[12577] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
EFF ENDORSES BROAD BASED INFO-TAX TO FUND UNIVERSAL SERVICE
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Frezza (via RadioMail))
Sun May 22 23:01:29 1994
Date: Sun, 22 May 1994 13:24:22 PDT
From: Bill Frezza (via RadioMail) <frezza@radiomail.net>
Cc: interesting-people@eff.org, rre-maintainers@weber.ucsd.edu,
alt-politics-datahighway@cs.utexas.edu
To: com-priv@psi.com
WHY WON'T THEY COME FORWARD AND SPEAK?
For an organization that prides itself on the need for democratic discourse,
why is the EFF hiding? Why do they reflexively kill-file anyone who
disagrees with them? Why don't they have the courage of their convictions?
The message below recording Danny Weitzner's call for an info-tax was
posted on May 6th in an attempt to clarify how the EFF expects
Guaranteed Universal Sevice to be funded. Attempts to contact the EFF
privately have been rebuffed. A Nixonian stonewall has descended.
This sad organization, originally dedicated to defending civil
liberties, has become a lapdog of those entrenched Washington interests
that seek to gain a stranglehold on this new industry.
Are you proud, Mitch Kapor, of the chain reaction you have set off?
According to the latest postings, 93 organizations representing the full
panoply of subsidized artists, public broadcasters, and professional
victims groups have demanded that congress set aside a free public
"right-of-way" on the info highway. Whose hands do you think this will
play into? Don't you realize that John Malone would gladly trade away 10%
of his channel capacity in return for protection from competition?
That's exactly how he built his empire in the first place.
How can you fail to see that everything you are doing to create a new set
of info-entitlements will only attract more and more groups looking for
a handout, ultimately creating a political constituency that congress
won't be able to resist pandering to?
Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. I was on the front lines
during the heyday of big city Cable TV franchise wars in the early eighties
and I can tell you it was not a pretty sight. The anti-competitive,
anti-consumer abuses that were perpetrated in the name of "the
public good" while private fortunes were amassed and politicians
pockets were lined was appalling. In but one example I personally
helped Wade Communications, the black front organization that Mayor Wilson
Goode promised a chunk of the Philly franchise to, fill out their
phony application - just to watch
them turn around and sell it to TCI.
Is this the kind of "managed" market you want?
The EFF leadership will no doubt not see this message as their software
will screen it out. I would like to call on each of the many people I
have corresponded with in the past few months to demand an answer from them.
Who is going to pay for Universal Service and how?
Please send your mail to:
Mitch Kapor <kapor@eff.org>,
John Perry Barlow <Barlow@eff.org>,
Danny Weitzner <djw@eff.org>
and ask them stand up and reveal their principles.
Bill Frezza
frezza@radiomail.net
----- Forwarded Message
Date: Fri, 06 May 1994 08:58:47 PDT
>From: Bill Frezza (via RadioMail) <frezza@radiomail.net>
Subject: Re: Another EFF response to policy questions
To: djw@eff.org
Cc: com-priv@psi.com
Danny,
..
I believe we (also) made some progress trying to clarify EFF's true
position on the manner in which subsidy mechanisms will have to be put in
place in order to support the EFF's proclaimed goal of Universal
Guaranteed Service.
I am going to restate here what I thought I heard you say. If I got
it wrong, please correct me as it is not entirely fair of me to publicly
put words in your mouth. (Of course, that won't stop me from doing it as
we all know "life is not fair" <g>.)
1) You acknowledge that there will be no monolithic "Information
Superhighway" and that a multiplicity of technologies, services and
communications media will all be competing for the consumer's
attention, each trying to bypass each other in search of market share.
2) You acknowledge that these services will encompass a broad range
of capabilities, prices, and geographic availability.
3) Given this you acknowledge that the
historical approach of invisible
cost shifting within a single provider that has been granted a monoploy
in a geograhpic operating region makes no sense.
4) You finally admitted, and I am quite certain you said, that the
appropriate answer to raising funds to provide for the basic needs of
the information "have-nots" would be a broadly applied Information Tax.
5) You were unclear on how these funds were to be distributed and who
would get them but you did assert that the federal government should
absolutely play this role.
6) You drew back when I called this an "info-stamp" approach comparing it
to the current food stamp program and then you changed the subject and
poured me another glass of wine.
Did I get this right or did I misunderstand something you said?
Looking forward to seeing you again soon.
Bill
