If, like me, you haven’t been keeping up with the net neutrality debate and assumed that since you pay for broadband, you’re entitled to access all internet sites without provider bias, perhaps it’s time to take a deeper look.

Clickz.com has an interesting article summing up the issues.

Here’s how it would work. Say Yahoo! pays a fee to Verizon for preferred treatment on that network, but Google does not. Verizon broadband subscribers, who already pay for bandwidth, would then get Yahoo! pages (and ads) delivered much more quickly than Google’s. Verizon could potentially even cut off access to Google altogether.

Farfetched? AT&T CEO and chairman Ed Whitacre told “Business Week,” “Why should they be allowed to use my pipes? The Internet can’t be free in that sense, because we and the cable companies have made an investment, and for a Google or Yahoo! or Vonage or anybody to expect to use these pipes [for] free is nuts!”

Of course, the issue is heavily split, with internet bigwigs Amazon.com, Yahoo, ebay, Google, and even Bill Gates supporting net neutrality while the Bells, Quest, and Comcast oppose it.

Isn’t that nifty? If the telecom companies get their way, they could pick which sites load faster than others, thus preventing us paying subscribers from accessing certain websites that aren’t paying them fees.

A few weeks ago, this prompted Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) to propose legislation prohibiting telecom provider from charging these fees.

Check out the Common Cause fact sheet for more info.

Stanford Law Prof. Lawrence Lessig also has a pdf transcript of his testimony to Congress last month that is worth a read.