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Argentine Government Orders Major ISP To Close
Doctor Jonas writes "Argentine ISP Fibertel has been barred from continuing operations because of the dissolution of their status as a company after they were absorbed by Cablevisión of Argentina, now part of media conglomerate Grupo Clarín. The Minister of Planning, Julio de Vido, announced the measure, and said it was Grupo Clarín's own doing by having shut down the Fibertel company and turning it into a commercial brand, and that ISP licenses are not transferable after acquisitions from one company to the other. The Argentine opposition said the move was another attack on Grupo Clarín's standing and another part of the feud between them and President Cristina Fernández and her husband, former president Nestor Kirchner. Cablevisión has promised to go to the courts to overturn the decision, and the opposition seeks to protect Fibertel's continuing operations through a bill in Congress. More than a million households and businesses would need to change ISPs in merely 90 days, possibly strengthening the internet provisioning dominance of both Telefónica (subsidiary of the Spanish Telefonica) and Telecom."
Pffft. Who cares?
They engage in politics. This is an exciting development.
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
Can anybody or the editors explain the relevance to "my rights online" of this story, or why it would be considered news for nerds? It sounds like a business decision that was made in a country in South America that for the most part is not relevant to readers of this site.
I'm just scratching my head trying to understand what the point of posting this story to slashdot is.
I thought I read somewhere that any Brazilian woman willing to show her ass via webcam has a constitutional right to free Internet access? Anyone know where can I find some hot Brazilian women? I want to help them keep their free access to the Internet.
Banana republic behaves like one. News at eleven!!!
I'm one of the affected million and I will have to change ISPs. Fibertel used to throttle youtube all the time, but apart from that the service was good, if a little expensive. They are part of a huge news-controlling monopoly, broke the law, and they got what they deserve. There are many choices of broadband internet over here, so I basically don't give a sh*t.
The URL is not Fibertel.com. Is fibertel.com.ar
It's informative, I am out of mod points. Please mod up.
"More than a million households and businesses would need to change ISPs in merely 90 days"
Technically, yes. In reality, not quite. Since Grupo Clarin will sue for its rights, the shut down of the company won't happen until all the trials are finished. Since justice takes a long time in Argentina, it will be some months before the users have to switch ISPs, and there is the chance that the trials carry on way past october 2011, when the next president is elected, so the decision may be overturned before it actually takes effect.
Still, there is a lot of misinformation on this story around here, so some people still believe the company is already shutting down, which is draining their customer base. Also, until the justice rules on the case, Fibertel won't be able to sell its service to new customers, to the advantage of other ISPs.
I myself have been using Fibertel for the past 5 years and had no complaint so far. Still, they do belong to Grupo Clarin, which is a huge monopoly around here, so the decision is not all that ilogical.
in north america, cablevision are the victimizers
but in south america, cablevisión are the victimized
it has to do with everything in reverse in the antipodes: summer is winter, night is day, good is bad, and i believe gravity works in reverse down there
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
South Americans have broadband? They're probably not even circumcised. Savages.
I blacklisted Argentina long time ago. That country is full of wallhacks.
In Soviet Russia, Major ISP closes YOU!
This is part of the intention by the government to stop the merger of the two biggest cable providers. The merger has already been done, despite it being rejected ( http://www.buenosairesherald.com/BreakingNews/View/10918 ). The new merged company dissolved one of the parts, without getting the license to operate under the new company. So, now they are operating under a license belonging to a company which no longer exists.
The issue here is government vs media giants. Antimonopoly measures, which are common in developed countries, have a lot more opposition in non-developed countries, where economic interests go over the people's interest (yes, more than in the US =) ).
Somewhere in the 20th century.
This is the difference between capitalism and socialism. In the U.S., the company would have just been fined every year that they didn't get a license. The company would eventually get a clue and start paying the lower fee over the larger fine, and operate legally. However, in Argentina, they just dissolve your company and screw all your customers. They screwed themselves out of all that tax money, fines, fees, and so on as well. It's a pretty poor move, and this is why companies prefer to do business with the United States.
So, allow me to provide a little bit more information on this subject.
Our current government has that schizophrenic touch that Bush had. Their policy is the same that Bush had: Helping their corporate friends, pushing an agenda.
Clarin is the largest spanish newspaper in the world. That includes all of Latin America + Spain. The Clarin Group, the holding behind the newspaper, also owns several other newspapers, several TV channels, publishing companies, and a lot of other companies in media and communications. It's one of the largest companies in South America, and it has huge worldwide influences.
They have been in a fight for market penetration and control of the media with Telefonica for 2 decades. Our former President Nestor Kirchner, Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations and husband of our current president, had overwhelming support from Clarin, they actually helped him to achieve the presidency. Later, their relationships got a lot more tense when Nestor Kirchner did a few deals with Telefonica. Eventually, Clarin had withdrawn thoverhwellmingeir support, and had became his number one public enemy.
Now, Nestor's wife (Cristina) is our president. Just like him, she's a fucking cunt, with a lot of personal interests that she has no moral issues pushing all the time, and a lot of friends to help out. Just like bush, they had interests in Oil companies, and in several big industries, and also in real estate. Pushing their own business is their only interest.
So, this is just a move to pressure the Clarin group. This is a way to silence the bad publicity they've been getting from Clarin lately. It's a douchebag move.
The worst thing about this is, Fibertel was owned by Cablevision. Later, with the approval of Nestor Kirchner, Clarin, through one of their subsidiaries (Multicanal: The Argentinian Comcast) bought Cablevision and therefore Fibertel. Now the government claims that data transmission licenses are nontransferable, and that therefore Fibertel is operating illegally. Also, Clarin owns almost 300 different licenses from several companies they have acquired throughout the years. That is highly irregular, and the government is using that as an excuse too.
The worst thing here is that there are not many alternatives in here where it comes to Internet access.
In Buenos Aires (Argentina's Capital City) and nearby cities (Metropolitan Area) there are several providers, such as iplan, fibertel, telefonica, telecom, telmex, telecentro, and others. In the rest of the country, the options are much more limited. There is surely one DSL provider (Either Telefonica's Speedy or Telecom's Arnet, and in most places there is also a cablemodem provider (Fibertel), a Wimax provider (Telmex), and some small local services, usually cooperatives or small wireless companies. And that's all. Telefonica sucks big time, both technically and commercially, and Fibertel is the only decent alternative, both technically and economically.
You can get a decent 3MB cablemodem from Fibertel for ~40 dollars (160 pesos).
Of course, Fibertel is not going to die. They are either going to appeal and win (or at least delay this for years to come), or sell the whole infrastructure to someone. Anyway, this is just the government reminding us that it can fuck with us whenever it wants.
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Argentina's government is becoming Venezuela.
A bit of extra info from another argentinian. Don't expect to be enlightened though, since the situation is basically a gigantic clusterfuck with no easily discernible good or bad guys.
Grupo Clarín is Argentina's largest media conglomerate. It doesn't have a monopoly in anything because there is lots of competition, but it is the 500-pound gorilla in all the areas it competes in and in most of the markets it invests in. The largest newspaper (Clarín), one of the biggest tv networks, one of the largest cable networks, one of the largest cable ISPs (the one mentioned in the summary), the largest newspaper printer, etc. Whatever media-related thing you can name, they have some stake on it.
Grupo Clarín is also politically opposed the the current administration, the Kirchners (current president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and former president Nestor Kirchner), and the feeling is mutual. The battle between them has been raging for a few years, but in the past few 10 or so months things have become wild (I'd talk about sending the police to strip-search the sons of the owner of Grupo Clarin, but that would really make this go off-topic).
Last year a new law governing media and communications was passed on the last few days before the Kirchner's lost the majoritary control of Congress. The law made sweeping changes to the process of getting a license for broadcasting, ostensibly to avoid monopolies, but in practice setting things up so that the Government alone chooses who gets a license and who doesn't. Given the size of Grupo Clarin, some of the new license limits would mean it would have to forcibly drop many markets, or split itself to satisfy the new requirements. Moreover, given its enmity with the current administration, it's obvious Clarin would be hard-pressed to get more licenses in the future. The law has a lot of good points, but this much is evident to everybody, though whether you interpret it as good (since it would weaken some businesses large enough to be close to monopolies) or bad (since the government gets to choose who has a voice and who doesn't) varies.
That the government is ordering this Grupo Clarin owned ISP to close is just the latest spat in this long fight. One one side you have the government's arguments: that the license has caducated, and so they are merely enforcing the law, and that Grupo Clarin is a big bad monopoly anyways. On the other side, there's the fact that the ISP has been operating under this license for about six years and that the issue only comes up now, after the current government modified the laws, arguably as part of an ongoing battle against the very people they are now attacking with them.
On the technical side, there's the issue of what to do with the many users of this [very large] ISP. The other large ISPs can't possibly take this many new users in a year, much less in a 90-days timeframe. Moreover, this is a country-wide ISP; there are places where there simply isn't another choice (which many users have already pointed out).
To make things more interesting, there's the fact that the other large ISPs are the duopolic companies mentioned in the summary. They offer telephone and internet services, but not cable, and cable companies can also offer internet services, but no telephone, as the so-called triple play is not allowed here (so much for wanting to fight monopolies, I guess). The telephone companies inherited the state's phone lines. They will be the big winners in this whole thing, and it seems they have ties to the Kirchners as well.
I try to be neutral in giving you this info, but I guess you can see I tend to lean on the side of Grupo Clarin at least on this one. I'm less afraid of a big bad conglomerate whose products I can stop buying if I want, than of a government who can decide whether or not I should be allowed to hear what someone wants to say.
Large media conglomerate wants to overthrow the government. The government (legally, although curiously 4 years late) shuts down the conglomerate's cable ISP in retaliation. Most of the customers outside of Buenos Aires are left without options because there's only one big telco in each region, the local loop isn't unbundled and there aren't any other big cable companies in the country.
Come on!. There isn't a single spot in Argentina where Fibertel is the only ISP. Telecom and Telefonica are forced to bring service anywhere it is requested, because phone lines in Argentina are considered by law a Public Service. Cablevisión only brings cable where it will be profitable, and only some areas. I live in Córdoba, the second largest city of Argentina and my house is located 35 blocks away from downtown (Barrio Alto Alberdi, para los que conocen). I live 4 blocks from Cablevisión's technical headquarter and I don't have digital cable nor cablemodem coverage. Wherever Fibertel is, there was Telecom or Telefonica before.
T!
I'd say Socialists are a proper subset of Progressives.
Progressives tend to be not just in favor of progress towards a better world, but in favor of government policies that will make a world they consider better.
There are two ways to give the government power to enact such policies: government ownership (Socialism) and government regulation. Socialism has a bad rap these days, so people who seek to make the government stronger tend to work for more regulation, such as the recent healthcare reform.
However, the difference is cosmetic. If the government decides what will be offered and at what price, it would not matter if the company officially has shareholders and calls itself private.
-- Support a free market in the field of government
Here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Brindis_Noble_Videla.jpg
Mrs. Noble (chief of Clarin) toasts to the establishment of Papel Prensa, the nation's main newsprint maker, with the President, General Jorge Videla, in 1978.
See also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernestina_Herrera_de_Noble
Now, if the claims that the Kirchner's were friendly to Clarin when they got support from them, is another history, but, if communications licenses are not legally transferable like some argentinians posters say, this is more a problem of stupid management than anything else.
Certainly, if Clarin group whasn't one of the main supporters of the murderous Argentina's dictators of the 1970's their claims of freedom of the press would hold more wather and not be simple posturing.
Mexico: 100% conservative's America now!
I'm one of the affected million and I will have to change ISPs. Fibertel used to throttle youtube all the time, but apart from that the service was good, if a little expensive. They are part of a huge news-controlling monopoly, broke the law, and they got what they deserve. There are many choices of broadband internet over here, so I basically don't give a sh*t.
It is a political decision, so are the new advances on the "Papel Prensa" company.
Unfortunatelly the Kirchner's Government, very much based on chavez policies on governing, have found this to be yet another tool to control upcoming election results, which can be clearly predicted into their re-election. unfortunatley, just as in Venezuela where Superman voted, argentine --READ: ARGENTINE!!!! it is not argentinian brutes!!!!--- eleccions will have this probable outcome.
Now as for what is going on: the goverment actually pays people for doing their political "advertising" (or actually discrediting any opposition) on the internet.
Fibertel is jut a name, but it is just one more step in the dictatorship decisions made by the presidential couple, who have been constantly attacking freedom of speech and thought.
The excuse for an "antimonopoly" is actually an oxymoron in this case. if fibertel is disbanned, then people will fall into Telecom's internet. Controlling (as a monopoly!) communications, with the slight bonus of being in great part owned by the Kirchers.
as i said this is not about Fibertel, or Papel Prensa, or Clarin, it is about a government doing what they want, with no regards for the law. (and this is being done one year prior to the elections)
PS: it was not the bicentennial on may 25th, bicentennial is on July 9th 2016. That's when independence actually happens. Yet another chance to use a patriotic date, and mislead the people, as a self promoting reelection campaign (payed by taxes).
The other day I was walking on the street and saw a graffiti that resumes (IMO) the current state of the problem between Grupo Clarin and the Government, but from the side that matters, which is the side of the people: The government pees on us and the media tell us that it is raining. This basically resumes who is who here. Argentina is VERY divided and almost everyone takes one side or the other without actually thinking that neither of the parties is makes any "good" to our society. And this is historical. This is why we were once a world power and now we're even less than a 3rd world country. Our story is really really sad. And as I said, neither Fibertel nor the Government is right. Grupo Clarin *probably* broke some laws but as other poster said here, it's not cool to have laws for an ISP to operate, I didn't knew that there was laws covering that. And the Government is being totally and completely biased on this decision. I hate the companies and my Government. Sorry. I really think we as Argentinians need to start thinking for ourselves.
I live in Argentina and my main concern is not Fibertel or the government, it is people.
Our current government is corrupt, definitely has an agenda, but so does Grupo Clarín.
Nevertheless, most people want to "save" Fibertel. There are facebook groups, people joining to set up a protest, etc just because they hate the government.
Everyone seems to forget that Grupo Clarín is an inch from owning ALL major ISPs in the country (Due to the telefónica-telecom merge that is still haunting us, and is a reality in Europe) and that it has been largely linked to the Menemist-era agenda that made this country the chaotic place it is now.
So PLEASE put your political views aside and focus on the facts: if Fibertele is not authorized to be an ISP, the government is absolutely in its right to shut down operations, even if that means that a million people will have to switch to another ISP (and again, Telfonicas Speedy, Cablevision's Fibertel and Telecom's Arnet are owned by Grupo Clarin in some way).
Please stop bitching about Fibertel, they never provided a good service, and no one ever liked them here, no wonder we call their technicians Fibercops!
Three days ago Clarin's newspaper put an article on it's website about what happened and let his readers to post comments, the funny thing is that it was the first time ever that Clarin had comments on an any of its articles. I posted a comment and because it wasn't on Clarin's side it was removed, as well as all the other comments against them.