[9118] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
The Buffalo Free-Net / NYSERNet / PSI problems
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Barry Shein)
Fri Dec 17 20:40:09 1993
Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1993 20:39:40 -0500
From: bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein)
To: rciville@civicnet.org
Cc: com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: Richard Civille's message of Fri, 17 Dec 1993 19:42:34 -0500 (EST) <Pine.3.05.9312171920.A28019-c100000@cap.gwu.edu>
Apparently this fantasy of no marginal increment in resource use by
adding another (large) system is so fundamental to a whole line of
reasoning that it's just never going to be disabused. People who want
to believe it will just believe it, and will always believe that
service providers (and I assume anyone else, nothing special here
about the net) who claim otherwise are merely liars and/or fools.
What it comes down to is that yes, when I take my car out on the
highway what is the marginal cost of my car being there? About zero.
Yet, if the highway is crowded, if I can't get where I want to go when
I want to, if the road is full of potholes or other problems, I seem
to feel a right to be dissatisfied. So what happened to the zero
marginal "cost"? Obviously something went awry.
Let's turn your reasoning around, if it costs nothing extra and
imposes no resource demands of note then why do you/they need PSI (or
whomever) at all? If it's all just like sunshine and air and just
there and one can breathe it in and bask in it and it's of no real
cost then why not just go do it and leave everyone else alone?
Also, why doesn't it multiply out? If one system/connection has no
marginal cost, then can I assume that 100 systems have no marginal
cost, since 100 x 0 should equal zero? A thousand? I mean, why in the
world do service providers go thru millions of dollars per year in
support, equipment, etc when their costs are zero? Why not just have
one person to cash the checks and be done with it?
And what's special about networks here? I mean, why can't I go to my
local movie theater by the same reasoning and say, hey, you're going
to run the film anyhow, what's the marginal cost of one more person
sitting in the audience (we'll assume an unfilled theater just like
you reason about e-mail just fitting in the empty interstices), why
not just let me in for free? Your "argument" is almost totally content
free and seems like it would apply to thousands of completely
unrelated situations. Why doesn't the world work this way?
Obviously because the *only* people who are going to help pay for that
theater, for the electricity and movie rental and staff and building
and so forth are PEOPLE WHO WANT TO SEE THE FILM! Is this really so
subtle? The marginal cost of every person entering that theater is
about zero by your reasoning, but if that reasoning is used then how
can a theater ever stay in business? I honestly don't understand, if
those who want to use the network shouldn't have to pay for the
network then who should? Give us a hint!
For someone who says they are from something called "The Center for
Civic Networking" your understanding of "civics", of infrastructure
and support of large, common resources, seems appallingly lacking and
flippant and naive to a point that one wonders if you even believe
what you say, or if you're just are trying to make some sort of
advocacy argument and just doing it very poorly?
I think a helpful reality-check rule of thumb might be:
If it costs nothing, and it's no trouble to anyone, and it has no
value, then why are you "here" arguing for it? If it's not worth
anything to you or anyone else then what's the problem? Why isn't it
by the same reasoning just as easily discardable or ignorable?
Either something has a value, or it doesn't. You really can't have it
both ways.
>To put it another way: If PSI had chosen to make a charitable
>contribution of resources to the Buffalo Freenet anticipating a tax
>write-off -- what would they write off?
Hey, that's easy, the normal cost of such a connection to any regular
customer.
Next question?
Seriously Rich, you're not making sense, time to take ten deep ones
and re-think this whole issue. You're not doing your "cause" any
service at all and to be blunt I think you just sound ridiculous. No
doubt you'll be irritated with my frankness but so be it, I can't
really think of any other way to put this unproductive line of
reasoning to rest.
Maybe if someone applied it to your own work you'd see how ill-founded
it is and you'd realize that slavery was abolished a long time ago.
And in a way that's really what you're arguing for, you seem to want
to, in a way, enslave people who work very, very hard to make all
these things you seem to believe are of value (but only of value when
you receive them) happen and seem to just begrudge them their
livelihoods. Sure, if slavery were permitted a lot of things would be
cheaper, but it doesn't seem a reasonable trade-off to me. Or put
another way, you first.
-Barry Shein
Software Tool & Die | bzs@world.std.com | uunet!world!bzs
Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 617-739-0202 | Login: 617-739-WRLD
