The first great equalizer – the revolver – was invented back in the nineteenth century. The U.S. federal government, in accordance with the Second Amendment to the Constitution, as expected, withdrew from having discretionary control over revolvers. As a result, the chances of bad guys versus good guys have leveled off. And in the end, the mores of the Wild West have been replaced by a law-abiding (and armed to the teeth) America.
The second great equalizer – the internet – was also invented in America. The U.S. federal government, in accordance with the First Amendment to the Constitution, as expected, withdrew from control over the internet. As a result, the chances of bad guys versus good guys, from the point of view of the free distribution of information, have leveled off.
As in the case of revolvers, there were some excesses of the internet. As a result, about 80% of all websites in the world are porn, and about 90% of all e-mails are spam. But the government preferred not to intervene. Consumers themselves determine which websites to go to and which ones to ignore. The internet industry has grown to a gigantic scale. The number of internet sites and the speed of information transfer have grown exponentially for many years. For example, my first modem had a speed of 2,400 bits per second, and it was as much as three times faster than the very first modems at 800 bits per second.
The exponential growth of the new industry continued until mid-2015. In that year, the Obama administration decided to implement government control over the internet. The P.R. campaign was conducted under the slogan “net neutrality.” But the remarkable term “net neutrality” had nothing in common with either the net or its neutrality.
In the progressive, politically correct Newspeak, this term meant “government control over the redistribution of profits on the internet.” Similarly, the term “global warming” has nothing to do with the rise in the temperature of the atmosphere; rather, in Newspeak, it means simply “a global redistribution of wealth.”
A year and a half passed, and the Trump administration abolished net neutrality. Thus, the business on the internet returns to the old and well-known bosom of “creative destruction” that exists under capitalism and was inherent to the internet until mid-2015.
It’s no secret that internet technologies work in a similar fashion in any other industry. A supporter of net neutrality, the company Netflix, for some reason, forgot that it was “creative destruction” that led to the success of the online theater Netflix and other numerous online theaters. After all, Netflix’s popularity took off due to the destruction (and subsequent bankruptcy) of the retail chain Blockbuster.
Google is also a supporter of net neutrality. But the rise of Google was due to the destruction (and subsequent bankruptcy) of many old-fashioned advertising agencies. Until recently, this whole cycle of “creation – destruction” on the internet took place without any intervention by the federal government.
The key to the control of the internet is that net neutrality was adopted and then canceled by non-electable bureaucrats of the federal government who are appointed by the president and who are unaccountable to Congress. Maybe in some countries, this model of the internet will appeal to citizens. But freedom-loving America will never allow some faceless bureaucrats to control what we already successfully control.
[Originally published at American Thinker]