[11641] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
The EFF and Universal Access
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Frezza (via RadioMail))
Tue Apr 12 14:07:46 1994
Date: Tue, 12 Apr 1994 06:36:45 PDT
From: Bill Frezza (via RadioMail) <frezza@radiomail.net>
Cc: stahlman@radiomail.net, com-priv@psi.com, ggilder@mcimail.com,
barlow@eff.org, rothman@netcom.com, jswatz@well.sf.ca.us,
kgs@panix.com, media15@radiomail.net, spiff@radiomail.net
To: brodsky@radiomail.net, interesting-people@eff.org,
farber@central.cis.upenn.edu, opfer@radiomail.net
Ira,
Thank you for forwarding the note from the EFF below. I would not
have seen it otherwise as I do not subscribe to com-priv or
interesting-people.
Professor David Farber takes exception to my characterization of the
EFF as an organization that supports the creation of an information
"entitlement" program. I truly applaud David's sentiments and reaction
but must ask him, where was he when the EFF published Open Platform 2.0,
its organizational manifesto demanding "Universal Access" to the
information highway?
This document directly belies David's statements. Don't take my word
for it. Go read it, particularly the first Policy Priority in
Section B entitled: Redefine Universal Service and Ensure Necessary
Funding. I quote from the document
"Extending this guarantee means ensuring that new basic
digital services are affordable and ubiquitously available. Equity
and the democratic imperative also demand that these services
meet the needs of people with disabilities, the elderly,
and others with special needs. Failure to do so is sure to create
a society of information "haves" and "have-nots"."
If this isn't a demand for a new information entitlement then
I can't read English.
The document goes on to define the principle under which this
entitlement will be funded. Yes, it does stop short of demanding
direct taxpayer subsidies but note that calls for such have already
begun. The document does demand that any company that offers services
on the information highway subsidize use by the "have-nots"
(however they might be defined) according to the following formula, and I quote again:
"The scope of these obligations should certainly be proportionate to
the companies' market presence".
(Let me rephrase this in words you have all heard before. "From each
according to his ability, to each according to his need". Note
that the country founded on the universal application of
this principle recently ceased to exist.)
Now, is this redistributionist economic policy consistent with the principles
of Liberty that the EFF purports to defend in its highly publicized
privacy initiatives? And how in the world do you expect to administer
the proposed subsidy formula given all the different, competing and
mutually bypassing communications modalities that these technologies
will spawn? This ain't just POTS anymore. What is the market?
Who gets saddled with the obligation to subsidize and who escapes?
Who is prohibited from providing services if "universal access"
isn't offered to "the poor" at a "fair" price? The only practical way
out of this quandry once you buy in to the basic principle being
promoted by the EFF is with a broad based info-tax.
It is also beyond me, David, how you can defend Mitch on this.
His position is crystal clear. I refer you to his public comments
contained in a press release entitled GORE ENDORSES EFF's OPEN
PLATFORM APPROACH, December 22, 1993.
David, with all due respect I challenge you and the other EFF board
members who believe in what you wrote below to publicly repudiate
the information entitlement sections of Open Platform 2.0 before they
destrory your organization, delivering it into the hands of those
whose primary objective is to gain a controlling stranglehold on
these new technologies while they still can.
Bill Frezza
frezza@radiomail.net
(201) 890-3643
(215) 321-0929
Feel free to redistribute this note (but not my income).
----- Forwarded Message
Date: Mon, 11 Apr 94 17:09 EST
>From: Ira Brodsky <0005196661@mcimail.com>
Subject: Farber
To: Bill Frezza <frezza@radiomail.net>
Cc: Ira Brodsky <brodsky@radiomail.net>
Subject: Fwd: a submission from me in response to PEARLS BEFORE SWINE
----- Forwarded Message
Date: Sun, 10 Apr 1994 21:11:20 -0400
>From: farber@central.cis.upenn.edu (David Farber)
Subject: a submission from me in response to PEARLS BEFORE SWINE
To: interesting-people@eff.org (interesting-people mailing list)
In a submission via Interesting People, Willam A. Frezza in a note titled
"PEARLS BEFORE SWINE" said:
"Lead by organizations like Mitch Kapor's Electronic Frontier Foundation
and Ralph Nader's Taxpayer Assets Project, supported by a phalanx of
tenured academics long accustomed to public subsidization, and supplied
with emotional ammunition by grass roots workers like Ms. Schneider, these
New Age Intellectual Poverty Pundits are determined to define, create, and
manage a new form of public entitlement. "
As a Board member of EFF I must take serious exception to Bill. EFF has
never as an organization even remotely taken that position or anything like
it. We as an organization pride ourselves on gathering a group of people on
the Board and staff who cover the spectrum of opinions and political and
economic leanings. We have one thing in common and that is to support the
fundanmental rights of an american citizen as we go into the information
age and to push, shove and tempt the nation to move into this future.
Given this variety of people on the Board and Staff, you will hear
individuals maybe taking such positions as INDIVIDUALS. I have never heard
Mitch take that position nor have I heard that from the Board members whose
statements I have read.
It is certainly not the position of the EFF.
****************************************************************************
Professor David Farber
The Alfred Fitler Moore Professor of Telecommunication Systems
University of Pennsylvania + 1 610 274-8293 FAX
200 S. 33 rd Street + 1 800 946 4646 PIN # 1097266 PAGER
Philadelphia PA 19104-6389 + 1 215 870 0175 cellular
Home: + 1 610 274 8292 Home
POB 424 + 1 215 898 9672 Secretary - Mike Felker
216 Good Hope Road (for Fedex) + 1 215 898-9508 Office
Landenberg PA 19350-0424
Primary occupation -- Tele-techno-yenta
Member of the Board of Directors of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Member of the Board of Trustees of the Internet Society
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -- Benjamin Franklin
"I disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to
say it" -- Voltaire
[As long as you agree to submit yourself to sensitivity training--Ira.]
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