What Do We Learn From Big Data Visualizations Of Net Neutrality Comments?

Author: 
Coverage Type: 

[Commentary] The 1.1 million public comments the Federal Communications Commission has received on its network neutrality proceeding do not simply reflect the talking points we see in the mainstream media and debated in Washington (DC) policy circles. We have started to see some data crunching of this data, with a range of results.

Perhaps most tellingly, the number of individual comments opposing net neutrality regulations as unnecessary and overly burdensome government regulation of the Internet is so small as to be statistically irrelevant to data visualization analysis.

So what are the big trends? The individual comments skew almost entirely in favor of having net neutrality rules, the number of unique individual comments not derived from templates is unusually high, people are really thinking about this and really engaged with it -- more so than with other comparable regulatory proceedings, and most individuals thinking about this care about net neutrality in ways not addressed by mainstream coverage.

Specifically, they care about net neutrality as an expression of fundamental values of basic fairness, opportunity, the American Dream, and preserving free expression and diversity of views.


What Do We Learn From Big Data Visualizations Of Net Neutrality Comments?