Net Neutrality might impact media consumers’ access to technology, information, and ideas as included in NAMLE’s definition of media literacy through not giving consumers the full access they may need, in order to fully operate under those restrictions. As someone who is always on their phone and computer, I tend to see a lot of pop ups on my screen, that either say “you are about to enter an unsupervised webpage” or just your general AD blockers. When there was nothing that was searched that shouldn’t be available to the full public, without those ads popping up. When consumers try to access certain web pages that they may need for their work or as part of something their education provides. It is an inconvenience to have pop up ads that in bold, capitalized, red lettering says “BLOCKED” or “VIRUS”. Certain information that these consumers are looking up as to what they need to learn throughout the day is dependent on who you ask. Generally speaking people will google their questions that they may need help on in the current moment, or creative ideas that will help them with something they are planning.

Regardless of what they are looking for, Net Neutrality can cause a restriction for those consumers who will not want to click on certain links, that they know will not lead them to the information they want to learn more about. Media literacy that gives consumers the ability to access information without the blockage of being censored will make things a lot easier for them as well as take up less time when they are searching for answers. People have the right to search up whatever information they choose as long as it does not hurt the general public. People are allowed the freedom to have this option through using sites like Google, Youtube, and other major platforms, that give these consumers the resources to figure out how something works.

Any participation that consumers give into what they believe in, but with the disadvantage that they might have something blocked, is not something that will have a high success rate. However, with all of this said I do think that Net Neutrality is something that needs to exist, and needs to stay relevant for everyone to know about, so that people are not looking up things that could be a detrimental harm to our society as a whole. Certain websites that block the answers some consumers are looking for are doing the right thing because they obviously find something off or weird about the search history. This is keeping our community safe and the guidelines make consumers feel safe as well.

https://www.eff.org/issues/net-neutrality

https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/net-neutrality

https://www.aclu.org/issues/free-speech/internet-speech/what-net-neutrality