[10468] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
bill to insure flat rate Internet email pricing (fwd)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Barry Shein)
Thu Feb 24 23:24:23 1994
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 1994 00:14:46 -0500
From: bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein)
To: love@essential.org
Cc: welch@oar.net, com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: James Love's message of Wed, 23 Feb 1994 23:33:57 -0500 (EST) <Pine.3.85.9402232357.F18706-0100000@essential>
>From: James Love <love@essential.org>
>On Wed, 23 Feb 1994, Barry Shein wrote:
>
>> The point being that flat-rates do not make costs go away, they only
>> average them across everyone.
>
> Sure, who would argue with that. But I would say that the democratic
>discourse we have today on the internet is worth preserving, and even
>doing something to keep.
And I'm saying you have not shown that flat-rates preserves this.
It might well encourage discourse among those who can afford the flat
rates, I am sure Perot would be very happy with your proposal, but
what about those who can't afford the flat rates?
Let's take phone rates around Boston for example. You can get a basic,
metered phone service for something like $5/month. Or for about
$40/month you can get a service which "flat-rates" all your calls for
about a 30 mile radius (oh my info may be a little out of date but
that's the basic structure.)
Now, one reason for the $5/mo rate was for people who were quite poor
but needed access to the phone for emergencies (e.g. old people), or
to receive calls. The $40/mo base rate is much more flat-rate but
tends to be something people of some means buy. There are middling
services (local flat-rate dialing, e.g. city only, metered elsewhere.)
You're saying that by eliminating that $5/mo metered rate and making
everyone buy the $40/mo rate (or nothing) you would improve democratic
access to the phone system?
> Now, that future may not bother you, but it does bother me. I find
>the charm of the net the democratic nature of the discussions.
I didn't say it wasn't an admirable goal, I was questioning whether or
not your proposal is a plausible way to achieve that goal. Somehow you
have become so convinced that it does achieve this that I suspect you
are not even hearing my questions. You're just repeating your goals as
if the means you propose were self-evident. I don't think so.
Like I asked in the previous note, if it were $100/mo for flat-rate
e-mail would that achieve your goal? Would a metered service that let
you send 100 msgs/month in a basic $5/mo rate and then $.01/msg
thereafter defeat your goals?
I think if I were a bulk political/charitable/etc e-mailer, or just a
wealthy crank with a lot of time on my hands I would like your
proposal very much, it forces everyone else to subsidize me no matter
how much I use.
>Don't forget, some of the NSF Internet grant recipients run
>such great services as Prodigy and MCI Mail.
And you subscribe to these "great" services?
Prodigy is something like $9.95/mo + various meters. Would changing
their rate to $100/mo and no meters make you happy with their service?
Where is the fine line between bona-fide policy issues and mere
meddling in marketing matters?
How do you propose to put PC's etc into more peoples' hands so they
may access all this? They cost, typically, each about 8 years worth of
e-mail access ($20/mo vs $2000/PC, about 100 months.)
Surely you must have an answer to this also? Fat lot of good flat-rate
e-mail accounts are if you don't have something to access them with,
no?
-Barry Shein
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