[44429] in Cypherpunks
Cyberspace Inc & Robber Baron Age
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (James M. Cobb)
Fri Dec 1 19:16:19 1995
Date: Fri, 1 Dec 1995 19:01:48 -0500 (EST)
From: "James M. Cobb" <jcobb@ahcbsd1.ovnet.com>
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Friend,
11 29 95 Computer underground Digest carries the complete text
of Rick Moore's article,
Cyberspace Inc and the Robber Baron Age,
an analysis of PFF's "Magna Carta"
scheduled to appear in the print journal, The Information Soci-
ety.
Here's a sample:
Instead of an infrastructure for public communications -- like
the current Internet, or the American highway system -- cyber-
space would be developed as a corporate owned monopoly --
priced at whatever the traffic will bear.
Instead of providing a "space" in which citizens are free to
speak and associate (like Internet), cyberspace would become a
profit-machine and propaganda channel for media conglomerates.
PFF's manifesto is a formula for neo-feudalism in the "Know-
ledge Age" -- it is a charter for what could aptly be dubbed
"Cyberspace Inc".
The most recent issues of CuD can be obtained from
http://www.soci.niu.edu/~cudigest
Cordially,
Jim
