Spring is here and while you might not be spending quite as much time indoors as you have over the last few months, streaming networks are going to be releasing a lot of quality programming. This will come in especially handy if you live somewhere that gets a lot of April showers before May flowers— and if you need some way to decompress after tax season!

Regardless of what your preferred streaming services are, remember that your streaming experience can always be enhanced by a quality, high-speed Internet connection. 

In the meantime, here is a short list of upcoming shows and movies to help you plan out your spring season streaming extravaganza!

Netflix

A Series of Unfortunate Events-Season 2-Spring 2018: A series spinoff of the movie of the same title. Neil Patrick Harris takes on the classic role of Count Olaf that Jim Carrey originally brought to life on the big screen.

Love-Season 2-March 9th: A comedy co-created by Judd Apatow that explores modern dating by following two characters with very different personalities.

Jessica Jones-Season 2-March 8th: In this Noir style drama from Marvel, Jessica Jones is a private investigator that is learning to accept her superhuman gifts, which she has always felt were more like a curse. This series ties into Marvel’s Daredevil, Luke Cage, Defenders, and Iron Fist.

There are also a number of really awesome shows scheduled for later release in 2018, but still waiting on official dates like: Arrested Development Season 5, Daredevil Season 3, Luke Cage Season 2, House of Cards Season 6, Better Call Saul Season 3, and a new original anthology western series by the Cohen Bros. called The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.

And for all you movie lovers out there, here is a list of Top 100 movies streaming on Netflix in March 2018.

Hulu

Atlanta-Season 2-March 1st: Donald Glover is the executive producer and star of this series that follow two cousins trying to make it in the Atlanta music scene. Their ultimate goal is to improve the lives of their families, but there are a lot of obstacles that they’ll need to navigate if they’re ever going to get to where they want to be.

Handmaid’s Tale-Season 2- April 25th: This series is based on a dystopian Novel of the same name by famed author Margaret Atwood. It is a tale of survival, detailing the life of a handmaid struggling to live in an oppressive, patriarchal society that is run by a totalitarian theological government.

Roseanne (Reboot)-Premier-Spring 2018: Originally airing from 1988 to 1997, Rosanne is a slice-of-life comedy and drama about a working-class family living in Illinois. The revival is set to pick up several years later, while filling in the details of what has happened to all of the characters since the last season.

Here is a complete list of movies coming to Hulu in March, with some added highlights about must see films for spring.

HBO Go

Barry-Premier-March 25th: A dark comedy from the minds of Bill Hader and Alex Berg, the series also stars Bill Hader as Barry, a hitman that gets been bitten by the acting bug while he is on the job. He makes an attempt to leave his criminal past, but ultimately it looks like he’ll have to make some sort of compromise.

Succession-Premier-Spring 2018: A drama about an American global-media mogul, played by Bryan Cox, and his dysfunctional family. This series was created by Jesse Armstrong and includes executive producers Will Smith and Adam Mckay.

Westworld-Season 2-Spring 2018: Westworld is a scifi thriller that revolves around a western theme park that is populated by synthetic humans. Guests at the park are able to live out their wild-west fantasies, seemingly without consequence, no matter how illicit their actions may be in real life.

Of course, HBO has many highly anticipated series that are still TBA including: Game of Thrones, Silicon Valley Season 5, the final season of Veep, and a series adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s classic novel Fahrenheit 451 starring Michael B. Jordan of Black Panther alongside Michael Shannon.

Here is a list of movies that are being released or removed from HBO Go, spanning February to the end of March.

Amazon Prime

Brad’s Status-Movie-March 2nd: A lighthearted comedy about a father that takes his son to tour colleges and runs into an old friend. After catching up, he begins to view his life through a different lens and feel as though he may not have made the best life choices. This, however, sets him up for a series of heartfelt revelations that come from spending quality time with his son.

Sneaky Pete-Season 2-March 9th: Executive producers Bryan Cranston and Graham Yost deliver this dark comedy about a man that gets out of jail and tries to escape his old life by assuming the identity of his former cellmate. When he meets his new family, he quickly learns that he might have chosen a worse situation than the one he tried to leave behind.

The Dangerous Book for Boys-Premier-March 30th: A TV series about a father who leaves behind “The Dangerous Book for Boys” as a way to help his sons cope with his passing. The Dangerous Book for Boys is an actual book that has a bunch of activities for boys “. . . from eight to eighty.”

There are a lot of movies coming to Amazon Prime this spring and throughout the summer. Check out this complete list of series and movies to see what you can look forward to!

So what’s good in streaming this coming season? You can look forward to spring 2018 because there is a nice mix of new programming as well as anticipated follow-ups to several already established series. This seems to be universal across all the major streaming providers, so if you had to make the choice between Netflix and HBO or Hulu and Amazon, don’t worry because there is something for everyone to look forward to!

Net Neutrality is a term that is now loosely used to describe a series of rules within the Telecommunications Act which have been used to regulate Internet Service Providers (ISPs). The term was first coined by Law Professor Tim Wu in a paper that was published in 2002. While the original Telecommunications act was established in 1934, much of the rules that concern us today originated in the 1970s. This is largely due to the fact that the language used in the Telecommunications act transferred reasonably well to the early forms of the Internet which, up until the late 1990’s, still ran primarily through telephone networks.

The Recent History of Net Neutrality Legislation (2000 – 2009)

In the early 2000’s ISPs started rolling out new network technologies that were built separately from the already existing telephone networks. ISPs collectively decided that these newer technologies—namely broadband and DSL—were not subject to the same regulation as earlier forms of Internet service. Under this assumption, ISPs began to experiment with a number of practices which were a direct affront to earlier, established ideals about the free nature of the Internet and how it should function.

Most consumers did not approve of these practices, and in 2004 the acting chair of the FCC, Michael Powell, reacted by putting forth a series of guidelines. These guidelines are known as The Four Internet Freedoms and were largely built by updating principles that were established in the original Telecommunications Act:

1. Freedom to access content
2. Freedom to use applications
3. Freedom to attach personal devices
4. Freedom to obtain service plan information

The Four Internet Freedoms would serve as the basis for regulating ISPs, effectively standing in as the Net Neutrality framework of the time. However, these rules were constantly challenged by ISPs, both in legal battles or by intentional disobedience.

The Mounting Controversy (2010 – Present)

In 2010, the then acting FCC passed a series of rules to strengthen the functioning Net Neutrality legislation set by the previous FCC. However, those rules were quickly challenged by ISPs and would be largely dismantled after a series of losses in federal appeals courts. Following this failure to establish a coherent Net Neutrality framework, a group of ISPs led by Comcast colluded to purposefully slow Internet traffic to the up and coming company Netflix in 2012. The ISPs then charged Netflix a fee for restoring and maintaining unrestricted bandwidth for future use.

After another series of failures in federal court cases brought by ISPs, the FCC passed a new set of rules in 2015. These rules were unique because they designated broadband and DSL Internet networks as Title II scheduling under the Telecommunications act. Shortly thereafter in 2016, a federal appeals court decided to uphold the FCC’s new rules and designation, in response to a challenge brought by ISPs. This victory would effectively protect broadband and DSL under all previously established telecommunications laws, while also strengthening the FCC’s position to enforce new legislation.

The Current FCC’s Recent Decision (2017)

The recent decision by the current FCC, on December 14th 2017, was to overturn the designation that was established in 2015, removing broadband and DSL from any protections under the Telecommunications Act. This single move has effectively disabled all legislation that was once colloquially known as Net Neutrality.

A Future without Net Neutrality

The recent decision by the current FCC has essentially given each individual ISP free reign over how they build out broadband networks. Consumer advocacy groups are rightfully concerned with the possibility that ISPs will abandon the End-to-End network philosophy that has made the Internet an interconnected and flexible tool across so many different platforms. ISPs contend that this reduction in regulation will allow them to build better products and offer better services. However given their history, it seems at least as likely that ISPs will revert back to their unpopular, pre-Net-Neutrality practices—like blocking, throttling, and prioritizing content.