Happy New Year everyone. 2009 saw me move from Movable Type to WordPress. So, one of my resolutions for 2010 is to keep up with my blog and site as a whole.

I had hinted in a previous post that the end of Net Neutrality would mean spats between content providers and cable companies. For actual examples of this happening, look at the following articles [1] [2] [3]. Just imagine if that happened to internet content! Scary right?

Here, I want to expand this discussion a bit. Although the internet can be a commercial tool, as well as a source of entertainment, its based on the free-flow of information. As the old saying goes, “Knowledge is power.” However, knowledge and access to it is becoming more of a commodity that is harder and harder to access. At stake isn’t just the level of ‘content’ (or the finished product), rather the whole processes – e.g. learning and literacy – are at risk. Due to the recent economic crisis, public institutions such as community college and libraries have faced cuts and closures. As such, according to Ars Technica, they are jockeying for stimulus money for broadband given their status as public computer labs all over the U.S. But, should they even have to make such a bid? How can an economy that has moved towards the information/service sector (and away from industrial production) over the past few decades even question expanding public access to computers and broadband? In short more and more money is needed just to get on the so-called information superhighway.

That said, education as a whole is a mess. Some are saying that it’s the ‘next bubble to burst‘ [also]. Higher education as a whole is full of problems, from funding, to hiring. This is the world in which I am starting my career as an academic. Scary right?

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