[12659] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Personal attacks are no substitute for logical consistency
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (William Drake)
Wed May 25 21:00:48 1994
Date: Wed, 25 May 1994 10:58:46 -0700
From: William Drake <wdrake@weber.ucsd.edu>
To: com-priv-forw@lists.psi.com, karl@mcs.com
Cc: com-priv@psi.com, eff-board@eff.org, frezza@radiomail.net,
niitalk@weber.ucsd.edu
Every now and then this list erupts into nasty flame wars in
which libertarians blast people concerned about broadening access
and preserving non-commercial public spaces (I would characterize
such people as "public interest advocates," but am sure someone
would object to the term, say these are just self-appointed digital
do-gooders, blah blah blah). Usually EFF is set up as the representative
of such thinking and tied to the digital wipping post, and away we
go. This is mildly amusing insofar as EFF members had/have libertarian
tendencies themselves; perhaps what drives people nuts is that in
trying to think through the public interest questions, they've been
inching slowly out the church door. Blasphemy!
I for one would welcome them out here in the sunshine, where people
are trying to confront difficult questions of market failure and
trying to figure out how to preserve free speech and robust markets
at the same time. Little is gained when the discussion remains at
the level of broad ideological slams, and that has been demonstrated
time and again. Any chance of returning to serious discussion of
specific points, or are people having too much fun tossing dirt to
stop now?
In the event someone wants to flame me, let me save you the trouble.
"Who the hell cares what some academic thinks, you people are just
a subsidized class of lazy do-gooders who ought to be buying access
from me, don't you know government is always and everywhere evil,
etc etc...." Ok, I'm humbled.
Bill
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William Drake
Department of Communication Tel: 619 534 6327
University of California, Fax: 619 534 7315
San Diego E-mail: wdrake@ucsd.edu
La Jolla, CA 92093-0503
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