Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Mathew Ingram, 1/9/25

Headline:  “Net Neutrality Is Dead (Again). Journalism Could Suffer.”

Subhead:  “What a new court ruling might mean for independent local news.”

“Net neutrality—or the idea that all digital information should flow through the internet unencumbered by restrictions and without internet companies showing favoritism toward some types and sources of content over others—sometimes feels like an immutable law of the modern world, like gravity or magnetic attraction. But in reality, it’s a political football that has been tossed back and forth for decades between open-internet advocates and free-market conservatives, who feel that neutrality rules are unnecessary and a brake on innovation and growth. Last week, the opponents of net neutrality won a significant victory when judges on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Federal Communications Commission didn’t have the right to impose such rules when it did so last year. Now critics say that the death of the rules could allow the internet to become distorted by partisan political and corporate interests. It could also make existing online even more difficult for news publishers and journalism in general.”

https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/net_neutrality_repeal_journalism.php