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AOL Time Warner Netscape CNN... and AT&T?
Baldrson noted a bit running on Yahoo right now where the AOL, Time, Warner, Netscape, CNN mega corporation is in talks with AT&T for their cable network. The inevitable and scary consolidation continues ever onward. The US govt will be sold on eBay in a few years, but only Microsoft and the corporation formerly known as Netscape AOL Warner CNN AT&T Time (NAWCAT) will be left to bid. But since Nawcat will already own ebay, there will no doubt be rumors of unfair play.
Any ideas how this might affect Road Runner users? (Cable service from Time Warner)
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
don't forget the fact that aol is foaming at the mouth for Yahoo! Check it:
i s?STRING=aoltimewarneryahoo.com&STRING=Search
http://www.networksolutions.com/cgi-bin/whois/who
Forget Microsoft. Fear AOL.
The world moves for love. It kneels before it in awe.
In the USA...
AOL is the internet (to most people)
Time/Warner is entertainment (to most people)
CNN is news (to most people)
Netscape is the browser (or used to be...)
ATT is long-distance phone service (to most people)
hmmm.....
Why not buy Microsoft (they are computing to most people)
-- Andy
// Would somebody please explain this to governments around the world? One day the companies will be TOO BIG to enforce anything upon! //
Not true, governments have guns. I doubt seriously any business is going to be able to fight that.
Plus wonderful countries like Brazil and South Africa are starting the horrendous trend of taking property and intellectual rights from corporations. They usually use the phrase "for the good of the people" but it simply proves business are subject to governments.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Seriously though, in the timeline for the roleplaying game Cyberpunk, corporations successfully lobbied for a federal law deputizing their security officers to enforce the law within corporate controlled "security zones" (city business districts, company owned housing developments, etc). How long before that happens for real?
Politics is the entertainment wing of industry. You don't need to 'buy' a country. All you need to do is buy the people who sit in key organizational, policy and operational roles in government. Those are called elections.
Salmon Rushdie suggests hopefully that there are no tyrannies that cannot be successfully resisted....
He cannot have considered a financial rather than a political/military one.
Political/military tyrannies give in exchange little or nothing; the thinnest illusion of security for their license to pillage and enslave.
By the innovation of offering a miserable amount of money outright thievery and slavery is given the imprimatur of laws and contracts. An illusion is created of acceptance by all parties almost disguising the fact that the various forms of slavery cannot be distinguished from each other by the pittance paid.
With indecent dishonesty, the few can obtain with deceit what would likely be unobtainable by force or coercion. This innovation is clearly the most profound of the Twentieth Century, far beyond semiconductors, air travel and automobiles.
Unlike the flesh-and-blood tyrant, the deathless corporation extends itself endlessly into all dimensions.
A new guide-book is in order, to suggest how to resist an organism that masquerades in providing as little as possible of what the slaves think they want. Of course arrogance (and hubris) will likely see a final resolution in the streets....Perhaps Rushdie is right after all.
If you are so worried about AOL MegaConclomo Inc. taking over your cable think about backing a MUD (Municipal Utility District) where you live. A MUD once established takes control of local utilities and puts them in the hands of an elected board. Let AOL buy AT&T, then watch as municipal districts all over the country take it back piece by piece. There's no more small guy provider any more or at least not for very much longer. That's gone forever. The only recourse we have now is our local (LOCAL) government.
Call me a socialist? Well you get two choices these days, unfettered capitalism building monopolies more powerful then most nations or capitalism held on a leash by prevailing socialism. If a corporation grows too powerfull and holds a monopoly it should get taken by the people with the power of eminent domain.