[482] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
ANS Acceptable Use: Common Carrier or Publisher?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (tmn!cook@uunet.uu.net)
Fri Mar 29 12:24:08 1991
From: tmn!cook@uunet.uu.net
To: com-priv@psi.com
Date: Fri Mar 29 12:15:30 1991
<<MESSAGE from>> Gordon Cook 29-MAR-91 12:15
cook@tmn
The following by no means yet represents the opinion of OTA, rather it
does represent some of my current thinking.
The ANS acceptable use policy seems to get it more explicitly involved
with content that the current NSFnet policy which if memory serves me
correctly, does not get so detailed as to talk about "the meaning of the
message... would likely be highly offensive to the recipient or recipients
thereof."
The responses regarding the way the telcos handle this seem to me to be
VERY reasonable. But therein may lie the moral of the story. The telcos
are common cariers and ANS is clearly determined NOT to be. I wonder if
the ANS acceptable use policy is as explicit as it is in order to
establish its bona fides as a VAN free of regulation from the FCC and from
any state PUCs? Is its goal to be a publisher running a private wide area
network? If so where do the first ammendment rights of its USERS shake out?
If ANS is to be nothing more than one of many commercial tcp/ip providers
competing in the marketplace, then let the marketplace decide these
issues. No problem.
But what if ANS continues as the provider of the NSFnet (interim NREN)
backbone after october of next year? Is the intent of Congress in asking
that the network be privatized to create a situation where for the first
time the national network is likely to become involved in disputes over
content?
