I received this in my email today:

Net Neutrality and the eBay Community: A Call to Action

Dear pricednostalgia,

As you know, I almost never reach out to you personally with a request to get involved in a debate in the U.S. Congress. However, today I feel I must.

Right now, the telephone and cable companies in control of Internet access are trying to use their enormous political muscle to dramatically change the Internet. It might be hard to believe, but lawmakers in Washington are seriously debating whether consumers should be free to use the Internet as they want in the future.

The phone and cable companies now control more than 95% of all Internet access. These large corporations are spending millions of dollars to promote legislation that would divide the Internet into a two-tiered system.

The top tier would be a “Pay-to-Play” high-speed toll-road restricted to only the largest companies that can afford to pay high fees for preferential access to the Net.

The bottom tier — the slow lane — would be what is left for everyone else. If the fast lane is the information “super-highway,” the slow lane will operate more like a dirt road.

Today’s Internet is an incredible open marketplace for goods, services, information and ideas. We can’t give that up. A two lane system will restrict innovation because start-ups and small companies — the companies that can’t afford the high fees — will be unable to succeed, and we’ll lose out on the jobs, creativity and inspiration that come with them.

The power belongs with Internet users, not the big phone and cable companies. Let’s use that power to send as many messages as possible to our elected officials in Washington. Please join me by clicking here right now to send a message to your representatives in Congress before it is too late. You can make the difference.

Thank you for reading this note. I hope you’ll make your voice heard today.

Sincerely,

Meg Whitman
President and CEO
eBay Inc.

P.S. If you have any questions about this issue, please contact us at government_relations@ebay.com.

All this time that I had been hearing about the government and how it affects eBay, I always figured that it was because of people who were not reporting their income. I believed that once I incorporated PricedNostalgia it wouldn’t be a concern for me. But this is just plain scary.

I know it makes me sound like a huge geek but I cannot imagine life without the Internet at this point. Forget about the part where I make my entire living on it, its this endless source of information and opportunity at your fingertips at all time.

If you click through that link in Meg’s letter you can input your eBay user ID and your name and address and eBay will automatically fire off a form letter to 3 different congressmen about this issue with your information filled in.

If you have two seconds to do it or just want to write your own letter, I would wager to say this is pretty important, especially for those of us who make our living online!

Last Wednesday, Steve’s brother packed up and moved to California. He is going to try to become an actor and in the meantime, is a receptionist for the Bold and the Beautiful.

Steve and his brother aren’t real close, but Steve was still bummed to see him go, though on the plus side, they have talked on the phone more times since he has been out there then in the last year when he was close.

So here we are, only about a week after Mark left and now my brother leaves on this upcoming Sunday at 4 AM for Florida. Sam’s Floridian trip may only be for 6 months or may be a permanent move so it’s weird to wrap my head around. I don’t want to get too attached to the idea that he will be back in 6 months in case he decides to move there for good but at the same time, it’s the only way his leaving gets any easier.

It’s a huge opportunity for him and I am really happy for him and I hope it works out, it just totally stinks that my brother is going to have nothing to do with the wedding planning other than just showing up on the day.

I am going to miss just being able to scream down the hall to him (not that I am living at home anymore anyway, but still) and just generally having him around.

I feel like I cannot make a big deal about this around Steve, however, since his brother has left too and essentially we are in the same boat. But there is this evil, selfish little part of me that says that Steve is upset about his brother leaving because they weren’t all that close and he regrets that, I am upset about my brother leaving because we ARE close and I will miss that. So I justify that I have more reason to be upset.

I am such a bi-atch.

I guess the only thing to do is to just spend as much time with him a possible and take things as they come….

Here is your daily moment of zen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vq7BUDHvx-M