[384] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: a strategic plan for farnet (and you)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Edward Vielmetti)
Fri Mar 15 13:42:45 1991
To: Richard Mandelbaum <rma@tsar.cc.rochester.edu>
Cc: com-priv@uu.psi.com
In-Reply-To: Your message of Fri, 15 Mar 91 11:23:17 -0500.
Date: Fri, 15 Mar 91 13:28:28 EST
From: Edward Vielmetti <emv@ox.com>
would this be an appropriate document to drop on an anonymous ftp
area somewhere? it's a bit huge to go out in the mail. Or
if it is on an ftp spot somewhere now the pointer would be enough.
i note the tell-tale phrase "Affinity Groups", which indicates to
me from a reading of the text that the authors of this document
have the same lack of real understanding of the dynamics of the
internet and usenet user communities that the authors of the
banned FARNET draft showed.
The references to providing information services for a fee
(e.g. Dow Jones) are in the context of allowing RBOCs and other
external entities to gateway their networks in (via the regionals,
of course). No mention of fee-for-service databases which would
be created, serviced, and sold by individuals and companies on the
internet itself; the "regional network as market maker" sections
posit that these services would be provided by the regional!
Sounds like needless overhead to me. Nothing in the discussion
to indicate what would be the real benefit, creating a network
infrastructure which has reasonable appropriate use policies so
that organizations could do this themselves.
The whole concent of a "market maker" in the regard strikes like
something from the days of the Sugar Trust, Standard Oil, OPEC, etc. a
large, powerful cartel, able to deliver "large blocks of customers"
(p.55) to transport providers, getting kickbacks and rebates (in the
form of advantageous prices) from those providers. a powerful
federation of organizations, each marketing and selling bandwidth as
well as services and support, with an orderly marketing plan so that
people don't step on each other too much. it strikes me as being
very anti-competetive.
Like I say, if this is what FARNET is about, I don't like it.
--Ed
--
Msen Edward Vielmetti
/|--- moderator, comp.archives
emv@msen.com
