Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Net Neutrality

Cable companies are trying to create an unequal playing field for internet speeds, but they're doing it so boringly that most news outlets aren't covering it. 
John Oliver explains the controversy and lets viewers know how they can voice their displeasure to the FCC.
 net neutrality

We are Team Internet

We believe in the free and open Internet, with no arbitrary fees or slow lanes for sites that can't pay. All of the people, companies, and organizations below have taken a stand for "Title II reclassification," the only option that lets the FCC stop Team Cable from breaking the key principles of the Internet we love.

They are Team Cable

comcast verizon time warner channel AT&T Cable companies are famous for high prices and poor service. Several rank as the most hated companies in America. Now, they're attacking the Internet–their one competitor and our only refuge–with plans to charge websites arbitrary fees and slow (to a crawl) any sites that won't pay up. If they win, the Internet dies.

The Internet rose up and we are closer than ever to winning net neutrality, but now Congress is trying to kill it.

This week, the House and Senate are holding hearings to hijack the FCC’s debate on whether to save net neutrality or let ISPs create Internet slow lanes. The Chairmen of the committees, who receive large contributions from the cable industry, want to pass legislation (called the Thune/Upton proposal) to derail the FCC’s net neutrality efforts. This is happening this week, tell them to stop now.

battleforthenet

You're our only hope. This is the time to go big, visible, and strong - that's the only way we can actually win this fight. We all need to get as many people in our respective audiences motivated to do something. We can make this epic, but only if you help. We need companies to be frontrunners, leaders, and heroes on this, that’s the key ingredient to raising the bar and making sure everyone goes big. We realize it's a big ask, but this is the kind of bad internet legislation that comes along (or gets this close to passing) once a decade or so. If it passes we'll be kicking ourselves for decades—every time a favorite site gets relegated to the slow lane, and every time we have to rework or abandon a project because of the uncertain costs paid prioritization creates. Doing the most we can right now seems like the only rational step.

Change your Twitter photo or make a post on your facebook

Protest Internet slow lanes on Twitter, by changing your profile photo to the dreaded spinning wheel of death (in your favorite color). Then you can try out these tweets.

BATTLEFORTHENET

There’s a bunch of different ways for sites to participate. The best way? Run this widget. You can place it on your site using just one line of code (see above). You can also change your site’s logo (or one of its letters) to a spinning wheel of death or embed this action tool in a high traffic page. NOTE: none of these tools will slow down your site; they just show a symbolic loading symbol. https://www.battleforthenet.com/countdown/

Join the Internet Countdown

Last year, more than 40,000 websites participated in the Internet Slowdown to demand real net neutrality. It worked! But monopolistic Cable companies are pouring millions into a last ditch effort to derail the FCC's historic vote. Help us flood Washington, DC with calls and emails to show lawmakers that the whole Internet is watching, and we're literally counting down the seconds until we get real net neutrality.