[12857] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
No Electronic Freedom at the Expense of Economic Freedom
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Brian Hawthorne - SunSelect Strate)
Wed Jun 1 21:20:08 1994
Date: Wed, 1 Jun 1994 15:15:16 +0500
From: brianh@suneast.east.sun.com (Brian Hawthorne - SunSelect Strategic Marketing)
To: eff-board@eff.org
Cc: com-priv@psi.com
Return-Receipt-To: brianh@suneast.east.sun.com
An Open Letter to the Electronic Frontier Foundation:
I am writing this letter to express my dismay at some of the positions
contained in the policy document "Open Platform Campaign: Public Policy
for the Information Age" (undated). While I applaud your stance on
the potential of a switched, interactive network and agree with the
Common Carriage and Privacy/Encryption positions in your paper, I vehemently
reject your assertions on the need for Universal Service.
In your "Policy Priority: Redefine Universal Service and Ensure
Necessary Funding", you demand that "Interconnection and universal
service obligations should apply to all entities that provide
telecommunications service". These obligations would include meeting
"the needs of people with disabilities, the elderly and others with
special needs" as well as insuring that "users who are economically
disadvantaged will still have access to basic communications services."
The creation of this information entitlement is not only unwise,
but unnecessary. Enforcement of such a policy can serve only to
stifle creativity and reduce the flexibility of an industry which
is just now beginning to fulfill its potential. Under your broad
definitions, every privately run Internet provider (such as The
Internet Access Company, in Burlington, MA), every privately run
bulletin board system, and every venture providing services that
we can only imagine today could conceivable be deemed to be
obligated to subsidize access by an undefined group of people
with "special needs" or economic disadvantages. An immense new
government bureaucracy would be required just to make the decisions
as to which providers were obligated and to what extent.
Do my special needs as a homeschooling parent qualify me for a full,
bidirectional, 100Mbit link at little or no cost to me, so that my children
can have the same access as those attending state-subsidized schools?
Why or why not? Who will make these decisions? Without an information
entitlement, I make these decisions myself, based on an analysis of
the costs and benefits involved. With an information entitlement, these
decisions will be made for me by some faceless bureaucrat. Worse yet,
I will be forced to pay for my neighbor's service, even if I decide
it is too expensive for me.
EFF was founded as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, using the
metaphor of the Frontier of the American Old West. On that Frontier,
freedom reigned supreme and the government was a world away, back in
Washington. There were no guarantees of Universal Access, whether to
water, food, shelter or transport. The marshall only had power as
long as he abided by the will of the people living nearby. Individuals
provided for themselves, with voluntary help from their neighbors and
friends. Anyone who wanted to publish a newspaper was free to do so,
as long as they payed for it.
In the Frontier being proposed by the EFF, all settlers will be required
to subsidize not only the newspaper subscriptions of their neighbors, but
also the use of the printing presses. The more successful pioneers will
be required to pay for the coach tickets and houses of the next wave of
settlers, and the marshall will collect taxes from everyone to pay for
the hotel room of the poor '49er who is down on his luck.
If this is your vision of the future, I want no part of it. This is
unfortunate, since the EFF has been one of the few voices of sanity
in regards to privacy and strong encryption, and I would sincerely like
to support your efforts. Until EFF publicly renounces its call for
Universal Access, I will not be joining, and I will oppose your initiatives
at every opportunity, including my meeting with Representative Martin
Meehan tomorrow.
Brian Holt Hawthorne
