Net Neutrality’s potential removal is a scary thing. To put in simplified terms, it is essentially as if a company like EA is responsible for the internet. To have access to certain sites, you’d have to pay. Want access to certain social medias? That’s extra. Twitch? Extra. News sites? Extra. It’s a scary time. As we await the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) vote for whether the protection will be removed or not, many voices are beginning to speak out. But it’s not just companies like Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitch, etc that are speaking out … game developers are now lending their voices as well.

Studio Wildcard co-founder Jeremy Stieglitz told Games Industry that people are right to be worried and that anyone invested in online gaming should be involved in making sure net neutrality stays in place:

Anyone who cares about multiplayer online gaming should be up in arms about the imminent demise of net neutrality in the USA. It’s completely destructive to the idea of fair and level competitive gameplay to have throttled bandwidth depending on whether you are a small title or a part of a big commercial enterprise.

Once the network carriers decide they can prioritize bandwidth to their own offerings above anything else, independent games such as Ark are likely to suffer. This performance degradation may not happen overnight, but it almost surely will happen once the carriers decide to commercially exploit the extreme power they will have been given. Gamers everywhere should try fight this, to the extent that they can make their voices heard.”

Rocket League’s studio, Psyonix, has also lent their voice to the masses:

We will be watching the rules vote on December 14 very closely. Rocket League has millions of active monthly players and any law or scenario that could jeopardize people’s access to it is definitely a concern. We are hopeful that players will continue to have great access to our game,” said Jeremy Dunham.

Comcast, a popular internet provided, has previously stated that they will not accept bribes from companies to have prioritization, but a recent statement has shed some light on whether that is … to be frank … is bullshit or not. Here are the two conflicting statements made by the company:

Comcast’s statement from 2014:

“To be clear, Comcast has never offered paid prioritization, we are not offering it today, and we’re not considering entering into any paid prioritization creating fast lane deals with content owners.”

Their most recent statement:

We do not and will not block, throttle, or discriminate against lawful content. We will continue to make sure that our policies are clear and transparent for consumers, and we will not change our commitment to these principles. pic.twitter.com/19PFCPJ3TY

— Comcast (@comcast) November 22, 2017

That never sure got dropped pretty fast. For more information on why net neutrality is important and how you can lend your own voice to that protection, check out a good resource for info right here and make sure to call your representatives to let them know what you think!