This, my friends, is why we need laws about Net Neutrality. Independent testing shows that Comcast, the second largest Internet service provider, actively interferes with BitTorrent file sharing by its customers. BitTorrent, while sometimes used for the illegal transfer of copyrighted material, is also used by hundreds of legitimate companies and organizations to quickly distribute large files. For example, OpenOffice.org, Ubuntu Linux, and other organizations with large downloadable products each offer and encourage downloading with BitTorrent. I’d bet that Verizon and other ISPs discriminate against BitTorrent traffic too (I am starting to have strange issues sharing legal ‘torrents’ myself). I have a right to use my Internet connection for whatever kind of legal data traffic I want, and it is time to protect that right by law.
- Comcast Blocks Some Internet Traffic (AP via MSNBC).
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