The following is from the article written by Iain Thomson, featured on CommonDreams.org:

Virgin Media is facing a possible boycott after its chief executive Neil Berkett described net neutrality as “a load of bollocks” and appeared to suggest that companies could pay for a stronger internet presence.

Berkett said in an interview in Television magazine that the company is already in talks with websites to provide privileged data transmission. The news prompted leading figures on the internet to call for a boycott.

“As a Virgin customer, I am not paying to see those services that bribe Virgin to reach me. I am paying to reach the entire web, whichever bits I think are useful, as quickly as Virgin can deliver them,” said Cory Doctorow, internet activist and journalist.

“Theoretically, I am locked into a Virgin plan for another six months, but as far as I am concerned, they have just announced that they are violating the agreement by announcing that the services I can reach will be systematically slowed down unless they pay Virgin extra. 

“That means that we are now null and void. I will be calling to cancel today. Who is with me?”

Net neutrality is the principle that all data is treated equal during transmission and has been a founding principle of the internet, making it possible for websites to compete on a level playing field.

Companies like Google are pushing for laws that would actually enshrine the concept in law.

Charles Stross, the UK’s leading science fiction author, has added his voice to calls for a boycott, claiming in a blog entry that not only is Virgin intent on scrapping net neutrality but is already throttling bandwidth.

Read the entire story here.