FCC Chairman Ajit Pai blasted everyone from Cher to Twitter for opposing his efforts to repeal net neutrality rules

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai thinks everyone from Cher to Twitter has it wrong when they say that his efforts to roll back the US government’s existing network neutrality rules will spell the death of the web. Instead, Chairman Pai said that tech giants could pose the greatest threat by discriminating against viewpoints on the internet. “They might cloak their advocacy in the public interest,” he said, “but the real interest of these internet giants is in using the regulatory process to cement their dominance in the internet economy.” “Now look: I love Twitter,” Chairman Pai began. “But let’s not kid ourselves; when it comes to a free and open Internet, Twitter is a part of the problem. The company has a viewpoint and uses that viewpoint to discriminate.” “And unfortunately, Twitter is not an outlier,” Pai continued. “Indeed, despite all the talk, and all the fear, that broadband providers could decide what internet content consumers can see, recent experience shows that so-called edge providers are in fact deciding what content they see. These providers routinely block or discriminate against content they don’t like.” Chairman Pai then charged that companies “want to place much tougher regulations on broadband providers than they are willing to have placed upon themselves,” before adding: “I don’t blame them for trying. But the government shouldn’t aid and abet this effort.”