces. This is the public wireless network that Google has put together in Mountain View, California.
Yes, publicly accessible WiFi is a great thing. We in DC have OpenPark on the national mall for those who want to blog on steps of the Capitol or Supreme Court. But what if we started to use these publicly accessible networks to prove a political point—like net neutrality.
Imagine the headlines: No Yahoo! Search on Google’s WiFi, or Google WiFi Prefers Own Base to Ebay, or Why Shop Amazon when Froogle’s Faster on GoogleFi?
What if, for a day, Google selected a number of its own sites to which it could temporarily block or degrade access, and instead replaced the site with a message like:
Can’t find the site you wanted? Don’t worry, it’s still there, we’re just blocking it.
Why? Because today we can under the law.
If you don’t want to be blocked and want to learn more about discrimination on the Internet and why net neutrality is so important, click here.
At least a select group of the public in Mountain View would better understand the issue. Maybe if we had a “No Net Neutrality Day” on a few of these muni-wifi networks, more people would get the point.
I'm from Alaska and trust
I’m from Alaska and trust me, there are MANY people here that know Ted Stevens is an idiot. Alaska has tried to vote him out, but sadly this is a very “red” state. Keep in mind that the people who live here are the children of “Pioneers”, who helped to destroy the Alaska Native culture and Alaska’s land; they feel they have some sort of right to be here and many are Republican. Also keep in mind that many of Alaska’s other citizens live in Rural villages, highly remote areas where the only way to get to them is by plane. Alaska does has a misconception of the issues because they have a harder time to access the internet, many make their living off subsistence, and don’t forget that this wonderful Bush Administration isn’t helping anyone, least of all the poor broke ass Natives like me and the rest of us. Ted Stevens can rot for all I care and I will fight for Net Neutrality. Go Native power! :)