[12691] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: EFF and the big bad T (tax) word [long]
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Frezza (via RadioMail))
Thu May 26 10:41:08 1994
Date: Wed, 25 May 1994 17:32:04 PDT
From: Bill Frezza (via RadioMail) <frezza@radiomail.net>
Cc: com-priv@psi.com, alt-politics-datahighway@cs.utexas.edu,
don.wills@swc.com
To: djw@eff.org, bzs@world.std.com
Barry,
Let me describe the trap you just fell into. It's a classic.
You accepted the moral principles of these social engineers and made
an appeal for pragmatism. Let's go slow. Let's be careful. Let's think
about what we are doing and seek a balance between everyone's interests
(as if you can compromise between the robber and the robbed).
Notice how comfortable Danny got all of a sudden and how smooth his response
was. You are on his home turf. Oh yes, we don't want radical change. All
we want is to incrementally apply well accepted social principles to these
new technologies for the good of the public.
He then warmed you up step by step. Oh yes, we all yearn for the day when
regulation will be unnecesary. All we are looking to do is ease the
transition.
Then he slipped in a big one:
<2. Ensure widespread availability of high-speed, digital infrastructure at
affordable rates.>
Whoops. We're talking about "managing" the flow of billions of dollars
of other people's risk capital here. Tell me, how good has the government
been at this sort of management task?
Then the pragmatic justification:
<The market for basic transport services, especially for residential
customers is still 99.44% monopoly. Gradually this may change, which would
be great, but it hasn't happened yet. Therefore, we need regulatory
involvement to ensure fair prices and deployment of new, high capacity
services.>
Stop a minute. We stand at a historic juncture, similar to the one we faced
a decade ago when the long distance monopoly was broken up, to the
benefit of consumer and provider alike. WHY do we have to accept the status
quo? There has never been a better time to break the local monoploy held by
the RBOCs and open the door to full competion. Why isn't the EFF putting
it's muscle behind this objective? Why is it trying to perpetuate this
system into the 21st century and inflict it's ills on a PC industry
that has thrived precisely because Washington has ignored it?
Think about the answer to this question.
Bill
