In a move that will surely go down in Internet history as one of the worst decisions in years, the Justice Department said last week that it opposes net neutrality, “the idea that all Internet sites should be equally accessible to any Web user.”

Thus in a move that favors big business over small, typical of much in the Bush administration, the good anarchy, and, in the case of the Internet, the idea that one is free to surf as one wants without paying extra fees, is all but dead.The Justice Department compared the Internet to the Post Office saying that if people pay different rates for different services, the same idea should apply to the Web. How is that for being in this world and of this world? Justice further stated that net neutrality could hamper the development and expansion of the Internet because the big boys would not invest as freely as they might if everything remained free. I said that the Internet represented “good anarchy.” Perhaps that is an oxymoron, but the Web is getting along quite well without the imposition of what surely will be a pay-as-you-go system that is waiting in the wings.

Perhaps an unorganized boycott is in order so that the phone and cable companies who might impose fees on the potentially millions and millions of users, will understand that freedom is what makes the Internet thrive, and not necessarily the bottom line.