Whats the deal with Net Neutrality?

I've been hearing alot about this topic lately, but I'm still a bit confused about it. What exactly is net neutrality, what has it got to do with the American government and does it affect anyone outside the USA?

 

I think the basic principal behind it is that many of the network providers for the internet want to charge companies for different speeds of bandwidth. So instead of everything running at one given speed the infrastucture provider say like Verizon will now offer two different bandwidths, the slower will still be provided for all users at no additional charge but if a company like google or microsoft wants to host their product on a faster pipeline they can pay extra for that service.

So the debate is whether or not the net should be the same for everyone (neutral) or if the people who can afford to pay more will get more.

 

Yeah, problem is they big companies are being disingenious. What they say now isn't what they'll do, which is to hold the internet hostage. It is a common tactic in big business and government, say one thing and do another.

Basically they want to sqeeze more revinues out of the net. Want to guess who'll end up paying? They are talking profit margins, they want more money for something that is already paying well.

If they were being straight (and I don't believe it for a minute) the arguement makes sense, with TV and other high bandwidth services coming online the web will need revamped. What will probably happen is those who are paying less will get less than they are now. Those who paying more will see their rates go up.