On April 26th, Congresswoman Heather Wilson, representative of New Mexico’s 1st district, voted against the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement (COPE) Act. In the same House Energy and Commerce Committee meeting, she voted in favor of Rep. Ed Markey's Amendment that contains enforceable Net Neutrality provisions. So, what does this mean?

In essence, it means Rep. Wilson is a supporter of small business, local democracy, and internet freedom. The COPE Act, sponsored by Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, has been drafted and introduced in the committee after an intensive lobbying campaign on the part of large, telecom corporations, like Verizon and AT&T. The telecos want to unlevel the internet playing field, creating a two-tiered internet where internet traffic is classified and routed in direct proportion to the size of the user's checkbook.

You see, all internet traffic is nothing more than electronic packets traveling across fiber optic lines and computer routers. Each packet carries with it important information, which tells the routers along the way what the information is and where it is is headed. Now all telco routers move audio, video, email, instant messages, regardless of origin, regardless of destination, through the pipes without discrimination.

The telco sponsored COPE Act seeks to change all this.  Ever used Skype, Vonage, or Yahoo! Messenger? Do you read an obscure, thematic blog hosted in the basement of some innovative Linux geek? Take your pick of your favorite web service or micro content provider; lack of Net Neutrality provisions are putting us in danger of losing it all. Under the COPE Act, Verizon will have the legal right to sign a preferential agreement with MSN, speeding up msn.com and blocking access to the Google search engine, or Yahoo! Messenger, while slowing to a crawl thousands of small content providers.

A site like agroinnovations.local/, which is hosted and maintained on a DSL line in a small office in Albuquerque, New Mexico, may be altogether destroyed by the new legislation. I would not be the the only one affected by the COPE Act. Thousands, perhaps millions, of bloggers, podcasters, small ISPs, and other small businesses who rely on Net Neutrality will have their economic livelihood threatened by this invidious legislation.

Net Neutrality has provided a democratic, wide open playing field all over the world. Political activists, innovative entrepreneurs, incisive writers, tech investors, small farmers….ALL have benefited from the global network. Allowing the telcos to compromise Net Neutrality will force a mass migration of innovation and creativity to places where such guarantees are provided, thus ensuring a steady decline in the economic output of the American economy. At this crucial time in our collective history, we simply can not afford to lose access to this critical resource in the name of heftier corporate profits.

So, Congresswoman Wilson, congratulations on a job well done. Though Markey was shot down and the COPE Act won by a margin of 34 to 22, the battle has just begun. And though the Congresswoman and I may disagree on a number of issues, this single issue is so important that she will have my support , and my vote, so long as she continues to support Network Neutrality.