Consumers have stake in net neutrality defeat

[Commentary] Consumers could be facing an online future that more resembles the current pay TV ecosystem -- the exact thing that many Netflix consumers attempt to evade as they cut the cord.

"People are going to be upset. What I hate about my pay TV service you are going to do to my Internet service, too?" says Phil Swann, president of TVPredictions. "It's opened the door to the likelihood of that reality unless something changes." Echoing Swann's concerns is Rashad Robinson, executive director of minority consumer group ColorOfChange, who said that "the Internet could very soon start looking like cable TV, where one corporation holds the power to decide which content we're able to access." Not everyone is convinced that consumers will see a lot of change on home broadband service, or that they would bear the brunt alone. "People are really concerned about the concept of quality of service and ISPs blocking things," says Don Bowman, chief technology officer of networking company Sandvine. "We think that the court of public opinion protects from that occurring." It is major networking companies such as Cogent and Level 3 that provide connectivity for Internet service providers and content providers (Netflixes and Amazons) that will seek to adjust deals on each end of the equation, Bowman says. For an ISP to tell a residential customer "that 'if you pay more, it will be less bad' is a hard message to sell," Bowman says.