Will this affect retail Internet traders by slowing us down? "The U.S. government plans to propose broad new rules Monday that would force Internet providers to treat all Web traffic equally, seeking to give consumers greater freedom to use their computers or cellphones to enjoy videos, music and other legal services that hog bandwidth." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125329467451823485.html
Not unless everyone quits their non-trading jobs and downloads movies and songs all day during trading hours.
Net Neutrality is a big deal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality From http://www.savetheinternet.com/faq: What's at stake if we lose Net Neutrality? The consequences of a world without Net Neutrality would be devastating. Innovation would be stifled, competition limited, and access to information restricted. Consumer choice and the free market would be sacrificed to the interests of a [select few].
This is a good thing. You want net neutrality. Let's hope it passes. It will likely slow you down if it does not pass. In addition, passing would curtail the internet to become a monopoly of select garbage; It's the one system that works great as it is. Please don't let greed F*&(*& up a good thing, for once. I'm thankful that the proponents have deep pockets.
As I see it, it will only slow you down without it (neutrality) if you need large bandwidth. It is my understanding that most trading applications do not need much bandwidth. I guess if you are streaming a massive number of quotes it might be. I agree net neutrality is preferred to keep ISPs from doing what Comcast did, but I still don't see that impacting trading for most people.
Obviously, no-one in this thread (except me) has the slightest inkling what net neutrality is about. Taken from ETs favorite source of information Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality The principle states that if a given user pays for a certain level of internet access, and another user pays for a given level of access, that the two users should be able to connect to each other at that given rate of access. (Remember Group 2 and Group 3 fax machines? The lesser service group controlled the entire transmission.) From todays Drudge page: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125329467451823485.html The Obama administration is taking the side of Google, Amazon.com Inc. and an array of smaller businesses that want to profit from offering consumers streaming video, graphics-rich games, movie and music downloads and other services. Yes, a formalized edict of net neutrality would stop Comcast from blocking access. It will not stop Comcast from charging ala carte for internet service. It is true a trading application alone does not require much bandwidth. Add on streaming quotes, streaming news, an occasional streaming news or analysis video, a bit of real-time IM chatter, and all the wonderful flash or otherwise animated advertisements from the big name http portal sites, all in constant use multiple hours per day, during business hours. Message from Pandora...We're sorry, streaming music is not part of your electronic trader internet service package. Feel free to enjoy our homepage.