[41] in Information Retrieval
More on competition
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (ganderso@Athena.MIT.EDU)
Mon Dec 23 12:46:12 1991
From: ganderso@Athena.MIT.EDU
To: libtalk@MIT.EDU
Cc: elibdev@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 23 Dec 91 12:44:23 EST
This has an article from the Houston Chronicle about the unfair
advantage debate.
Greg
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From: James P Love <LOVE%PUCC.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu>
Subject: Re: NSF/ANS/IBM/MCI/Wolff/Kapor from N.Y. Times News Service
To: Eric Celeste <efc@Athena.MIT.EDU>, marilyn geller <mgeller@Athena.MIT.EDU>,
Tom Owens <owens@Athena.MIT.EDU>,
Greg Anderson <GANDERSO@Athena.MIT.EDU>
In-Reply-To: Message of Sun,
22 Dec 1991 19:24:00 CST from <SCOTT@SKLIB.USASK.CA>
Here is a similiar article from the Houston Chronicle
- ------------------------------------------------------------
From: farber@central.cis.upenn.edu (David J. Farber)
Posted-Date: Sun, 22 Dec 91 06:55:43 EST
Message-Id: <9112221155.AA01726@pcpond.cis.upenn.edu>
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To: com-priv@psi.com
Subject: From the Sunday Houston Chronicle by Joe Abernathy
Restrictions on computer net creates uproar
At stake is direction nation's Internet "highway' will take At
stake is future direction of nation's Internet system. byline
By JOE ABERNATHY
A high-stakes, behind-the-scenes battle is being waged over
right-of-way on the nation's computer highways.
Luminaries from the computer science community are protesting what
they view as new restrictions to commercial activity on the
Internet, a research-oriented computer network that covers much of
the world.
They say the outcome of the debate may determine whether
these crucial circuits develop as an equal-access public resource,
or as a tool tailored for the Fortune 500. Commercial activity
related to the network and its underlying technology is expected
to become a $1.2 billion industry in 1992, according to a
congressional overseer. The Internet now connects at least 12
million computer users, up from some 3 million only two years ago.
In its 20 years of existence, it has developed into a network
linking many of the nation's universities, military sites,
government installations and research facilities. It opened to
commercial uses last year with the creation of Advanced Network &
Services, a non-profit entity intended to take over day-to-
daymanagement of the Internet from the National Science
Foundation. The Foundation, a federal government agency, created
and developed the electronic backbone over which Internet traffic
moves.
ANS was formed by IBM, MCI Communications and Merit Inc. Merit is
a Michigan consortium that previously managed the network under
the supervision of the Foundation.
The current uproar, so far evident mostly in the form of
electronic letters of protest circulating on the Internet, was
sparked by the recent move to tighten restrictions on commercial
activity.
The restrictions would require that anyone doing commercial
business on the Internet gain access to it through ANS.
Critics charge that by permitting this arrangement, the
government through the National Science Foundationgives unfair
competitive advantage to IBM and MCI, to the exclusion of other
enterprises that now provide access to the network.
""The situation which will result from the latest mandates
creates a market that is fundamentally unfair in that it will
tilt the competitive playing field too strongly toward one player
_ ANS,'' said computer science heavyweights Mitchell D. Kapor and
David J. Farber, writing last week in an electronic open letter
on the Internet. The letter focused discontent that has simmered
for months.
""This advantage to ANS will have been accomplished solely by
virtue of the exercise of intentional or unintentional NSF
policy. No provider should be given such an advantage without
public and open discussion and competition.''
Kapor, the founder of software giant Lotus Technology, has become
a leading activist in exploring legal and social issues on the
electronic frontier, including Internet. Farber, a University of
Pennsylvania scientist, is one of the intellectual parents of the
network and has lately conducted a wide-ranging survey of the
worldwide economic market for high-performance computer
networking.
Besides providing Internet access, possible commercial uses
include for-profit information libraries and software
distribution.
""The evolution of a strong networking infrastructureis essential
to the health of research and develpment in this nation,'' Kapor
and Farber wrote. ""Competition has shown itself to be an
effective vehicle for creating the best for the consumers as well
as providing jobs and trade. We believe that no further progress in
networking infrastructure is possible without ensuring the
creation of a level, competitive playing field.''
In an interview with the Chronicle, Farber suggested that the
Internet can best evolve as a market free of government
restraints. ""Then let the best company win, and there will be
many winning,'' he predicted. ""My strong feeling is that this is
going to be a field that is going to be very, very large. I'd
like to see this country get strong, and the way we get strong is
diversity.''
The National Science Foundation quietly gave ANS the exclusive
rights to carry commercial traffic over the electronic backbone,
in a letter from Stephen Wolff, who over sees the Internet for
NSF.
Wolff told the Chronicle late Friday that he hopes to reach some
kind of accommodation with users who have protested the new
policies.
""I've been working toward a consistent set of policies and a
consistent set of goals for five years,'' he said. ""We know
where we want to be. We want to get out of the business. As soon
as the government stops funding the suppliers of networking and
begins funding the users of net working, it's the users who
become responsible for appropriate use.''
He said it would take a change in government policy, possibly in
the form of an executive order or congressional action, to
loosen commercial access in the manner preferred by Kapor, Farber
and other critics.
On Dec. 9, President Bush signed the High-Performance Computing
Act of 1991, a five-year, $5 billion blueprint that will turn the
Internet into a broadly available National Research and Education
Network (NREN, pronounced en-ren). The NREN is held forth as a
tool that will revolutionize communications, education and
business.
Senate sponsor Al Gore, D-Tenn., spoke for the plan's many
proponents in describing it as a key vehicle for international
competitiveness in the 1990s.
At the signing ceremony, Bush touted the new network as part of
a strategy to enhance U.S. competitiveness.
""Private industry will work closeqly with federal agencies and
labs in the planning, funding and management of this initiative
to ensure that the fruits of this research program will be
brought into the educational and commercial marketplaces just as
soon as possible,'' he said.
But critics, engaging in a lively online discussion prompted by
the Kapor-Faber message, argue that the favorable status afforded
the ANS partners by the National Science Foundation is stifling
healthy competition on the network itself.
""The NSF effectively pumps vast sums of money into one provider,
and changes the rules of the game midplay, setting that provider
up to compete unfairly with existing en terprise, thereby
disrupting a burgeoning industry,'' wrote William Schrader of
Performance Systems International, a fledgling provider of
Internet access, which is in direct competition with ANS. ""In
legal jargon, this is called restraint of trade.''
The Internet is actually a ""net work of computer networks''
embracing some 3,000 individual networks, each of which may have
from one to tens of thousands of users.
The National Science Foundation has gained wide praise for
creating the initial environment that brought about the network.
By funding a high-speed, high-capacity nation wide backbone, the
foundation was able to encourage industry and education to invest
several dollars for each dollar spent by the government, in order
to hook up to the backbone.
The Foundation's national back bone in effect does the network's
heavy lifting, speeding millions of messages from coast to coast
and around the world each day.
This backbone originally was funded by the federal government
explicitly to serve the research and education communities.
ANS was created in 1990 to assume management of the backbone,
injecting professional management skills into the rapidly
expanding Internet, which users have characterized as ""anarchic
democracy.''
This year ANS announced a for- profit subsidiary called ANS CO+RE
(Commercial + Research), with exclusive commercial connectivity
to the backbone. The Science Founda tion has agreed to spend $6
million in 1991 and $10 million in fiscal 1992 to improve
capacity.
Allan H. Weis, chief executive officer of ANS, could not be
reached for an interview, but did address the controversy in
messages on the net work.
He said the ANS connectivity agreement with commercial users only
requires them to accept traffic from ANS CO+RE customers, but
does not prohibit them from connecting directly to other
networks.
Left unsaid, critics say, is that such connections cannot go
through the Internet without ANS involvement.
The fundamental problem arises when the myriad of companies and
individuals hooked up to the backbone attempt to carry out their
business, which is often difficult to identify as purely
commercial, or purely research and education oriented.
""Our industry is young,'' Weis wrote, ""and we are all still
struggling to determine the best way to ensure fair settlements
and quality service to the networking community.''
z com-priv psi 12/22/91
'David J. Farber com-priv@psi.com 12/22/91 From the Sunday Houston Chroni
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