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The best way to make people care about net neutrality: Show what ‘slow lanes’ will do to their porn

Published Sep 5th, 2014 8:20AM EDT
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Now this is a net neutrality campaign that might catch the attention of people who normally couldn’t be bothered. On September 10th next week, several websites are planning to take part in an “Internet Slowdown” in which they’ll post symbolic “loading” icons on their sites to demonstrate what will happen to them if the FCC goes through with its plan to sanction Internet “fast lanes” that would completely kill off net neutrality. And now it looks like the campaign has just grabbed its most important contributors yet: Popular porn sites.

MORE: Tech companies still hate the FCC’s net neutrality plan

Over at Reddit, a Pornhub representative announced that Pornhub, Redtube and Youporn will all be taking part in the Internet Slowdown on September 10th. The sites won’t be intentionally slowing down your favorite porn videos, but they will be posting a “a big in-your-face message that users will need to close” before they can watch their desired videos. Combined, the three popular porn sites hope to reach upwards of 50 million people to educate them about the need for net neutrality.

The Internet Slowdown campaign was created as a way to protest the FCC’s proposal to let ISPs create Internet “fast lanes” that would let some companies pay more money to get their content delivered faster over ISPs’ last mile networks. Many popular tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon and Netflix, have all come out against the proposal.

Brad Reed
Brad Reed Staff Writer

Brad Reed has written about technology for over eight years at BGR.com and Network World. Prior to that, he wrote freelance stories for political publications such as AlterNet and the American Prospect. He has a Master's Degree in Business and Economics Journalism from Boston University.