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AT&T shows the future without net neutrality
AT&T censored the web stream of a Pearl Jam concerts last Sunday because the lyrics denounced Bush. Sang to the tune of Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall, part 2", the band asked Bush to "leave the world alone" and "go home".
The telecommunications provider sponsored the concert and made it available on its Blue Room website. But after lead singer Eddie Vedder sang the first line of the George Bush bashing,
"This, of course, troubles us as artists but also as citizens concerned with the issue of censorship and the increasingly consolidated control of the media," the band wrote on its website.
The ability for a large corporation to censor public opinion is why we need net neutrality, and why we need it embedded in a law if not in the constitution.
AT&T is realizing its mistake, blaming the mishap on an outside contractor. The real question however is why AT&T felt it needed to have censors monitor a pop concert in the first place.
"Those lyrics in no way, shape or form, are something that should have been edited," AT&T spokesman Michael Coe told Reuters.
After Janet Jackson's 2004 "wardrobe malfunction," you want to make sure that you don't expose minors to adult content. But that could have been easily settled by adding a disclaimer before users are allowed to view the concert. There is never a good excuse for censorship.
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