Governments provide or guarantee internet access
Americans are in agreement that free speech is a fundamental and inalienable right – but would we say the same about internet access?
Finland and Estonia see web access as a component of a civilized society. Those countries’ governments have established internet use as a human right for their citizens, the BBC reported this week.
And most Britons polled by the news agency – 80 percent of respondents – said that they agreed with the assertion that the internet should be a fundamental right for all people.
Here in the States, the Federal Communications Commission is working to bring high-speed internet access to more of the country. People in rural areas, specifically, would benefit from the FCC’s proposal to modify the Universal Service Fund to provide financing for broadband subsidies.
The USF was created to subsidize voice coverage for rural dwellers, but, as the Associated Press reported Saturday, the shift to digital communication is rendering it obsolete.
In some areas, only one broadband provider would be granted subsidies under the modified USF – news that could bode well for internet companies in rural parts of the country.
But internet providers have been chafing against a proposal called "net neutrality" that would prevent them from regulating the content, platforms or sites their customers access.
Some, like University of Michigan law professor Susan Crawford, argue that net neutrality "provides the widest possible encouragement of business activity," but others allege that the enactment of a net neutrality law would undermine providers’ business model.
No final regulations have been released on the issue of net neutrality, but a framework could be provided in a FCC report on national broadband coverage that will be released on March 17.
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