Two reports out in as many days make a brilliant case for net neutrality. And one of those reports is from the FCC itself, the body currently stalling instead of moving swiftly to protect online consumers from big telecom company greed and expand service and speed by codifying net neutrality.

First up, we have the Connectivity Scorecard, a yearly industry-funded study that attempts to grade each country on their online infrastructure. This year’s Scorecard shows the U.S. bumped out of the top spot and losing to Sweden, mostly because our telecom companies are too greedy to invest in infrastructure:

Sweden has overtaken the U.S. in a survey that measures how well a country uses broadband, primarily because the U.S. has stagnated on the consumer broadband side as compared to other top-performing nations. The Connectivity Scorecard, which is sponsored by Nokia Siemens Networks, measures not only the raw infrastructure used to deploy broadband, but also policies and the way people use it. The U.S. scored a 7.77 on a 10-point scale, while Sweden scored a 7.95.

[from the survey:]

"It is important to note, however, that in areas where the US lags Sweden, it has not really closed the gap. Further, looked at over the long term, the US lead in Internet usage and in areas such as Internet banking, Internet commerce and e-business has eroded somewhat. In many of these cases, while the US remains a substantially strong performer, it is now one of many rather than a clear leader. In the current edition of the Scorecard, many of these deep-seated trends have come to the fore."Those deep-seated trends include an inattention to boosting average upload and download speeds at consumer homes, a lack of penetration across the entire country and a decline in graduation rates, showing a less-educated population capable of wielding broadband connectivity effectively as a tool. Basically, the U.S. has been resting on its laurels while other countries have improved relative to the U.S. — for example, Sweden’s deployment of LTE and improving how businesses use broadband.

The best part of the writeup came at the end:

The U.S. started out in the top spot when the survey was released in 2008, but Sweden was never far behind. Ironically, the survey was used last year by the telecommunications industry to say that the U.S. wasn’t so pitiful when it came to broadband, despite the slow average speeds in the country (between 5.1 Mbps and 10.12 Mbps depending on the survey) and a pitiful lack of real competition. It looks like that complacency is coming home to roost. Unfortunately, since our broadband plan aimed at getting the U.S. up to speed on the consumer side isn’t all that ambitious, we may further fall in the connectivity rankings, leaving ISPs with even less to crow about.

Well then. Let’s unpack this a little. The argument over net neutrality at its core is about two things.

First, it’s about freedom. Telecom companies fundamentally should not have control over what you consume on the Internet, so long as it’s legal activity. That goes from free speech issues (you should be free to criticize your cable company or politicians your cable company backs) to choice of content issues (you should be able to browse a competitor’s news website with as much speed as you browse your cable company’s – this situation is particularly pertinent when it comes to the Comcast/NBC merger).

Second, it’s about infrastructure. Right now, when big phone and cable companies reach capacity on their Internet lines (as in, they subscribe too many customers or those customers are doing too many bandwidth-heavy things like streaming video from Hulu) they have two real choices: They can selectively slow down certain kinds of online activity such as streaming video or peer-to-peer downloads (or they could charge you more to have those blockages removed), or they can build better online infrastructure to widen their bandwidth and improve the customer’s upload and download speeds. You can easily guess which is cheaper for the corporations.

With net neutrality, broadband providers won’t be able to choose between screwing the customer and providing the customer better service – they’ll have to expand infrastructure. If they don’t, speed for all customers will be dragged down and they’ll lose business to their competitors.

The decisions by broadband companies not to expand infrastructure – which has a lot to do with not having to respect net neutrality – is clearly hurting the country, as a second study by the FCC confirms:

New research from the Federal Communications Commission finds that between 14 and 24 million Americans still lack access to broadband, and the immediate prospects for deployment to them are bleak.

…

Free Press Research Director S. Derek Turner: "Today’s report is the first time the FCC has determined that broadband deployment is not reasonable and timely, and we are extremely pleased that the Genachowski FCC had the courage to do what all previous Commissions could not, and that is to put politics aside and take an objective look at the law and the data. Millions of Americans lack access to broadband, and tens of millions more have only the option to purchase slow connections that fall well short of the congressional definition of ‘broadband’ – at expensive prices. The facts present a sobering reality of our broadband problem. We pay far too much for far too little, and the lack of meaningful competition among Internet service providers leads to delayed investment and slow technological progress. Now that the FCC has taken the first step of acknowledging America’s broadband problem, we hope that it will advance policies to will reverse this decline though the promotion of real competition and true consumer choice."

Competition in broadband is extremely low, and not enforcing net neutrality will only keep it there. This ensures broadband in this country will always be out of reach for millions of Americans, and woefully inadequate for millions more.

We’re falling behind the rest of the world and millions of our citizens lack what’s quickly becoming a fundamental communications tool necessary to live and compete in today’s society. All because telecom companies are allowed to screw customers instead of investing in infrastructure.

It’s time to change the status quo, and that starts with ensuring the FCC can protect consumers, enforce net neutrality, and implement the national broadband plan. Chairman Genachowski, you have until September to stand up for us against these big companies and show us you’re on our side.