[ale] OT: Craig Newmark of Craig's List on Net Neutrality

[Jim Popovitch]

Pete Hardie wrote:
> On 6/10/06, Jim Popovitch <jimpop at yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Pete Hardie wrote:
>>> Personally, I think it's closer to the company that built my
>>> subdivision's roads requiring me
>>> to rent a vehicle from them to drive on those roads.
>> Hey, it's almost like that today.  You have to have a license (and a
>> licensed vehicle too) to use the roads provided by others.  You also
>> have to have insurance, pay ad valorem taxes, get tested, and (if
>> required) use special equipment.  Additionally, based on your age and
>> conduct you can be restricted from said roadways during certain times of
>> the day.
> 
> That's not quite the same - your speaking of the government, who might
> be presumed
> to own the roads.  I'm speaking of the developer who physically built the roads
> in the subdivision.

The developer just can't go a build a road.  They have to get regulatory 
approval, zoning laws, etc.  They have to get approval to connect to 
road to other public roads, and then they have to have a public hearing 
with local citizens who can (if their are enough) prevent the developer 
from even building the road on the developer's own land.  All of that 
costs money, lots of money.  Now, do you think the developer is going to 
want you and others to tell him/her that they have to open the road up 
to through-way traffic without any speed bumps or stop signs?

Additionally, few if any developers really build roads without the 
intention of the government (YOU!) maintaining ($$) them in the future. 
    That is not the way Telcos and Cable companies work.  They 
(Telco/Cable companies) invest for the long haul, decades.

>>> Enforcing Net Neutrality might slow down the deployment of higher
>>> speed connectivity.  But allowing the *monopoly wire providers* to
>> Just don't forget that those "monopolies" invested a significant amount
>> of the $$ to build the "roadway" you now want to make the rules for. ;-)
> 
> And haven't they made plenty of profit from it?  They are profitable
> corporations, are they not?  Being granted the monopoly gives them
> some privileges, but they forfeit others for that, like being free of
> control.

To some extent.  I suggest you go see what their agreements with the 
government(s) provide for.  I'm guessing not much.  You're not 
suggesting that we nullify the old contracts that were done in the past 
and draw up new ones, are you?

>>> block out any traffic that either does not pay them for favored
>>> access, or competes with a service that the monopoly wants to provide,
>>> means that we will not get good versions of that service - witness the
>>> quality of lon-distance service once Ma Bell was forced to allow
>>> competition.   Sure, there were many fly-by-night shoddy LD services,
>>> but the market weeded them out, and we now have good, cheap LD.
>>>
>>> As long as Bellsouth want to offer any bone of a service, they will be
>>> able to block better services - look at DSL, now that they are not
>>> required to allow equal access to Speakeasy/SpeedFactory/etc.
>> No one is preventing Speakeasy/SpeedFactory/etc from doing what the
>> Cable companies did (bury their own lines). ;-)
> 
> Are you certain of that?  The whole reason that the Bells were
> monopolies was that it was a bad idea to have multiple companies
> running different sets of wires.

The reason Speakeasy/SpeedFactory/etc don't run their own wires is the 
sheer cost involved not the desire to play nice and be a good netizen 
singing Kum Ba Yah.

-Jim P.