In a victory for advocates of equal access to the Internet, Telecom giant AT&T has agreed to commit to principles of network neutrality for 24 months. Now, groups say Congress must act to pass a law that protects the public’s access to and use of the Internet. Craig Aaron is communications director for Free Press, which coordinated the “Save the Internet” campaign.

Aaron: “Last year the Republican Majority pushed together a pretty bad bill that would have been a sweeping overhaul of the nation’s telecommunications law. The good news is that bill failed to pass. It died in the Senate and after the election they could not get enough votes to bring it to the floor. That now sets the stage for the new Congress, with new leadership to go in a completely different direction, to tear up that bad bill that was just a big give-away to Verizon and Comcast and others and really begin a true public conversation about what the future of the Internet should look like.”

Though the issue was fairly obscure just one year ago, Aaron said the grassroots support behind net neutrality played a large role in this victory.

Aaron: “People want a free and open Internet where the biggest website and the smallest blog have a chance to attract a big audience where certain companies and content is not favored based on who owns the wires but that everyone has a chance at the same even playing field. And we’re confident, starting in the house that we’ll see legislation that looks a lot better that anything we saw last year.”

According to Free Press tens of thousands of letters were sent in support of net neutrality. After AT&T’s commitment to protect net neutrality, the FCC voted to approve the company’s $85 billion dollar merger with Bell South.