Imagine if a few big companies dictated which sites loaded quickly and which ones didn’t? That’s exactly what Time Warner, Verizon, Bell South, AT&T and other communications giants are attempting to do. They’re in the process of lobbying congress to block laws that would prevent a two-tiered internet, with a fast lane for websites that can afford to pay and a slow lane for everyone else.

These telecom giants reason that since they provide the lines (copper, fiber optic or cable) that supply internet connections to consumers, they should profit from the data that flows through them. Here’s how it would work: Websites that pay a fee would be allocated the most bandwidth and thus load quickly, whereas websites that can’t afford to pay the toll, or simply won’t pay the toll, get whatever bandwidth is left over (i.e. the slow lane).

As internet marketers, it antes up the question: Would you pay? If you’re a larger company with deep pockets, and can afford to, you’d once again gain a competitive advantage over smaller online business owners that can’t afford to pay.

For the online consumer this means higher priced goods as website owners won’t silently bear the extra costs.

I just hope that a two-tiered internet never becomes reality, if it ever does, hundreds of thousands of at home online business owners will suddenly find themselves looking for a J.O.B.

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