Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Should the US Government Tax Email?
Contramac writes "I've been hearing lately that the government wants to place a tax on outgoing email because more people are writing email than postal mail. Should this or other taxes on the Internet take place? Should the Internet community enter politics and make a stand of how they feel? I'm sure there is or have been some legislature about this topic somewhere. Myself and maybe other people out there want to find out what others opinions about this matter are. What is yours? " This is something we are going to have to face sooner or later, but I don't see how the US Government can justify it. A large portion of this infrastructure is based on commercial resources, not governmental ones.
The current email tax rumor is probably based on the UN recommendation of a 1c/MB, which was incorrectly reported by Wired (and picked up by slashdot) as being a tax of 1c/100 emails, based on an example of how "inexpensive" the tax would be.
A bandwidth tax is far more insidious, since it would be harder to evade, easier to cost someone else money, and kill all free services on the net.
*chuckle* So I hope you feel proud to defend your freedom by spending 10 years or so in Federal prison....
We should revolt and violently overthrow the gov. Use the guilotine to lop off the heads of all politicians.
The 16th was not properly ratified, it was ram-rodded by dear ol' congress. Check it out. Big money corrupts big time.
don't forget the lawyers.
the lawmakers knowing appallingly little about technology. I assume they've forgotten that the internet spans the entire globe, not just the US? Or perhaps they just want to tax email sent from servers in the US? If this is the case, everyone will just get shell/pop accounts on a server that is not in the US. I'd like to see them find a way around THAT. When are they going to realize that their regulatory efforts are ineffective at best when it comes to the internet?
I don't really like to pay taxes, but I guess I agree with you. Although I have to say that I am surprised that we have gotten off this long w/o sales tax on internet transactions. Don't worry though, it'll happen very soon.
It's great that this topic has created so much discussion, but does anyone out there believe that this wasn't a hoax? Come on, people! Be realistic here. Although in principle the government may want to tax email, even THEY know that it's not happening anytime soon! IMO in the future we will see governments becoming less and less powerful. It is the corporations that will rule. Think about it -- the individual have legal immunity! They can do whatever they want!
We will see more and more that everything will become privatized.
Whether the postal service is doing well or not doesn't matter.... Unfortunately, it makes a lot of sense for the gov't to at least try to tax email.
We have two kinds of things here:
- Things that I fantasize that the government might be doing, but actually they are not doing them.
- Things the government are actually doing.
How exactly do you go about distringuishing between these two kinds of things?If you have no evidence that it's happening, than it's just FUD, isn't it? Maybe I'm just a lunatic, but I'm more interested in the real world then in some kook's fantasies. Neither the USPS nor Congress nor the IRS are going to tax email. It's just not going to happen. If anyone ever tries to propose this lunatic idea, it will get shot down. Not even Congress is that stupid!
OTOH, I'm sure the government would absolutely love to have a quick and easy way to tap into everyone's email. Taxing email would give technical infrastructure leading to easy snooping of those messages.
Not like they'd need any help for that. In fact, let's make Uncle Sam's job easier and start forwarding all of our email to say president@whitehouse.gov. I'm on 6 high traffic mailling lists, wonder if he'd like to help me keep up w/everybody.
You heard? From whom? After the recent bogus email chain letter suggesting that Canada was about to launch a similar tax, why should we believe the US government is going to do the same without something more specific than "I heard?" How about some facts, guy?
Hmm,does anyone remember that the way constitutionally provided for the fed to raise money is to lay tarrifs on goods entering the country not by robbing citizens of the several states? i guess since we dont remember history we'll get to repeat it.revolution over taxes (then going "postal"will be perfectly p.c.) Taxes are illegal,do your homework.
I'm becoming more and more libertarian everyday. I can stand a lot of things, but I will not stand for taxing my email!
if they do, everybody in the US with half a brain will just get a mail or shell account outside of the US.
I guess I'll stop developing my device for disassembling the atoms of an object and transporting them as a signal over the net to someone else. They'll probably want to tax that too... And teleportation was going to be so cool! *sigh* Anyway, I'd say no taxes.
This is a hoax. The Postal Sevice had a message about this on their main page until it got pretty old. They've still got a bulletin about it here here.
Why do these BS articles get posted? "Taxing email" - It's totally impossible. I run my own mail/POP server. Are they going to have everyone on the net modify their servers to be compliant with taxable email? Yeah right.
Nuts!
Like taking maybe 4 to 5 days to get across town ? That happens (at least sometimes) here in Oklahoma, by the way...
FYI only, over in England a letter sent by First Class mail is guaranteed next day delivery, regardless of distance within the UK. Except possibly in the outlying islands when there's limited traffic...
Their mailboxes don't stand out in the street either. Houses generally have a slot in the door or wall, so your mail is (relatively) secure once it is delivered.
Would you like some more crack for your pipe, by any chance? Come on now, you've got to think of how many mail servers and different clients there actually are out there. You think that a mail client that was written in say, sweden, would change their code to conform to some stupid US law? What do you do, put import laws on mail programs?
In any case, what server would the software send it to? Lets think about this. How many of you out there run your own mail servers? Quite a few, I bet. So, you're going to tax yourself? The term ISP is too wide of a term too use, and pretty much means absolutely nothing. To me, my ISP simply lets me dialup, I take care of mail, news, and the rest with my own servers.
What would also make it so that you couldn't alter your routing table and make it send your tax information right back to your own computer? Or for that matter, what would stop you from writing a simple mail client, or just using the command line tools? Oooh, maybe they could write a hack into telnet, to check to see when people telnet using port 25. No wait, they could hack sendmail itself, or no, even better, change the linux code and windows code so that it can tell when you are using the smtp port, and then it can log it!
The terms "software manufacturing", "auditing", and ISP mean absolutely nothing. Whats a software manufacturer? Hell, I'm handly with Perl/TK, so does that make me a manufacturer? I run the http summary programs too, am I auditing it? And wait, you know those annoying ass banners you see on the top of almost every page? those people that serve them, they are ISP's too. Think about it "Internet Service Provider", they are on the internet, and provide a service.
You seem like a very closed minded person, who sees software and networks in a way that it actually isn't. Wait, you're a windows guy, right?
Even if they did pass such an absurd tax it would be completely unfeasable. Can't be done, no matter what the gov would try.
Has anyone noticed how the government is willing to step in and stop e-mail spam, but not snail-mail spam? Everyday I get ads and crap that I don't care to receive, and it wastes paper if anything. But the government makes money off this spam so they won't intervene.
It's impossible to tax email. This is just another uban legend like the bogus "modem tax" rumor that surfaces every year or so.
Are you serious? Thats pretty funny. Which government were you talking about? Last time I checked, the US government couldn't tax people from say, Canada. What would make it so jo-schmoe couldn't put up a huge network somewhere in like the fiji island, with satelite access to the net, offering free email like hotmail? whats the US government gonna do, put export taxes on data sent out of the country using port 25?
There is absolutely no way to tell if the person is from 5 miles north of the canada-us border, or 5 miles south of it. Do you guess on it? Well, we think you're american, here's your bill! And if for some reason people decide to be malicious (remember the hotmail account hacks?), then they could ring up bills for other people like there is no tomorrow.
And better, what about use people who have our own mail servers? I don't know about you all, but the time that I tax myself for using my own mail server will never be here. And hell, SMTP servers aren't really needed that much anyways. Why can't you run your own SMTP server on your own computer, and set your mail programs to use localhost? Now, you send an email to a hotmail account. How does it know that you're a dialup, and not a dedicated email server that has already payed its taxes?
Who really gives a shit what Microsoft and Hotmail track? Everyone probably knows about giants like IBM, AT&T, GM, and others who absolutely dominated the field they were in. Nothing ever lasts, and its just about time for Microsoft to either hit the road by being undercut like IBM and GM, or split up like AT&T. There's nothing they can do about it, its the way life works, its the way business works, hell, its even the way sports work.
hehe, and how could Microsoft know how to track mail from Hotmail? Come on now, Hotmail runs on FreeBSD running Apache, which means, no cute little windows with popup help buttons. They'd be lost =)
NO
Errrm, didn't "Honest" John just shackle some (more) of our freedoms? To get an unworkable tax, on an unwilling populace, who elected his government with the biggest swing vote (against) in history? And you think we're free?
Something that should be pointed out strongly is that even a $.01 tax per outgoing e-mail is a form of censorship. At that rate, a mailing list with 100 subscribers getting 100 posts a day would cost around $3,000 per month in taxes. That places running a mailing list well out of the reach of most individuals. Of course, the proposal to tax e-mail is probably based on a hoax, would be horribly expensive to impliment and could be easily bypassed (although then you start taxing every downloaded web page, and ...). I know I can always write my own client/server solutions so that me + my friends can communicate over ICMP-encapsulated IP packets for free (until they start taxing ping requests...). However, we should be aware that taxation can be censorship.
Since when an american has contradicted IRS ;-)
Pay no income tax.
All this talk of logical stuff has no bearing on the governments ability or DESIRE to tax the Web and increase income. Lets face it they can justify nearly anything. It is only a matter of time before someone tries to pay for 'somthing valid' with internet taxes. Would getting an ISP that originates outside the US fix that ?? Say a canadian ISP or somthing ??
who would bare the costs of mailing lists? Majordomo would become a huge waste of money. Correct me if I am wrong, but the internet was always supposed to be about the free exchange of information.
This is nothing new, the DTI in the UK proposed to tax email/inet access in the same way. With the popularity of the Internet worldwide, I hope this will be a vote loser in all countries. There are a lot of techies saying "this is impossible - I'll use ICQ etc" This is BS, if this happens, they will tax bandwidth at the ISP, so the ISP will have to pay for bandwidth used, they'll pass this on to their subscribers. No escape. This is the only way they can enforce it and also account for all protocols. What this does mean is that there will be a real case for damages claims when someone uses your mail router for spamming.
10 goto subject line 20 end
This has got to be the OLDEST Internet rumor to be floating around ever and it shows up on Slashdot as "Fact"! Compounding the idiocy in posting this without double checking to see if there's any truth to it all is the kneejerk screams of protest by the script kiddies that frequent this site. GET A BRAIN FOLX, IT AIN'T TRUE. IT'S NEVER BEEN TRUE AND IT AIN'T NEVER GOING TO BE TRUE! Slashdot has all the journalistic integrity of the National Enquirer. I guess like the SCTV skit, Rob and all have discovered you "..don't have to bother 'verifying the facts'" when your on the Internet.
If the us government does have to tax outgoing mail, just use sendmail. Linux always comes in handy.
don't be stupid, they would just refuse any other than the standard port, especially if there was the threat of financual loss attached to it....
If you do not think MS is tracing EVERY email from HOTMAIL then you are more foolish than I thought. A web based email is MUCH easier to track that POP based. If the Govt. really wantsto tax the Web there is little or NOTHING we can do about it :(
don't be stupid. We are talking about computers here and there are ways around everything. Instant messaging is another way around this. ICQ could take off. Besides, you can't refuse any port above 1024 without severly pissing off users that might be using it. Even so, pick another port. You can also encrypt the mail, send it via another protocol. Possibilities are endless. I know I will never pay for a tax on e-mail...
I work for a large medical claims clearinghouse which mails out more than 3 million pieces of mail per month at $0.26 per piece of mail, and I spend $0.33 to mail in my bills. Which do you think is subsidizing which.
Check out the following sites for the bogus "email tax" 'net legend: /. fell for this tripe...
http://urbanlegends.about.com/
http://www.scambusters.com/
http://www.snopes.com/
Just to name a few. I can't believe
Tax the hell out of the spammers
Should the US government ever begin taxing email to any significant extent (a penny per hundred outgoing messages isn't significant), someone would come up with a new messaging system with many of the same features as today's SMTP email system, but not quite the same; and the government would be back to square one.
Any system to report outgoing messages would be immediately spoofed anyway.
http://www.snopes.com/ /. is just the latest dupe.
http://urbanlegends.about.com/
http://www.scambusters.com/
Try researching things independantly before going off half-cocked, you half-wit. This is a 'net legend that has been going around for some time.
The U.S. Gov. tossed the idea around for a bit, but then scrapped it. There is no pending legislation about taxing email, get the fuck over it.
For the government to charge for stamps, I understand: they are offering you a service. However, in the case of e-mail, what is the government providing that would justify you paying them? Niet.
:-)
Now, things you buy are taxed. This is why you already pay taxes to your ISP for the service he provides you. But who pays for e-mail? (AOL users maybe?) Almost nobody pays for e-mail. Why should it be taxed then?
Should things like hotmail and yahoo mail be included in the new tax? But then, Deja.com offers something similar also. And while you're at it, what about discussions on slashdot.org ?
I would like to close this, asking, should web-page views be taxed? What about comments posted on IRC? Oh, and Usenet is very similar to e-mail. And maybe the government will feel like making me pay for all those "Uh-Oh" from ICQ?
--
(From a guy quite happy to be in Canada. Hey, maybe I could set up a POP3/SMTP server here, so that you guys can get free e-mail?
I thought higher of Slashdot readers... If Slashdot readers can be fooled by such an obvious hoax, I can only wonder about the Windows98 grop. Nu Laudna -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- This document is very much under construction, please send comments, advice, criticism, and further information to chymes@crew.umich.edu. DON'T SPREAD THAT HOAX! Recently, the internet community has endured a wave of e-mail hoaxes and pranks, exploiting users unfamiliarity with how the internet, and computer systems in general work. With the explosive growth of the internet and its popularity, more and more new users are "getting online" and becoming targets for pranksters. "Ancient" myths, like the cookie story, are just waiting for a critical mass of people who have not been exposed, so that they can go streaming across the net again. There is no technical solution to this problem. Even when users users become experienced enough to be able to tell a silly message when they see one, anyone can get suckered sometimes. It seems that all users of the internet will have to put up with a certain amount of nonsense. Right now, these messages are only an annoyance, but it is only a matter of time before someone's` reputation, career or bank account is ruined by some out of control e-mail message. Experienced users call these problem messages Junk-mail Viruses, because they act like other computer viruses, only they use people as the method of infecting new systems. Users of the internet must learn to be skeptical, and think carefully before spreading a message to new users. There are some simple things you can do to avoid being a carrier for Junk-mail Viruses. 1) If you get a message, or see a posting on usenet that seems like it should be shared with LOTS of people, **DON`T SEND IT** unless either you KNOW the message is true, you can authenticate their identity (through PGP or some other system), or you know the sender personally, and know they would have written this message. The more urgent it sounds, the more skeptical you should be. Even if you think it might be true, let someone else spread it. 2) If you really want to send it, **ALWAYS CHECK WITH THE ORIGINATOR** before forwarding it! This is the best way to tell a hoax or a prank. Just reply to the first sender, and ask them if it is true. If they can`t tell you, then don`t send it! Most pranks and hoaxes have forged headers and signatures, and when you try and verify the validity of the message, you will find that the address is not valid. Even if the originator is the prankster, and tells you to go ahead, at least they can be caught and dealt with. If this seems like too much of a bother, than it is not that important and you should not send it anyway. 3) If the message tells you to do something, especially if that something involves changing in your account or sending a file or message over the network, **CHECK WITH SOMEONE KNOWLEDGEABLE THAT YOU CAN TRUST**. Imagine you received a package in your real homes mailbox asking you to place your house keys in the return envelope provided, and mail them to a post office box. Would you comply? People fall for the computer version of this all the time. 4) If you see or get something that really makes you angry, remember *** YOU CAN`T BE SURE WHO SENT IT!!** It is very very easy to frame someone with an e-mail message or usenet post. All someone has to do is sit at their computer when the victim is away from the keyboard. But hackers can be much more sophisticated. They can forge any message to make it appear from anyone. 4)Chain e-mail and Pyramid posts on usenet are a scam, and they may be a crime. If you forward one, you will be blasted with hundreds of angry messages in reply. But if you see one, remember that you can`t be sure who sent it. FAMOUS HOAXES The cookie story (Mrs Fields, Neimen Marcus, etc) is a myth. It has been circulating for at least 10 years. Please do not forward it. The kid who wants postcards before he dies is also no longer true, don't forward it either. Similarly, the federal government is NOT going to start charging for e-mail, or any other use the the internet. When you see a call to arms about this issue, disregard it. The Good Times "virus" deserves a page all its own. Here is an HTML version , and here is the plain text . Anyway, there is ABSOLUTLY NO WAY** for an email message to infect your computer with a virus just by reading it. Even the infamous internet worm did not operate this way. This "mother of all Junk-mail virues" Has made it into the photocopy room, and is going around again. There are enough myths, legends, and hoaxes on the net to fill a book, in fact, one is growing, check out the alt.folklore.urban Frequently asked Questiones list . Finally, note that when April 1st comes up, the Net will be awash in phony messages, forged return addresses, pranks, and general amusing nonsense. The best thing to do is to read them and have a good laugh. Baring that, ignore any message from anyone you don't know, and ignore any message from anyone that asks you to do something. HOAXES & HUMOR ON THE INTERNET 1. April Fools on the Net 2. Official Usenet Alt.Folklore.Urban Frequently Posted Legends 3. Usenet group on Computer folklore> 4. SERIOUS INFORMATION 1. Pretty Good Privacy, a great way to authenticate the sender and insure privacy for the receiver. 2. How NOT to create USENET Posts 3. USENET frequently asked questions 4. Hints on Writing Style 5. USENET Primer 6. Rules for posting Charles Hymes,aka Charweed Hymerfan chymes@CREW.umich.edu, http://www.CREW.umich.edu/~chymes/ C.R.E.W.: room 2420busad, 701 Tappan Street,Ann Arbor Michigan 48109-1234 Voice: (313)-764-6715, FAX:(313) 936-3168 Psychology: Psychology Dept, rm B268 525 East University, Ann Arbor Michigan 48109-1109 Voice:(313)-763-6992 * Well, maybe it was true at one point, but it is not true now. ** Really experienced users know about holes in sendmail and particular mail readers, but this message is not for you. - -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.5 mQBtAi3hKJAAAAEDAKWu78FpM0TI9ULSFZhi0HP2yx3DCsBvUb ugyij/lgLC1VIk 8FrAGkv3Pi0K0K3T0bC6xjRNceVIO4CCMCe/FsXxrNhWjMwO81 90qi2lzTQ9zZRf 573Njs+/uk64hK+aeQAFEbQSQ2hhcmx3ZWVkIEh5bWVyZmFu =blsm - -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.5 iQB1AgUBMAqo2L+6TriEr5p5AQEOqgL/YXpC5yjvlncRE4cXBb 5cyfnz/zyeMjFk SHwGm5aIgOvdJ2v+3T5owsCrocw6botWVGqUZCem2PSNmaVym+ U4POlucE4+5Xcu fAnUDcziMEvdq/NgLm5hMo3nl9MHrPmK =MJXN -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
I had heard somewhere that the UN was wanting to impose some kind of tax on email (something like 1 cent for every 100 emails) ... first thing that pops into my mind is what right does the UN (above all policitcal instituions) have to tax US citizens ... I don't think email tax by the US Govt. is a good idea ... I'm even more against it if the UN is behind it ...
Since nobody else seems to have done so, I thought I'd highlight one of the benefits of an e-mail tax: we could show our faces in public again.
Logically, if we were taxed, say, $.005 per e-mail, somebody who sent 100 e-mails a day would end up paying 50 cents. Anyone who sends 100 e-mails a day can probably afford that. However, John Q. Spambot, sending out 500,000 e-mails a day, would be shelling out $2,500 a day. More than most of them can afford. So if this were (somehow) enacted, we could give out our e-mail addresses without fear of being bombarded by "opt-out" spam, I could stop using not@here.com as my e-mail address when registering software(that guy's probably really pissed at me), and, perhaps, the internet would be a better place for it.
Although I'd sooner see an anti-spam bill. We should petition.
Yeah. It's gay. It has the marks of a queer all over it.
The USPS is most definitely tax supported. Fedex and UPS have complained mightily about this since they cannot compete with the tax subsidized govt.
Just another hoax, originating at the US government, in order to make us all look paranoid. The ultimate goal being to ram the 3" wide steel pipe that is encryption legislation up the asses of every US citizen. "Don't be silly, the government would never do anything like that!" Another false conspiracy theory to make everyone think the government isn't conspiring. Well I'm not falling for it.
This is not flamebait, but I know most people here don't seem to agree with what I am about to say.
Taxing e-mail is not any different from taxing property and income. If we don't have a problem with those taxes, why should e-mail be so different? Its not some magical manna from the sky people.
Of course I don't support taxes without qualifications, nobody likes paying taxes. But if the taxes are (1) efficiently used (2)not excessive, I don't see a problem with them. The first condition is especially hard to meet obviously.
So basically, I don't oppose this as a matter of principle, it all depends on the specific proposal. This all ignores implementational details. I presume they will add a surcharge to your ISP, perhaps depending on the bandwidth you consume. Obviously, they can't count the e-mails you send, it would have to be a bandwidth tax rather than an e-mail tax. Big deal, we already pay sales tax on that I bet. The ISPs pay taxes obviously and pass some of that on to us.
This is the same story as the "UN proposes email tax". Except they didn't propose an email tax, this was an error in the Wired report, it was a bandwidth tax, of 1c/MB, they used email as an example of how inexpensive it would be. (that 100 10kB emails would cost 1c).
The above URL is a site containing an official record of business before the U.S. Congress. Two weeks ago there was an announcement on that page that there is no plan to tax e-mail, that rumors of such are a hoax. Of course, this _could_ be subject to change.
the government always wants to tax something. they always want to make more money off of something simple. so this is what i tell the governement over tax and the internet. FUCK YOU!!!!!!
>Easy...they force software manufacterers to add
.sig? http://www.netigen.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000012.html
>auditing software to their email package. It
>measures quarterly and you send it in like you
>do your taxes. Your ISP adds it into your account...
While the last remark of the person who replied to your comment was derogatory and not needed, the poster knows what he's talking about, and you, im afraid, do not. The best thing to do is try to weed out any insults and learn from the information. Perhaps the reply could have been posted in a more polite way, but the tone of the post was probably due to the arogance in your original post. By begining your sentence "Easy..." you convey that you actually know what you are talking about, when in fact, you do not. This frustrates some people to no end. The person who replied to you has a valid point, who will force me to add auditing to my email client, which I wrote myself in C? Your attitude is a poor one for someone who is seeking knowledge (Future Linux-Guru). When the student attempts to teach the master, the master may listen, but don't get upset if he hits you in the head with his walking stick for being a poor student.
I somehow get the feeling that the person who replied to you would most happily insult you in person, if the opportunity presented itself.
Offtopic: what "blasphemy" do you speak of in your
contains some bad arguments and some good arguments about linux. What gives you the right to call these people fools? Are you a "coward who insults only via the web"? And when you make the statement "Go crawl back under your rock", what exactly did you _really_ want to say? Are your subtle comments really insults in disguise, or are you so much of a coward that you can not actually insult someone in plain view, even via the web.
-- I am NOT the original poster who replied rudely to you. But i guess im another poster who replied rudely to you.
This post may be an oxymoron but its something to think about. I think i'll go crawl back under my rock now.
It would be virtually impossible! If e-mail were taxed, geeks around the US would just create a new system to deliver mail and call it geek-mail or something. it's just not going to happen. if it does, it won't take long before we nerds make n-mail or g-mail (nerd or geek mail)
Stupidity tax, that is a great idea. Revenues from it would certainly be so great that US goverment could abolish all other taxes and still have more money in their coffins. As evidenced by the number of people who actually believe this IMHO extremely crude 'email-tax' hoax. Too bad it is just about as hard to implement as email tax.
To hell with this hoax. I hate paying the city for my animals. My animals never leave the house. They are up-to-date with their shots, are now neutral as far as sex goes, etc. Why do I have to pay the city to license my animals? I live in a small city, Charlotte, NC AND I HAVE TO PAY THE GOV TO HAVE ANIMALS. OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!
Can any useful discussion come of this article? Of course not. In fact, if one person says, "E-mail tax is a good thing," I'd die of shock. On the other hand, I would expect lots of angry flame-filled threads to result.
In light of this, I recommend that the moderatos kill this whole article as flamebait. Yeah, I realize that's impossible, but I'm getting sick of these flame-encouraging obvious-answer "Ask Slashdots".
I feel your pain.
I belive the internet & WWW was created, By the People for the People...It would be nice if the or Our goverment would just stay out of this one..E-Mail Tax, I don't think so.. thanks John Seymour
I admit I didn't read the article but I might as well say this: if the US taxes email, what about email coming from outside the US? Would I be subject to taxation for getting email from family? If the US *manages* to *convince* the UN to establish a international tax system, what happens to email to/from non-UN member states (like Taiwan, Cuba, etc)? I say we should state a Boston Tea Party-type rebellion if this tax ever appears.
Still, I wouldn't complain too strenuously. In some places over in Europe you can pay upwards of 60% of your income to taxes and are looking at sales taxes in the neighborhood of 20 to 25 percent (or even higher.) All in all we have it pretty good here.
I have the same feeling. Especially when I am bored, and I don't have anything to do but read slashdot. I have become too lazy to go and actually SEARCH for interesting stuff like I used to.
On the other hand, if I don't check slashdot for an entire day, I find plenty of stuff when I get time. If there were more stuff I might be in danger of falling behind after a long weekend or something.
As it is, I haven't missed a post in about 8 months. So I think the current output is just about right. They just need to focus on the quality and focus it so we can the good stuff a higher percentage of the time.
And I need get outside and not read slashdot all the time....
The gov. has no right to tax the internet. It is against the constitution to tax interstate. Tax on e-mail is absurd, it uses no gov. funding or infrastructure. Any attempts would add costs to ISPs and other areas (basically the whole industry). The internet is world wide, controlling it all would be difficult if not impossible (china and other backward countries can because they have little to no technology to speak of). And this country has had a surplus recently. Tax is only to pay for necessary services. We should not be taxed "just because". Basically, the whole thing is crap and the government (and all others) should keep their slimy paws off it. side note: why is real estate speculation ok and web pages not? NO TAX. PERIOD. NO CENSORSHIP. PERIOD. FREE SPEECH. PERIOD. NO LAWS OR LIMITS OR MORALISTIC "for the children" BS, PERIOD. NO ANYTHING. PERIOD. IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, FUCK OFF. PERIOD. thank you and come again.
This is not true. Click here for USPS comment on this.
The alleged "logic" amused me. Since more e-mail is sent than snail mail, we should tax e-mail. If e-mail is taxed, then LESS people would send it by the law of demand, since the price of sending it rises (from 0 to something positive).
So such a tax would eliminate the reason for its existence. SolaRJetmaN (whose login doesn't seem to work)
The way I look at it the post office is a bussiness. Forget the fact that the goverment owns it. If they can't keep up with compenition then get of out the kitchen. Since we ( the Linux dudes ) are takening away money and puuting up some compention against MS. Should the goverment step in a tax us and give the money to MS. Another example would be 8 tracks. I think that any company that makes CD should give money to the inventers ( or companys who made ) [ of ] 8 tracks. Theres only one thing I need to say about the goverment doing syupied things. Theres more of U.S. then them.
THe national sales tax. Email is not a sale. just visit http://www.fairtax.org THAT is the way taxes should be. Tax consumption, NOT production
You see, unlike UPS and FedEx, the Postal Service pays no taxes, and its personnel costs are paid for by the federal government's personnel budget, not their operating budget. The USPS is turning a comfortable profit. I would like to see the USPS get involved in email, though. Why? Several of our duly rented^H^H^H^H elected representatives would like to ignore email on the basis that there's no way of absolutely ensuring that it comes from one of their constituents, and they're right, however, the USPS could set up a web based email service. Sure, it'd be non anonyomous and gubmint run, but it would be completely optional, though I wouldn't blame any pol for placing more weight on an opinion from user@usps.citizen.gov than xxxstacy713@hotmail.com. It could be ramped up for polling, but enabling blind ballot voting would be a programming challenge, and a difficult sell. And to those who say email can't be tracked, Microsoft is testing email tracking software with ESPN and Disney right now.
Yes, this has been around. At least one of the major versions refers to a Bill Number and a Congresscritter, both of whom don't exist, and references a non-existent editorial in the Washingtonian, which is Not The Washington Post or Washington Times, and which has an article on their web page explicitly denying that it was their fault. Bill Stewart, who for some reason is impersonating an Anonymous Coward.
Geeeeze.. all these new laws.. i think we need a geek president, or at lest someone who has an idea of what the internet does and how it works. I say next election we nominate CmdrTaco!
There is no way to charge for email, as Internet is global network. One can always use email server abroad. Similar would be trying to impose extra tax on faxing. Practically impossible because of technical and privacy reasons.
Now..
They could set up a secure email server (nationwide service) with certificates. This would be somehow analogous to post office. This is in my opinion needed for effective business-to-business and business-to-government communication. They could charge for that.
Peter
Stop posting messages like this.. you might give the australian government ideas!. - ^Zer0^
Wrong: "The Congress shall have Power ... To establish Post Offices and post Roads." It's not required to do so; it's just granted the authority to do so if it chooses.
Another tidbit: because it is legally required to charge the same rate for first-class mail, regardless of costs, the USPS has been given an exclusive right to carry such mail.
And private mail carriers have been discriminated against and hindered for years by those wishing to preserve a government postal monopoly.
Most ISP's service email. Most ISP's are commercial. Most ISP's make a profit. Most ISP's pay taxes over their profits. So, in a way, email is taxed.
Hmm. Seems to me there was a "tea party" about a similar issue, a couple of hundred years ago, or so...
If that would happen, we'd shut our doors immediately. I am already bogged down with work, I would not have any time to 'write' extensions to track emails. Granted, our logs already keep a lot of info,.... Government, GTH.
during a recent stop at http://www.usps.gov, I read a statement stating that the USPS had no plans/means/whatnot to tax email. Of course...I can't find where it says that now.
When it comes to my "essential liberties" being delicate and politically correct is secondary. It is my opinion that everyone being afraid to speak out is one of the real problems. With everyone being polite, the bastards encroachment onto our freedom has gotten worse. They never back off and being polite only encourages them (or makes them subtle). If more people would speak their minds this country would be a better place. I say FUCK OFF and mean it.
How will they chek that companies are paying??? I heard Hotmail got about 1.000.000 adressess. These are sending a lot of mails. This could realy be i to remove unemployment. "houndres of thousands of people to chek every e-mail account in every company involved???
Well, you could start the Linux implementation in Kansas schools but unfortunately the highest level of technology you will find is one of those fold-down kneelers. On a more serious note, public schools tend to be bastions of hideous beurocracy. To try to penetrate that level of ignorance with a novel idea like Linux will certainly be a mammoth task. May the force be with you.
The downloader has to pay a huge premium for this privilege. First for the hardware/software setup, then a flat access fee for each login, then a small percentage on the actual value of the stamp, plus the cost of random audits designed to stop cheating.
It's worse than a "free" Pitney-Bowes postage meter. Speaking of which, they also these four ways.
It's about as workable as, well, a tax on email.
If the postal service is making less money with conventional mail why don't they do some "E-BUISNESS" WHOA!!!! what and idea!! ;) Start doin some revolutionary package delivering.. Or how about "just like get a transporter like in star trek to deliver everyones mail" hehe ;) might improve business..
Yes, the USPS is self-sustaining. They made a record profit last year. Then they got the Postal Rate Commission to approve a thoroughly unjustified increase in the letter rates to subsidize package delivery. You will note that they charge considerably less than UPS or FedEx for two-to-three-day delivery (of course, they don't do a particularly good job of getting the package delivered on time, which is WHY people will pay UPS and FedEx rates). This is part of why we need to get rid of (or at least allow competition with) the USPS: From *their* perspective, trying to drive UPS and FedEx out of business is a good thing; but from the perspective of the federal government *as a whole*, greater net revenue will clearly be achieved by collecting the taxes on UPS or FedEx's delivery of the package rather than having the government actually deliver the package (even if they WERE charging market prices). And in what way could it possibly be in the people's best interest for the government to compete - with tactics that would have the Justice Department after them in a heartbeat, were they not the government - with private businesses which do the job better? I get really pissed every time I see a USPS television ad - they are using money that I *have* to pay them (some things still have to go through First Class mail), to advertise DIRECTLY against my enlightened self-interest and try to put me out of a job. Why should I stand for it? Anonymous FedEx Coward
That email hoax you provided a link to is generated by a web site called "Create Your Own Urban Legend" what is does is have you fill in a madlibs type setup and then ender whatever email addresses you want it to go to. Unfortunately I can't find the URL right now. But the link at EFF is exactly like one of these 'Urban Legend ' emails
jeez, of all the people, I thought Slashdot readers would at least be somewhat resistant to the Gullibility Virus (aka, nasty-sounding e-mail, omigod, I MUST FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE I KNOW!!! ). Get a clue, folks.
If there is no way to enforce this (I don't see any way), then it is irrelevant to discuss it. I do realize it is important that the postal service needs to survive this information age (at least until we can beam stuff over.) The government must find other ways to get funding, but taxing email is definitely not a way. AC
US Gov gave up the post office a while back. It is now supposedly seperate entity. It is run off of the price of the services and not for profit, so taxes would not support it. If the gov taxes email it is for another purpose.
"Fsck no." They get enough of my dosh. Piss off.
Right, you can't vote Gates out but you do have a choice to use his software. Do you have a choice for who's in office (vote the gov out as you said)? No, you do know that most people didn't want the current president, right? Yes in two elections MOST people didn't want him. So since you really can't effect the gov by voting, and buisness don't have armed swat teams breaking down doors and killing people, who is a bigger threat?
The guy behind that website, Irwin Schiff, is a stupid blowhard who was imprisoned for tax evasion. You can talk all you want about the constitutionality of income tax, but claiming that you don't have to pay it is like threatening to cut off the government's air supply, and it will respond accordingly if it can. Not that I enjoy paying taxes any more than you do, but you will have to do something more subtle than just announce that you have made no income on your return form if you really want to get out of it. I did fifteen minutes of research on this guy, and turned up a lot of supportive web pages about him by libertarians. That was suprising, considering that I also turned up this: http://evans-legal.com/dan/tpfaq.html#proponents Alex.
My question is what justification does the government have taxing e-mail and giving the money to the Post Office when the post office is in no way involved. Hell, I'm not involved in delivering e-mail either. Does that mean I can get a slice of the cash? FatRatBastard (who lost his password when his harddrive took a dive)
This was one of those April Fools' emails going around. IMHO, It holds about as much water as the "annual Internet cleaning" or whatever.
I think they should tax email. After all, they have to pay for all the FBI machines that crack the encrypted ones somehow... :)
If you could use email like a regular snail mail. Let me summarize: 1)You create an email with the address you wnat it to goto. 2)Email it to the USPS 3)They charge you a small fee (say $0.02) and forward it to the address you specified. The *best* part is that all email deiveredthis way would have all the guarentees of regular snail mail. For instance it would be illegial for other people to read it (your employer eh?). Messing with email delivered this way would be a federal offense. etc....
You can read the whole FAQ here
3. Is E-Stamp available for the Mac? The initial version of E-Stamp Internet Postage works with Windows. But we are considering a follow-on release that will include support for Macs. We are certainly committed to providing products that meet our customers' needs. Please check out our website periodically to find out about new products, features and technology partnerships.
Hell, I bet It won't work with W2K.
8. Can E-Stamp be used internationally? Initially, the E-Stamp Internet Postage service is only available in the U.S. However, we do intend to make the service available in other countries in the future. In fact, we have already had discussions with a number of postal authorities and corporations around the globe, including several in Europe.
Or if another country starts doing this I can print foreign stamps....
12. Do digital stamps expire? The postage you purchase does not "expire" since it's the same as currency. However, once you print it onto an envelope, label, or document, U.S. Postal Service regulations require that you mail it within 24 hours.
So... In effect... They do expire...
2^5
Yeah, you're right. Ever notice how people start speaking more freely after a couple of free beers?
Adam Schumacher
- A.P.
--
"One World, One Web, One Program" - Microsoft Promotional Ad
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
I'm an rr employee, and I'd kick there arse before they tax me email server!~ dadgum it's late.
--------- The universe as we currently understand it: First there was nothing
They're taxing the private sector just because it's providing competition to existing government services. This is insanely wrong. They're here to support competition!
--
I noticed
--
I noticed
It's getting about time to leave everywhere
if anything the government will start taxing backbone providers per packet sent. possibly under some sort of interstate tariff type law? Its much easier and cost efficient to tax the backbone, then let them worry about passing the extra charges along to the customers. (then the customers customers, etc etc)... of course.. this IS the US government we're talking about here... the home of the $250 2.5 gallon gas can.
-- "I feel a strong disturbance in the for.."\*Segmentation Fault*\ (core dumped)
Second, why does the government care? Didn't they let go of the USPS and make it its own company and not government run?
Can we get them to tax SPAM mail at $1000 per non-solicited emailing instead, and give that money to improve network stability, and build the future of the internet?
my drunken throughts
Thank you slashdot for perpetuating Urban legend.
-- There is no sig line, only Zuul.
Sure this is a hoax. It's never been discussed by anyone with the real power to do anything like it.
But how you react to it says something deep and profound about your mental health (something which "they" couldn't test without asking strange-sounding questions you probably wouldn't answer). So, the fact that such an obvious fraud appears on slashdot must mean that someone is reading the responses, collating them, and preparing a report on how many nerds are schizophrenics.
This reminds me of a newspaper column a few years ago in which the columnist argued that the fact that he had fallen for a hoax about the government because he believed they wanted to overregulate showed that government was bad. Of course, I learned much more about him than I did about government regulation.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
The way I see it, tax is a way of paying for services. You might not use, want or need any of the services bought with your tax money, but the capability (in theory) exists. Postage stamps are the governments way of taxing us for carrying our mail. However, don't companies like sprint and at&t carry most mail? So, what the government is trying to do is charge money for a service provided by someone else.
sarcasm mode ON
Well, since the government gives huge amounts of money to big buisiness in the form of tax breaks, they _deserve_ this money
sarcasm mode OFF
Just my two centibucks.
Yes, I'm still a junky. Are you still a bitch?
Do we get to throw a shipment of PC's into Boston harbor now?? Fun. Fun.
People would just use things like instant messaging or some mutant of traditional email just outside of the legal defination of email. Mutilated or faked headers? Java based portals with certificate uploads on every site? More jobs for net admins?! More Fun! ;)
Where would we be if Al Gore had not invented the internet? What else could chalange us like this?
Novel theory: Modern Man evolved from psychopath
Interesting thought. I'm sure I'm not the only one who sees the irony in this.
The government complains that email is 'cutting into' the postal service? Isn't that a GOOD THING? Email, unlike the postal service, is efficient. It is fast. It is cheap. If the postal service is being used less, then by all means cut back the number of employees or whatever it takes - cut back on the infrastructure. Don't do an ass-backwards thing like tax the superior technology so that people will continue to use the old, inferior way.
Is it me, or does the government's primary goal seem not to be to provide needed services, but to ensure its own bloat?
And yes, I'm sure it's a hoax, but regardless given the bloated government we have, it's almost plausible that they would attempt something like this if it were technologically feasible (which, as others have said, it is not).
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
Or to allow the millions of Americans who don't have E-mail to communicate with each other, or for people to send bill payments without paying extra bank fees for "online" payment systems, or for me to be able to send a birthday card to a friend without paying for FedEx or UPS rates...
The USPS isn't dead yet, nor should it be. We've got a LONG way to go before E-mail replaces the postal service...
You are half-correct. Tax money doesn't fund the USPS at all. But it is a government agency. It is entirely self-supporting, getting all its revenue from postal fees. Hence the periodic rate hikes.
Most ISPs DO keep extensive records of their mail-server activity. Sendmail has historically been the #1 daemon that crackers will set their sights on (for a combination of reasons); add to that the numerous times a customer will call in and say "someone sent me a large file and I can't get my mail" (or some other mail-related problem), and you get a climate where ISPs are ALREADY happy to keep logfiles of their chosen MTA's activities.
As for taxing the sender, even without hacks to sendmail, it's trivial to monitor port 25 -- which affects "real" SMTP sessions and spoofed SMTP (sorry, telnetting in will not win you anything except the Booby Prize for not having written a script in perl to do it for you). While individual Linux (etc.) users may be able to run sendmail on an alternate port, they WILL need the cooperation of an existing MTA (listening on the well-known port), or they will need to stop corresponding with any of their friends who don't also have the modified daemon.
That said, it'd be horrifically difficult to offer solid evidence of a mail message being sent without some form of authorization. SMTP is essentially a one-way protocol; there's nothing to stop it from being spoofed.
Enough of the technical: I won't even start in on the social problems this could cause.
Nothing worth doing is worth doing today.
Unless they did something completely off the wall like phrase the law like: "any form of textual communication sent by one individual and addressed to another shall be taxed." it will be trivial to come up with free alternatives.
Maybe they will realize this and do something a little more useful like create a new epost office that offers guaranteed delivery and/or legally binding email with digital signatures or something. Charge for something new instead of leaching off of something that's already in place. Wouldn't it be amazing if the government actually did something clever?
It seems to me like the amount of energy it would take to put a system of taxation in place for email would be enough to create something usefull.
More importantly, they should spend less time looking at StickMan porn and more time screening Ask Slashdot.
This is getting to be really sad. I sent in a technical question about cutting edge technology and how to tie this into a project that would get linux into a school districts network to start replacing the NT boxes (it was about the HP SureStore tape drive that was purchased for a backup device on a web server), but low level Jerry Springer Talk Show style internet trash like seriously questioning the validity of spam content makes it on slashdot instead?
I suppose it is all objective.
-- DrZaius - Minister of Sciences and Protector of the Faith
So if it's time-critical, you can use FedEX. If it's not time-critical but it is critical that it eventually arrive and not fall into the back of some mail carriers truck or in some stranger's mailbox, then you're out of luck?
---
seumas.com
Actually, it was several years ago that I heard it stated in a documentary segment by 60 Minutes or 20/20 regarding the USPS. According the them, some 20% of all mail never reaches it's intended destination.
I doubt they pulled that number out of a hat. And from my personal experience over the last year, it seems more and more legitimate.
---
seumas.com
If the government taxes email, the government
knows how much you email.
Squick!
If this would happen, in what condition whatsoever, everybody could just change their ports and call it something else than E-mail ... leave port 25 open for "normal and taxed email" and a new port like 29 or something could be used for "messaging" ... The day they are going to put "messaging" on the tax bill it can again be changed to something else.
:) let's see ... the internic database is like 250.000 participants for the .net or .org domain ? ... 250.000 * $ ... they will learn not to spam just anybody anymore :))
Well, tax could be a good thing against spammers
Freaker / TuC
--- I am known for the ones who want to find me on the net. Is that a privacy risk or a privilege? One might wonder..
I saw two almost identical letters about the
subject. One originated from Canada and one
from the USA. Names like MPs were changed
to senators and representatives to make it
look more US like. The bottom line is that
it is a hoax put on the net to get morons
going and make sure they annoy the politicians.
The representative and senator responsible for
the said bill don't even exist. The bill is the
same as the one in Canada, the said MP probably
doesn't exist either.
At work we had someone who posted the letter
on the bulletin board. I didn't take it out
because I thought it was funny that so many
idiots would bite to it. And I don't care much
for the local republicans that we're stuck with.
At election time this is straight party stuff
and I have no choice except the senator and
president. Every one else on the ballot are
republicans. It is amusing to think of those
guys being harrassed by idiots who think they're
about to be taxed on their EMAIL.
We had another hoax just about as amusing this
one a while back about the long distance versus
local calls. A lot of morons fell for that
one. Apparently the politicians got more calls
about that one than about the president's
impeachment trial.
As we say in French : "Juste une trappe à cons"
in other words, it's just a trap for morons.
If all mail cost a dollar and a half to send, everyone with a computer would pay their bills electronically over the web and everyone without a computer would pay their bills over the phone via credit card and/or checking account autodeposit. Companies that for some reason had to send out printed statements would start billing in six-month increments instead of one-month increments, or would hire their own delivery service rather than using the mail. People would use email and telephone instead of personal letters even more than they do now.
And dozens of local companies would start competing using the existing FedEx and UPS infrastructure for long-range travel and local couriers or pick-up locations for local delivery.
Really, it's ridiculous that mail is as expensive as it is now. Privatisation couldn't help but lower prices.
I play Nerd-Folk!
If we simply get rid of the laws that maintain the remainder of the postal monopoly, whatever private companies enter the breech will undoubtedly be able to provide the same level of service for half the cost the Post Office charges. So no, there's no reason for the Post Office to exist as a government-granted monopoly service provider. Sell it off!
Side note: when UPS first started delivering packages, the Post Office claimed that it couldn't make money delivering packages and did this at a loss, subsidized by first class mail. UPS managed to make a profit providing nationwide coverage for significantly less than the post office was then charging. There's no reason to think First Class mail is any different in this regard; a profit-oriented company could undoubtedly improve things.
Also, the Pony Express was essentially a private first-class mail-delivery service, one of several of that era.
I play Nerd-Folk!
Note that UPS and FedEx and Airborne currently don't bother to price discriminate based on location. They could charge different prices and certainly would if it were profitable to do so...
Also note that in many rural areas UPS already has better local coverage than the Post Office does; UPS generally drives a truck out to your door while the Post Office only delivers to the nearest "Mail Stop" which might be many miles away.
I play Nerd-Folk!
Of course they still use Apache to serve their pages... :-)
-Glen Raphael
(I'd moderate it up myself, but I've already posted in this thread).
I play Nerd-Folk!
The same is true of pretty much any proposed measure to tax Internet users directly, whether it's a tariff on email messages, bandwidth usage, commercial transactions, or anything else. It's trivially easy to make my sending or receiving email look to any monitor like a bout of web surfing; in fact, sometimes that's exactly what it is. Traffic-analysis-defeating measures, combined with decent crypto/stego, can defeat pretty much anything a snooper would throw your way.
The only way a (more-or-less democratic--totalitarians have a lot of leeway here) government might get away with this sort of thing is by imposing huge duties on backbone providers, based on traffic or aggregate supportable bandwidth, who would then pass the increase in their operating costs downstream through ISPs until it eventually reached the consumer. I wouldn't enjoy seeing that, but it's a lot more likely than an individual tax on users.
spawn_of_yog_sothoth
Where I live, there are new post offices sprouting up everywhere because of the high demand. How they can turn around and say that they are losing money I do not know. I use email like I would use the phone, not snail mail. If anybody should be worried, it should be the LD carriers. But even then, they are making money on Internet backbone services, so they can quit their whining for all I care.
A slip of the foot you may soon recover, but a slip of the tongue you may never get over. -Benjamin Franklin
I really don't see the taxation of in-house activities as feasible.
I would start ranting about the immorality or whatnot of the idea, too, but that doesn't really matter, anymore....
-rozzin.
No, the USPS is a government corporation, like, for example, the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation), formed by an act of Congress. It's quasi-independent in terms of its operations, but it still must refer back to Congress for significant changes (such as postal rates).
Note for folks who slept through civics class: the Post Office is actually mandated by the US constitution. Another tidbit: because it is legally required to charge the same rate for first-class mail, regardless of costs, the USPS has been given an exclusive right to carry such mail. Given that the US Senate would have to approve a change in this, and that high-cost states have as many senators (though far fewer people) than low-cost states, you aren't likely to see it happen any time soon.
Sure! What better way to insure that the US will paint itself in a corner???
-- ----------------------------------------------
Vive le logiciel... Libre!!!
I have, and continue to run an e-mail list server out of my home (and friend's homes, at times) for the last five years. I shudder to think what an impact even a small surcharge would have on me now that the outgoing volume of my machine exceeds 5 megs per day.
Not that I particularly worry about this coming about, since such a such an action here in the United States would instantly be responded to by a deluge of complaints to legislature by people in all walks of life who use e-mail in their day to day lives.
Unless, of course, the cries of "Wolf! Wolf! 601B!" have suitably dulled our senses by then.
Lets hope not.
--
Rob Carlson
What's scary is that some people might actually believe you.
People, don't accept rumours without reasonably trustworthy sources. Don't trust those with 'em either -- people can make mistakes or just plain lie.
-- Moderation in all things, exceptions to all rules --
A tax on email would be a double tax, in addition to the outragous taxes already nailing all of all for phone service and long distance service. How is it reasonable in any way to tax me $8 on 5 cents of long distance?
I do not support the taxing of email . . . just wanted to get that out of the way.
Onto my real point. How would they do that? Would ISPs be required to log all of the email messages that people send? This alone would be a huge task to put to ISPs that would cost them money. Second would be the issue of logging such emails from the standpoint of privacy.
I do not support the taxing of personal income . . . just wanted to get that out of the way.
Onto my real point. How would they do that? Would employers be required to log all of the personal income that employees receive? This alone would be a huge task to put to employers that would cost them money. Second would be the issue of logging such personal income from the standpoint of privacy.
Once legislators get involved, the logistics are not so infeasible as you may think... (Or, rather, their feasibility is no longer relevant.)
Every c-mail everywhere in the world is logged (for "taxation" purposes). See no problem someone enforcing this on email. And your suggestion basically sais that we should all pity the US post office for having to maintain accurate accoutning records, while the ISPs should not. And none has ever raised any concerns (and remained alive and kicking) on privacy grounds here.
How would the taxes be collected? Would it be added on to the bill you pay your ISP, would it be put on your W2? What if your ISP was not your email provider (free email abounds)?
NO more free email.
Needless to say, I think that it would cost twice as much to manage the thing as it would gain in revenue.
So? Who cares about the dead fish
The other question that comes to mind is what about all of us who run Linux and Sendmail? I run my own sendmail and IMAP server on a dedicated connection. I am about to give a couple of friends account because they are moving. Would I be required to log the number of email that left my box (something I really don't know how or want to do), and then collect the money from them and me (something that I WON'T do).
Indeed you will. Being obliged by law. Since when an american has contradicted IRS ;-)
This is a really bad idea IMHO. If someone would explain the logistics behind such a proposal, at least it could be debatable from an ethical/political standpoint as to whether or not it would be beneficial, but without any such logistics worked out, it's nothing . . .
The logistics are very simple. Any taxation information is accessible to the all kinds of agencies with three and four letter initials. As long as they have proved unable to control the matters otheriwse they can easily regain control using the taxation as an immediate threat
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
Taxation info in all countries has always been available to "proper" authorities. And quite a lot of stuff is taxed for this reason, not for other reasons.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
This will allow them to require contol over email flow for taxation purposes. To remind you t he IRS in the US can suspend almost all of your civil rights if it likes to. Remember Al Capone?
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
They will simply require ISP's to maintain "accurate" records of their mail transactions. And they will require this by law. It is as simple as cake ;-)
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
As idiotic as our government can be at times, I still find it hard to believe that anyone would even consider lending credibility to such an idiotic idea. It's simply absurd in the most extreme fashion.
Urban Legends has a writeup about this particular hoax, with a link to the USPS rebuttal of the idiotic message.
Hopefully, no one takes this thing seriously, but I fear it already too late, judging by the amount of /.'s resources wasted by this thread.
Matthew Vanecek For 93 million miles, there is nothing between the sun and my shadow except me. I'm always getting i
They could tax email rather simply. Same way the collect payroll taxes. It is much too difficult for the government to do it with individuals, so they make the employers responsible and if they don't then it is easier for the government to go after the employers.
Substitute ISP for employers and you'll see how they could easily do it. Then when some ISP decides not to cooperate, they go to the next upstream link and shut them down. Amazing how quickly the people will fall in line...
Even if this is (and I think it is) false, never underestimate the evil that any organization with endless pockets can contrive. As noted "power corrupts..."
Then I download pine and remove the code for the auditing. It's 100% impossible.
-matt
From what I understand the USPS is essentially 100% separate from the govt. It receives NO tax money, and it is making a profit. The profit it makes doesn't go back to the government, the USPS gets to keep it, which IMHO is a Very Good Thing (tm). Also, the internet has created MORE postal mail. Sites like ebay are causing an increase in priority mail shippings (which is where the post office makes its real money). I'm fairly certain they actually take a loss on standard first class mail. Trust me, the USPS is not hurting financially. The government does not now, nor has it ever, seriously considered taxing email.
-matt
This is an old hoax. It started in Canada a few months back, and then moved to the US with barely a change to the text. You can find it at the Urban Legends web site at http://www.snopes.com/spoons/faxlore/internet.htm
Please stop perpetuating this stupid spam.
-- Meet the Residents -- http://www.residents.com/
Sorry, I gave the wrong URL at the Snopes Urban Legends site. The page for the email tax hoax seems to be offline at the moment.
The details: the original Canadian message claimed that a non-existant Toronto Star editorial sang the praises of a non-existant government Bill (bearing an incorrect Bill ID number) to tax email, which was being fought by a non-existant lawyer at a non-existant firm at a non-existant address in Toronto.
The US version of the message simply changed the Toronto Star to the Washington Post, the Canadian Government to the US Government, and the law office address (but not name) to an American address.
-- Meet the Residents -- http://www.residents.com/
I don't think this is something the government can truly enforce. Even IF they started doing it, I would simply develop some quick and dirty software to do something very similar so I could still communicate with friends and family. Sorry, Fuckem, their wrong on this one (are they ever right?)
But another, more accurate thought is that the US Postal service is a branch of the federal govenment. See www.usps.gov . Note the .gov in the address.
Personally, my worst fear is that they'll put a tax on the vehicle of sending email. I can imagine them taxing any piece of software that, say, opens a connection to port 25. Imagine that -- a tax on SMTP. Creepy.
:)
Of course some government official is probably reading this and saying "Hey, good idea. I didn't think of that." So if this ever happens, could some moderator go back and delete this post so I don't catch the blame
_______
2B1ASK1
IF and only IF they can eliminate spam could they possibly be justified in taxing e-mail.
the day I have to pay for spam received is the day I stop using e-mail altogether.
--- Bill
A while ago our local news did a story on this. They interviewed our local Congressman and he claimed that this was a total hoax. He said there is no legislation being proposed to tax email and that this is a total internet rumor to try and discourage the government from taxing internet commerce (which they probably will do). Anyway, how could they tax email? The effort in tracking it would be enormous given the fact that lots of email is inter-country. I really don't care if they would put a tiny tax on email (maybe $0.01 per message). It would sure stop a good number of spam messages.
You are so easily led, it is a hoax that started in canada. Do you believe everything that is said on the internet? The rightwing hate groups are using the internet to manipulate people. so consider the source, research everything that seems inflamatory.
Once again, it is a hoax. Cool down, relax, drink decafe, and Stay off the jolt for a day or two.
while you are doing that, I am off to Tennessee looking for hot sex and good BBQ, not necessarily in that order.
Big Business is a much bigger threat than the government. You can vote the government out, You can't vote Bill Gates out.
photosMy Photostream
There's no way.
The govt. has nothing to do with bandwidth usage.
E-mail is not theirs to tax...
I can't belive you're all taking this seriously.
If they tax it... we'll sue... it's unconstitutional and totally
and completely insane.
Friends don't let friends buy Compaq's. (Dell/Gateway... same same) You want a good computer? Build it yourself.
1) Hopefully by now we all know that no such tax has been proposed in any real way (especially since the USPS is entirely self-funding these days). But the topic is still relevant, because there WILL be internet taxes of some sort.
2) Paying (in some way) for network services based on usage (rather than "unlimited use") is a MUCH more economically efficient. Think about all the spammers who wouldn't be in business if they had to pay $.01 for each email. What if a basic net connection were free, but you had to pay 1 cent per email and 5 cents for each meg of download? Hey, it would screw me too, but it might make us think about the fact that network resources ARE limited, and some clowns suck it up without thinking about that. I'm not saying that this should be a tax, though.
3) Sales tax will eventually have to be applied to internet purchases. As more commerce moves online, it's inevitable, and it's no worse than paying the sales taxes we do now. I'd say, half of the tax goes to the destination state of the sale, half to the originator. Then you don't get much of a break for locating offshore to avoid the source tax.
--JRZ
The government should not put a tax on e-mail the internet is based on commercial services not governmental ones it's made up of wires and boxes of equipment OWNED by commercial companys not Uncle Sam.
either we are networking or we areNT networking
Maybe the US government are trying to cut down on
spam and useless e-mails? Most of what people
send these days is just jokes, chainletters,
stonking huge binaries and stupid questions...
The only reason there are more e-mails than plain
old letters, is because it's so easy, so people
waste most of their workday sending shite to all
their friends. I know I do. Often.
Buuut it's not my problem. I live in Ireland.
I have heard so many people talk about this it is foolish. If the government wanted money they would just impose a sales tax.
If a tax per email were implemented people would change protocols. The government would then have to change there definition of what a message is. Once they did change their definition then icq,irc,message boards communities like slashdot would then probably fall under that definition.
Logistically it would be impossible to implement.
Does anyone have any idea how much software would need to be rewritten, then bean counters would need to be hired to make everthing balance. Image someone spoofing your email address and you get a bill for 3 million emails. It just wouldn't be worth it opening up that can of worms.
If any law was passed other countries would be the major benefactors when US citizens would just sent email through foreign free email providers.
What would be next, a tax per web page delievered to you.
This reminds me of the people that fall for the Good Times Email Virus, they eat it up hook line and sinker. They always feel like they are doing the world a service.
There should be clue that an email is a hoax or spam when:
1 The message tells you to forward it to all your friends,family,coworkers,pets,support group,etc...
2 It is coming from AOL
3 The header of the email is 3 pages long with forwarding addresses.
4 The header of the email reveals it came from Outlook
Sure there is, make it illegal for American businesses and organizations to accept email from specified domains and addresses.
There is always a way. If not today, then tomorrow.
You gotta figure that this email tax is REALLY looking like a great idea to a lot of legislators. They're hearing complaints about unsolicited junk mail, and looking at having a hard time paying for all their vote buying schemes (social programs).
Unfortunately, the email tax idea is a symptom of the problem, rather than a problem in itself. Once upon a time, our federal and state governments saw themselves as stewards of our freedom. Now, they see themselves as stewards of our money. They've already decided that they can spend all of our money they want.
So, since citizens are little more than vending machines for money and votes, nobody should complain about a tiny tax on email. After all, it will still be cheaper than paying a government monopoly to spend far longer to get your mail where you want it to go, maybe.
In order to manage such a tax scheme, a huge network auditing system would have to be in place to make sure that no free email exchanges were taking place. That woulnd't hurt the feelings of Janet "The Butcher" Reno or Bill "I've got your freedom right here in my pants" Clinton much.
Then again, I have a bad attitude about government.
Visit Lockjaw's Lair. He won't bite.
I would like to know how the people who proposed this are going to enforce it. If they started taxing email people could just switch to something else, everyone use icq, or something similar. Email is just passing some packets around, are they going to tax ftp and http connections too. I doubt whoever came up with this bright idea has much of a clue about how things on the internet work(not that I do:).
It really dosn't matter weather they tax e-mail or not, they will still get no taxes from it. how many people out there are going to be willing to use e-mail with a tax on it, when they can use ICQ or some other service for free. there will always be another technology to go to. the govt has not caught up with it citizens yet.
Supposedly there's a government surplus, right? So if there's a surplus, that means the government has more money than it should. It should be looking for taxes to *cut*, not brand new types of taxes to implement. The only problem is that too many in government view taxes as a way to control the populace, not merely as a revenue generator.
Get fragged @ Lone Star Quake II
- If you use UPS, you don't pay the governement afaik... i don't know about taxes on it. But I don't remember the gov't marching up to those brown uniformed bastards doing their cartman impression to get money from them, as they yell "You will respect my authoritay!" If you want to use the USPS, is it any wonder how they get money from you?
- The governemtn doesn't have a stranglehold on the internet. To a degree, a grip. If I email say, from one machine to the next, I can go over any means of transport (tcp/ip, netbios [don't ask]) with any format (email,IM, icq) over a virtual distance: it my bounce around the world using email routing before it gets there, or just one hop (one link between a server and the next).
Now let's ask this question again. How will the government even invision doing this? If you can't even take out most of the variables that make it impossible, why believe it can be made possible much less believe who is telling you this?-
ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
While the bad parts are numerous and have already been mentioned (1-it sucks, 2-as an ISP, I don't want to have to collect it for the gov't, and 3-it sucks), there IS one good aspect of an outbound email tax....
It'd stop SPAM in its tracks. Well, maybe not all of it, but companies would have to actually target the spam. No more sending crapola to "1 million addresses on CD".
This whole idea sounds way too familiar...
---
"Go Metallica. Die RIAA." -- Linus Torvalds
I think we should leave this decision up to Dan Quayle. After all, he invented the interenet....
./adam12
No, the US government should not tax email. How much money the USPS loses to email is irrelevant. The post office doesn't deserve money just for being there. They don't have a right to our money unless they provide a service to us, mailing our packages and letters. The fact that we choose another route to send messages doesn't mean we are stealing from them. This kind of reminds me of the laws making it so the government own the space inside your mailbox so that only the USPS can put mail in it.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
our govenment went postal
Grunt. Oink, oink.
I'd love to see THAT figure cited.
typical slashdotter...a coward who insults only via the web. Go crawl back under your rock
Easy...they force software manufacterers to add auditing software to their email package. It measures quarterly and you send it in like you do your taxes. Your ISP adds it into your account...
Please how are they going to tax it??
Charge every person that uses this type of messagesing system??? I would be one of the first people to write a new one.
They would have to tax the bandwidth (bits downloaded) to do anything affected and then the tax would be grossly out of balance. if it did happen i would vote everybody from the local school board to the whit house out of office ASAP!!!!
MarNuke
There was a stupid email going around in Canada a while back, saying Canada Post was going to tax email. It made me think about the situation a little bit.
Anyway...some thoughts (not entirely lucid, but it's late...)
1) How could they tax email?
2) We already pay for access (companies don't maintain the backbone out of the goodness of their hearts).
3) Even if they taxed the ISPs who passed on the costs to us, they couldn't tax actual usage (could they?!?)
Good call, Anonymous.
t m
:-)
Visit the Urban Legends Reference Pages for more info on this one, folks.
http://www.snopes.com/spoons/faxlore/internet.h
This incarnation of the old favorite is detailed near the bottom of the page.
Nothing personal, slashdot, but shame on you!
First off, this would be extremely hard to do, and even if it is somehow implemented, people will find an infinate number of ways around it (ie: non-USA accounts, creating a new and private protocol, etc)
Does the government need to back off just a bit? YES!
Just when I thought this discussion couldn't get any stupider... "Yes to taxes" actually gives me the idea that there are officials stupid enough to fall for this. The only thing as bad as the ubiquity of advertising is the ubiquity of taxes. It's about high time we solve both trends by turning everything over to the army, who will paint it.
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
If you remember your history the British but a tax on tea, and letters (e.g. anything that had to be mailed). This was one of the factors that made the colonists so mad that they stages a revolution. Anyone see an interesting correlation here?
BTW: The British also tried to take away their right to free speech (see Communications Decency Act) and the right to keep and bear arms at the battle to Lexington and Concord (Now think of the Brady Bill).
yes, i totally agree, email is just one protocol - most US legislators know as much as the average person about the specifics of these technologies, which is a fuzzy understanding at best. Most likely, any law they would create would either be so vague and non-specific that it would be easily circumvented by using ICQ or other progreams of the sort, or it would be so broad that irc and icq messages would be taxable, making it clearly unenforceable and and ripe for overruling by courts.
Juln
After reading your comment, I agree entirely (Although if I had said it myself I would have come up with a more delicate phrasing)
One of the extremely important comments here is "Tax is only to pay for nessisary services [that can most appropriately be suplied by the govt]. We should not be taxed "Just Because"."
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
It's a silly idea, and something that the US Government will never seriously contemplate, for a couple of reasons.
First, the USPS is a self-sustaining government organization which doesn't take a dime from the government coffers. (The USPS pays for itself entirely from user fees--that is, through selling stamps and other products.)
Second, e-mail is not seriously impacting the number of letters that the US mail sends. Remember, the majority of mail that gets sent via the USPS is junk mail, bills, magazines and packages. I would say that in fact, with the number of people sending each other little trinkets they bought via eBay through the USPS, their business is doing quite well.
Third, there are other organizations which are making a larger dent in USPS business than e-mail. Like UPS and FedEx. And I'll bet people would scream bloody murder if the US Government started taxing those organizations because the USPS couldn't compete.
The question is "can they", and the answer is no.
The sooner the boys in Washington figure out that my use of the Net isn't a taxable resource, the better. Anything they come up with, I'll get around, whether through proxies, tunnels, encryption, or, in the end, by leaving the country and taking my computer skills somewhere that properly appreciates them.
And for those of you saying that this is all a hoax, think again - the net tax moratorium was passed specifically because lawmakers were eyeing the net with dollar signs in their eyes.
When technology such as digital signatures have been put into widespread enough use, and the USPS starts feeling the resulting business switch, just see if there aren't committees springing up all over the place to figure out how to tax email to make up the difference.
not that that legitmizes anything...
but shit, our gov has done a pathetic job of managing the dough we give it. i dont know how much the national debt is up to now, but last time i heard it was 1.1 trillion, and that was a while ago. does this debt ever go down? no. therefore the government is losing money at a prodigious rate. if this (the united states) was a company, the management (the gov) would have long ago lost funding from the stockholders (us taxpayer types) and ceased to exist as a coporate entity...
but, tragically, the gov doesnt really have any external competition. we stockholders dont really have the option of buying somebody elses stock. we can vote for to determine who gets to be on the board of directors, so to speak, but we really cant sell our stock or anything. aw well, at least ive got a vote. maybe we can vote in some freethinking people to one of the boards of directors, in the hope that the stockholders get some of their power back...
note: when i say "get their power back", dont think im getting all nostalgic on ya. i know that when the constitution was written, only 9% of the people could vote... so it was never perfect.
"eris is my current goddess... shes a figment of my imagination, and i only pretend to worship her, but at least i admit it when my gods are make believe and my worship is a facade..."
sayke
-- sayke, v2.3.05
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
what if the internet community developed an online government that had a legilature made up of reps from all countries (or regions?) w/ internet access. then ppl on the net were taxed, and and that money was distributed in a somewhat equal manner to all the companies and organizations for supporting their internet thruput service.
just an idea.
-james
All I did to find this was search for 602P from the www.usps.gov web site.
Email rumor completely untrue
Postal News - Email rumor completely untrue
Sounds like a plain old urban myth to me. Like its really going to happen
1. Isn't this rather similar to the 'modem tax' hoax that has been going on for the last eternity or so?
2. How exactly do the US plan to tax non-US citizens? Is it just going to be email from a US citizen that will be taxed, but not TO a US citizen, but from a non-US citizen?
Apart from the fact there is *NO* way to tax this, (assuming point 2 above is true, say someone outside the US sets up a free 'yahoo mail' type thing. Everyone uses http to get outside the US, then they only technically start sending e-mail from outside the country. how are they supposed to detect this, never mind attempt to tax it?)
If this law is serious, it is even stupider than the ITAR laws about encryption, and i doubt it could be enforced at all, assuming anyone would be insane enough to pass it.
Even if the government comes up with some way to tax e-mail (wouldn't they have to own the backbone
and put in some kind of filter???) internet users would just start using irc and message boards more, or even e-mail software that uses a different port number. All the gov't would accomplish is wasting lots of $$$ on paperwork and lawyers.
-- 2 + 2 = 5, for very large values of 2
I can't believe people are still ranting about this supposed "e-mail tax". Jeez, it's a HOAX! This hoax and it's bretheren "The Modem Tax" and "The DiVinci Virus" are almost as old as the 'net itself! How did this make it's way to SlashDot; I though you guys were a bit more cluefull than this.
To all of you who still believe there's a proposal to levy an e-mail tax, I have a great new product for you; it's this awsome new game called BLAZEMONGER. BlazeMonger is the best game to ever hit the market; just send me $35.00 US and I'll tell you where you can get it.
P.S. if this thread is indicative of the quality of today's "netizens", I would encourage Al Gore to take his "Information Superhighway" and route it up his ass!
~Any apparent grammatical or typographic errors are caused by defects in your display device.
That's really nice. It's like microsoft being able to apply a tax to every linux, BeOS, UNIX sale just because their business is failing. This is along the sames lines of if someone made fecies an alternative auto-fuel I would have to pay 10 cents for evey crap I took. If my companie went out of business it sure would be nice to be able to just start taking other peoples money for no good reason!
That's really nice. It's like microsoft being able to apply a tax to every linux, BeOS, UNIX sale just because their business is failing.
This is along the sames lines of if someone made fecies an alternative auto-fuel I would have to pay 10 cents for evey crap I took.
If my companie went out of business it sure would be nice to be able to just start taking other peoples money for no good reason!
The "tax on e-mail" has been circulating as a hoax for a while now. Even if there are proposals under consideration, they are foolish, as the idea itself is not well thought out.
Ask yourself, what would be taxed and how would it be measured? SMTP traffic from a host? Move the host offshore - easy to do. SMTP traffic from a user? And how are you going to measure the packets going down a phone wire and differentiate them from the other types of traffic? I know - maybe they could set up some kind of enormous sniffer network at key network interchanges, sample all of the traffic, then figure out which host originated it (sometimes tricky, but not impossible), then figure out who owns that bit of traffic (what company/user - this is tricky).
A tax on e-mail would be about as easy to enforce as that French idea that all web sites should be translated before crossing to national frontier. If it happens, just move your e-mail somewhere where it is not taxed. End of problem.
There is no reason to tax it other than "We want more money." There is an obvious reason for a price on the USPS, because it costs the U.S. money! Sales tax is a more general tax, closer to "Ok we want more money, so we're gonna tax anyone doing anything that requires spending money." This would be like a tax that is sincerely "We see a lot of people doing this... so we're gonna make some money off of it." It's not gonna happen any time soon, and if it does then anything more than $0.01/letter would be acceptable. This would get a little money out of mass mailers, while leaving normal people (who don't forward chain letters) alone. Most people do forward chain letters though, and this might discourage it. So it might be a good idea... not sure yet :-) Depending on how much they decide (if it happens) I might actually be for it. As long as the keep their grubby hands off of ICQ and the like :-)
Patrick Barrett
Yebyen@adelphia.net
Fav Quote:
"It's not X Windows dammit, it's X Window!!!" --Patrick Barrett, 1999
Restating the obvious since nineteen aught five.
It's be fun..... I wouldn't have any moral reservations about evading something like this.
/. This post was about as insightful as the typical "Yet Another 999 Windows Tips" crap you see on those "other" sites. Whatever happened to the good old days when you posted stuff like "What is the bandwidth of a nerve?"
BTW shame on you
Grrrreg
When they started losing money with the telephone, because I am sure that mail got hurt by that they began taxing that. Now that email is taking the place of both telephone and snail mail they want to get thier grubby hands on that. We can not let this happen. The government has grown to powerfull as it is. They tax and tax and tax and we do nothing but stand by and let it happen, because we feel there is nothing we can do. It is time for a stand. Since they decided they can completely control the internet they want to tax it. It HAS TO STOP HERE.
This is a hoax, of course, and one of the oldest in the book. In 1982, it was pretty much the same, except it was a "modem tax" not an "e-mail tax".
But anyway, I'm surprised that no one mentioned the one advantage of the thing. It would kill spam dead forever.
I suspect that we would all be better off in general if, instead of handing out free e-mail addresses to all comers, ISPs instead charged $0.01 per e-mail, with, perhaps, some non-automated way for mailing lists to get a price break. You could even do something like "first hundred messages a day free" and still it would put most spammers out of business.
The cake is a pie
1) Its literally impossible to tax each and every individual email from every singe different isp in the entire company. Its just impossible. 'nuff said.
2) If the government is proposing this, how come we havent seen anything on the news?
3) If they somehow find a way to tax every 2 billion emails sent every day where would the funding come from to hire people to monitor everything?
4) and lastly, the government or US postal service cant charge people for a service they dont provide.
-Dyl6
Taxing email would be a violation of the 1st Ammendment of the Constitution (free speech).
Postage for a letter is not a tax, it's the price for a service (and a very reasonable price, in my opinion). Since the government is not involved in the delivery of email, they can not charge a fee.
-- Will program for bandwidth
...to everyone who has pointed out how ridiculous this discussion is. No, the government is not going to tax e-mail. And, while we're at it, that "save NPR" petition you've been forwarding to half of North America has been out of date since the early 1990's, and even then was innaccurate.
By the way, I heard about this HORRIBLE NEW VIRUS which will claw its way into your computer through the power lines and appear on your desktop completely indistinguishable from your "My Computer" icon, and what's more it will do this NO MATTER WHAT operating system you use, that's right, Mac OS and Linux as well, and then it will ERASE your ENTIRE HARD DRIVE and cause your household appliances to SODOMIZE your PETS.
Everybody who's been responding to this with outraged statements like "the fedz cant do this they wil half to pry my keybaord out of my cold ded 31337 handz" should wake up and take a listen to some common sense.
"Don't touch the bunny!"
Yebyen used to write:
:) :) :) and most of all $TIME_OF_DAY :).... Really addicted persons might get a deduction in time :)
.... I'm giving them new ideas, I guess ... :) :) :)
>"We see a lot of people doing this... so we're
>gonna make some money off of it."
----
I don't know why, but this resembles damn well with actually putting a tax on having sex. Can you imagine actually paying that?! Having $IRS (or otherwise "your favourite taxation service") blowing up your door and arresting you for not paying to fsck your $SIGNIFICANT_OTHER. I guess that they could also improve the tax, depending on the $DURATION, $POSITION, $ORIFFICE, $GENDER, $SPECIES
Nyah-nyah-nyah
Ino!~
Everyone is up in arms about a proposed tax, and one of the major themes is "Why should I pay the government money when I don't get anything in return?"
I am not a US citizen, I am all for freedom of speech, I use PGP, I think the US government is crazy, but why is everyone so against a tax on Internet traffic? The only answer I can think of is pure selfishness.
Governments provide many services, some you use, some you don't. You may not like everything they to, (and if I was a US citizen, I certainly wouldn't), but you have just as much say as anyone else. There are a lot of good arguments that the US government is undemocratic, but no one is citing any of them.
You rely on the police to keep the streets safe, you applaud the justice department for attacking Microsoft, the EPA tries to protect you from industries, big and small, who would make the planet a worse place to live. Yet you complain about a small tax on your Internet?
What-ever your position on social-security, health and education, YOU get some benefit from the government. There are a number of arguments against a tax per-email, but a small charge, about 1c/MB on bandwidth (which was in the earlier U.N. proposal / hoax) would not be noticed by most people. I admit that for many people charging per MB is unusual, but it is really a very sensible way of doing it, once you are used to it.
I would welcome a small tax on Internet traffic that would be used to help the under privileged take advantage of the "Information revolution", but I think they need food to eat, or a roof over their heads more.
Democracy isn't about no one telling you what to do. It's about everyone telling you what to do.
The US government have finally gone crazy. Do they tax IRL (snail) mail !!! NO !!! ... we already sorta are with the ISP costs == stamp costs. Heh. Oh well, at least if they DO do it, I won't be affected =) ... our Prime Minister, in response to the protests, said, "You don't understand the mood of middle Australia on this ... you don't know how deeply some people feel about it." Why not just try and censor swearing, and parents have to deny access to anyone caught saying a swearword ?? Just as stupid ...)
Well, I don't care about the US government, living in Australia as I do, but I only pay 45c for the stamp (only more for very heavy parcels, overnight express delivery or international), and I don't get taxed for that
(our government IS trying to regulate the Internet though
d
"Bastard Operators From Hell" is an anagram for "Shatterproof Armored Balls". =)
I think the big issue here for them is that they're
scared shitless that people are communicating for close
to NOTHING and are relying less on the USPS. This
scares the hell out of them because it means less money,
and likely will knock them down a notch or two in
importance. Witness the free phonecalls over the web.
Scares the hell out of the telcos. Imagine a car
that uses water instead of gas (theoretically of course).
If something like that worked GREAT and go popular,
you'd be taking away the cash flow of the oil companies. Probably the same deal here.
-- www.bteg.com | bleh.n3.net | hac47.dhs.org
Is it just me, or is the government trying to tax something they don't own or support? I havn't seen the government offering any free stmp servers. Even if this bill was passed, how are they going to "bill" all emails? And if they did, someone would just make a new protocol (not to mention all the US's geeks waging a war..but besides that...).
maybe i'm stupid (and it's probably true) but as a us citizen i find this stupid too. taxing email? most of the world is not the united states. so therefore taxing email would either involve only taxing us citizen or the assent of all world governments.
if only it were feasable it would be nice to get several influential networks to shutdown mail service for a day. of course all of the senators/reps who are proposing this are using government servers, but, they'll still encounter quite a few problems when the external servers aren't running mail processes and all of their messages are funneled into a black hole.
the other option is to implement the processes that it would require to add taxes to the existing mail logs. take the time used on this (bump it up by 100 hours), and send every senator/rep a bill for services rendered for programming/accounting/billing costs.
but that's just my opinion.
Why not put a small tax on all domestic orders placed on the internet?
I would be perfectly willing to pay an extra 3% sales tax on an order, and no tax on anything else internet related. This could also be applied to same-state transactions (instead of the full sales tax charge). If 1% went to the origin state, another to the destination state, and the last to Uncle Sam, everything should be fine. This would increase revenues to the states, and I really can't see 3% being all that much of a burden...
Criticisms? Agreements?
First, let me say that I am a Libretarian and I don't support the government having anything to do with technology, the Internet or pretty much anything else.
:-))
These are the reasons that an E-mail tax will never happen (at least in my lifetime).
1: Impractical, the congress and president (and Al Gore) have no idea when it comes to technology. They don't know that it is impossible, but I do.
It would be very hard (impossible) to log all e-mails, the tax would basically become voulntary.
If the tax is voulntary (although, we already have a 'voulntary tax system', reall check it out) nobody would pay (note: even if it becomes invoulntary, I still woln't pay
2: Not that the government pays much attention to this document anymore, but the constitution dosen't allow it.
3: Why charge taxes on private networks? Maybe if the government still kept the network running and payed for it all, but not anymore.
4: You can just write another program, change the ports to 26 and 111 and call it whatever you like. It's no longer e-mail.
5: You can also IM somebody just as fast (faster) then you can send an e-mail.
Will all the facts stated above, I believe that we don't have to worry about a e-mail tax. But if we do, then I will personally, set up a server in New Zeland that will provide free e-mail to all.
That's my 1/50 of $1.00 US
JM
Big Brother is watching, vote Libertarian!!
--Justin Mitchell
"2nd Place is a fancy word for losing" --Bender (Futurama)
thus they shouldnt need a tax to finance the operation. The US government actually delievers normal US mail, but they dont do shit for email. So no, clearly it should not be taxed.
-I go to Rice, so figure out my email address
Dateline 1900:
The United States government considers taxing phone calls because telegram communication is suffering a slump.
US senator: "We need to protect our Telegram communications into the next century. It is an essential business for our economy."
Telegram operator: "My job skills at typing in morse code don't apply to this new world of phone communication. Ma Bell has not offered to hire me, so I feel it is my duty to protect my job."
---
Seriously, sending letters by paper means is troublesome, expensive, and only makes sense if you are in an under-developed part of the world. The US has not legal ground to tax email, any more than the RIAA can tax me for playing an MP3 on my stereo.
This doesn't even touch the fact that a) the mail server is run at the cost of the owner and b) the protocols and standards are used in every country.
How will they regulate this? "If our advanced NSA (and now FBI) sniffers catch email from you going through the internet, we will fine you for tax evasion!"
- Another Canadian citizen shocked by the US gov't.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Thank god I am in Australia, the land of the free and the poor...
Whether the postal service is doing well or not doesn't matter. The USPS offers a great deal, yeah, but the real issue here is that there is a lot of money that could be had by instantiating a tax on email. The post office doesn't figure into this at all, unless they maybe have the same administrative entity handling both of them.
Unfortunately, it makes a lot of sense for the gov't to at least try to tax email. It seems likely that it would be a sort-of-voluntary thing, like income taxes. You know, where they don't check every last person in the country, so you can get away with not paying up, but if they ever do catch you...
If they tax messages sent over normal mail servers/protocols, just write a new protocol! Do instant messages count as e-mail, or text files sent over FTP or DCC? Don't call it e-mail, call it borscht for all I care :-) That way, you become exempt from the tax.
As I think Rob or jeff said a few weeks ago, a tax on email might stop or reduce the amount os spammers. But I honestly would rather get spam than have to pay for email. Luckily, I think that the Internet is too convoluted for the government to manage to directly tax individual emails. As someone else said, they might tax ISPs, but as that same perosn said, AOL would tihs a brick. I think that the government of any country has no right to try and regulate or tax the Internet, it is the first thing that is truly owned by the world community, and it belongs to Us and not the governments. Maybe if Al gore invents something else like he invented the Internet they will be able to tax that, but leave us alone. And BTW, even if they tried to tax individual emails, how long would it take before somone had figured a way around it?
Ben Garrison, a mindless idiot who will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.
I really don't know how it is implemented or enforced, so don't ask me. However, a friend of mine recently went on a trip to Israel. She sent a few emails. Even though the computer and connection were provided for free by the group she was traveling with, she had to pay 1 shekel per email for email tax. I was stunned.
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
If the US gov't is going to start taxing email, they can just lick my sweaty scrotum, cause i aint gonna stand for it. the internet doesnt belong to anyone. they have no right doing _anything_ like that
----------
Have FreeBSD questions?
----------
Have FreeBSD questions?
http://balambiris.ne.mediaone.net
I dont think the goverment is thinking about taxing emails, i have heard alot of people saying that they will. but i dont remember reading anything from the gov that said they were thinking about it, accept the UN and that got shot down quick.
For anyone interested in the US Post Offices official word on this should check:http://www.usps.gov/news/press/99/99045new.h tm
(The last line would be the one to pay attention to...)
Here it is incase you are as lazy as.........
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 21, 1999
Release No. 45
E-MAIL RUMOR COMPLETELY UNTRUE
WASHINGTON - A completely false rumor concerning the U.S. Postal Service is being circulated on Internet e-mail. As a matter of fact, the Postal Service has learned that a similar hoax occurred recently in Canada concerning Canada Post.
The e-mail message claims that a "Congressman Schnell" has introduced "Bill 602P" to allow the federal government to impose a 5-cent surcharge on each e-mail message delivered over the Internet. The money would be collected by Internet Service Providers and then turned over to the Postal Service.
No such proposed legislation exists. In fact, no "Congressman Schnell" exists.
The U.S. Postal Service has no authority to surcharge e-mail messages sent over the Internet, nor would it support such legislation.
-30-
If you voted for Nader, THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!!
>Sure there is, make it illegal for American businesses and organizations to accept email from specified domains and addresses.
How could that be implemented? You can't make it illegal to receive foreign mail, the same way that you can't make it illegal to receive junk mail from a certain address. Anyone with SMTP can send mail to anyone, so therefore blocking e-mail means restricting a piece of software, which unfortunately for them is not owned by anyone. As the original post said: "Logistics anyone?"
Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
even if they do decided to tax e-mail, it's not that terribly hard to just come up with a new protocol. there would be enough cause for change, so everyone wouldn't mind changing to something else. there are too many different ways to communicate online, irc, icq, email, aim (cough), etc. they would have to somehow manage all of them to prevent people from circumventing their almighty, all-knowing, divine, god-like, power.
SuPz.orG
The Internet Tax Freedom Act was signed into law on October 21, 1998 by Slick Willie.
This act, contained within the Omnibus Appropriations bill established a three year moratorium on internet related taxes.
Basically, the soonest any tax could be imposed is late October 2001.
Even then, thanks to the paranoia produced by all these scams, most congressmen (who want to be re-elected) will oppose any such tax.
the us postal service does not recieve funding from the government anyway! they used this fact to explain the rising price of stamps in a commercial a while back...
What the government actually taxes is almost irrelevant -- it takes a certain amount of $$ to run the government, provide benefits & services, etc. If revenue is dropping due to a change in the population's behavior (e.g. e-mail instead of postal mail in this case, or buying over the tax-free internet v. purchases subject to sales tax), either government spending decreases, existing revenue sources are amplified, or new revenue sources are found. Since the first option isn't too likely, someone (most likely you) is going to pay -- it'll just get hidden as a sales tax increase, an extra charge on your utility bill, removal of an income tax deduction, etc.
So, wise up, learn more about how your government(s) actually raise and spend money, and make your opinion known.
Well I don't think that anyone need worry. I'm in the middle of 'The Sovereign Individual' by James Dale Davidson and William Rees-Mogg, and it's all about the coming economic revolution and how technology advancement will, with a high degree of probability, bring about the evolution of a much more distributed economic climate, one where, for instance, tax as a way of funding infrastructural components, no longer exists. It's pretty radical thinking, but looking at where things are now, and the inherent uncontrollability of the net which is a foundation communications infrastructure, I think it makes a lot of sense. 'User pays' everything, anyone? I haven't finished the book yet, I'm reading it as we speak, but it's a pretty awesome read. Particularly for those Tofflerans amongst you (specifically The Third Wave and Powershift as two essential reference books on global change).
The Sovereign Individual at amazon
cheers!
The numbers I've seen for the "tax" look like the only ones that will be affected are major spammers. Lotsa zeros after the decimal point. So what's the problem?
....
Think about it for a minute. What would the Gov't need to collect a tax like this? Well, every e-mail client and gateway would have to have a secure component to log e-mail messages. This component would have to be queried by the Gov't computers to calculate the "tax".
Now a simple software upgrade can also tell if you are sending messages to an "inappropriate" location.
Expect the "upgrade" sometime in President Buchannan's second term
If people are using the postal mail less then it should also mean that we need less postal workers ,less space to store the mail, less vehicles to transport the mail, less bureaucracy to handle all of the above, and of course with less of all of the above less money that is needed to make it all happen. So why tax something that actually saves them money & work?
This, much like the Urban Legend about applying long distance charges to dial-in ISP services, is intended to anger the gullible. I really don't see how the government (much less the entire infrastructure of the internet) could implement such a strategy. How would work email factor into this? And what about anonymous email addresses from free sites? Too many questions.
return;
OK, I'll tell you right off the bat that this my theory--based on something I heard somewhere I don't remember a couple years back...
Obviously it's impossible to track every time someone sends e-mail. I do however remember hearing something about the USPS planning to continue making money on some kind of certified document delivery.
If the US government determined all e-mail agreements to be not legally binding in any way unless it passed through the USPS, they will certainly have a method to continue making income without actually having to do much other than collect the money.
Who knows, I'm just a Linux geek.
numb
It's like me making the grandeous statement, "I'm going to tax OC-3 lines." It's rather ambiguous to say that you're going to tax any part of the Internet, simply because the Internet is a medium in which an unlimited amount of resources and programs can be run on it, as long as they conform to regular transport protocols. If you eliminate e-mail, what's going to happen? People will find other (if not better) messaging options!
Ok, let's assume that the government taxes each e-mail $.10 just for the sake of argument. Services such as ICQ and AIM are going to skyrocket, and offer features like "offline messaging" which leaves a message stored in the system until the target person logs on. What's that sound exactly like? E-MAIL! GO FIGURE!
Not to mention that discussion groups and NNTP posting are just various kinds of messaging, basicly "open-ended e-mail" where it's not specificly addressed to one person, but to a variety of people. So what can you do with the news protocol? 256-bit encryption that only a single user can decrypt. Now you've just created the world's largest inbox, with each post addressed to somebody. It's far fetched, but it's still a feasible idea, and it's still e-mail.
Ok, so now e-mail has been obliterated by taxes. What else is gonna happen? IP-to-IP messaging! You're going to log on to a service which when your computer connects, you'll receive a log of all the people who tried to contact you last, and what they wanted. E-mail again!
These are three ideas that I just basicly pulled out of the air. You're telling me that with the long future the Internet has in front of it, you think that a bunch of free messaging services aren't gonna pop up the milisecond that the government taxes e-mail? Please. Taxation of e-mail is not only absurd, but if it happened, it would be the death of e-mail as people abandon it for other communications medium. I think the government is smarter than that.
Maybe it's just me, but I think a team of computer specialists can spot a problem that an 18-year old punk sitting at his computer in his boxers (too much info?) can come up with. It's not going to happen. You can't tax a service or a protocol, simply because if you do, we'll all just make another communication standard and abandon your precious e-mail protocol you hate so much. Either way, we're still communicating. You can never tax that.
Someone write me a letter when they start taxing keystrokes and enact hourly vocal cord usage taxes.
This is an insipid anti-government fantasy. Can you show me one shred of evicence that this idea is being seriously considered by anyone in Congress, or the Post Office, or anywhere else, for that matter? This would NEVER happen, EVER. Anyone who proposed this would make a laughingstock of themselves, and the idea would quickly be forgotten.
Last I heard, the US Postal Service was doing very well financially, and the cost of postage from the USPS is still much cheaper than the cost of other countries' postal services. Regular letter, 33 cents from anywhere in the US to anywhere else. Can't beat it.
Yet, I'm sure that there are plenty of people out there who are happy to believe this FUD, because some people are ready to believe abolutely anything negative you ever say about the government, regardless how completely wrong or unfounded it is. Our Congress is scary, but people who dream up these ridiculous scenarios are a lot scarier to me.
If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go back downstairs into my concrete bunker, where the jack-booted government thugs won't be able to reach me. My killer robot dog biff, which runs Linux, will protect me from the IRS email-stamp stormtroopers. They'll have to pry my email client from my cold, dead fingers.
How exactly would the uberidiots in D.C. manage to track e-mail usage in the first place? The costs of monitoring traffic, let alone collecting the taxes, would probably exceed any potential revenues.
This is probably either a "mature" Internet hoax, or a stupid scheme dreamed up by bureaucrats worried about losing their gravy jobs. As a matter of fact, I can't see any reason for the USPS to exist outside of high volume, low speed junk mail delivery. What little business they haven't lost to e-mail and fax machines is divided up between Fedx and UPS. The Postal Service should be sold for scrap, and their functions should be farmed out to the lowest bidder.
slashdot broke my sig
to show that email can never replace snail mail
(If anything, email is replacing the telephone,
and we already see how the industry is fighting
that).
Bills - How the heck would this work? The bill is my receipt for services
rendered, and without the paper copy, I have
no prove that they provided me services, and
thus, I can ignore paying it
we're getting close to e-bill payments, but
until every American is wired, snail mail will
still exist.
Cards - I'm not necessarily
prompting the greeting card industry, but
the online greeting card sites will never replace
the cards you send out on holidays and for
the all important Mother's Day. (They may
suppliment these cards, but think of the heck you'd pay if you only sent an electronic card...
Magazines - Magazines will
never be ousted by online versions until you can
drag the computer into the bathroom or the
bus to work. A substancial bulk of snail mail
is for this.
Soliciatations - Nobody likes
spam, but surprising, snail mail marketing works
more than email marketing. Take a look at
how far Publishier's Clearinghouse got before
they were basically punched in the stomach.
Besides, I'd much rather get a soliciation in
the snail mail box, as that can be tosses with
no cost to me, as opposed to email spam that
may cost me online connection time.
Email and Snail Mail are two different worlds;
there's some overlap, but the two services work
simulataneously as opposed to competitively.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
--
There IS no serious discussion about this. There is not and has never been. I'm shocked this would even be posted on here, thirty seconds of searching on the Internet turns up the fact that its a hoax. Its a version of the FCC modem tax hoax that also has been kicking around for over ten years.
l
Most of the e-mail forwards going around the Internet refer to Bill "602P" when they're talking about it.
The FCC actually put out a statement on it, the hoax had spread so far:
http://www.fcc.g ov/Bureaus/Common_Carrier/Factsheets/nominute.htm
I hope this will stop the waste on here even discussing it. Maybe Andover should hire someone to check up on these silly stories on here before getting people all worked up.
The originator of this hoax was a lawyer here in the U.S. known for starting these hoaxes, unfortunately pre-coffee I can't think of his name, although anyone curious could probably find it with a few minutes searching on dejanews.com
Did you know that it is illegal to use FedEx to send anything other than "time-critical" material or packages?
I kid you not. The government has fined many companies hundreds of thousands of dollars for using FedEx to send non-critical packages. The USPS has a government-imposed monopoly on low-priority letter delivery. Attempt to evade the monopoly, and you will be fined.
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
There are so many points you could argue on this one, but they're all moot unless someone can explain what authority the government has to try to do this. This is like Microsoft coming into Real Networks and saying "Hey, we aren't making enough money for ourselves so we're going to start charging you everytime someone plays one of your media files with your Real Player."
Seriously, I can't even begin to understand how they can just move in on something and say "Oh, hey -- let's tax this". What's next, taxing me evertime I read a book? Even though they didn't publish it, shelve it, write it, read it, sell it, or anything else?
What if I use a SMTP server that is located outside of the country? What if I send an 'email' as a file via ICQ instead? How about Usenet? How about charging me evertime I download a post from there? How about charging me everytime I make my own post? Maybe even charging me for every data-packet transmitted while playing Quake or KingPin?
How about students? What if you send a personal email from work? How are they going to charge you? What if you don't have a credit card or checking account to pay from? How am I going to contact administrators regarding spammers who are hitting my accounts? What if you don't use an actual SMTP server directly and you use Hotmail or some other form of web-based email?
I send approximately 20 emails per day. That's 600 per month. The average message is around 3k. So I'm transfering less than 1.5MB's per month in email. If they charge me a penny per messag, I'm paying 6 bucks to send 1.5MB's of data?
What's next -- do they want to take over all of the email servers and have one central post-office run by the USPS? (The same people who fail to deliver some 20% of all letters!)
What about FEDEX? Do they want to start taxing me for using that service? Sure FEDEX is more reliable, friendlier, and professional, but it takes away from Uncle Sam's almighty dollar (seeing how Uncle Sam is becoming one big fat corporation).
---
seumas.com
The problem with this is that most of the bandwidth I use is for things like Starcraft. I send a hell of a lot more data through my ISP for Starcraft than for email or other important uses. So if they taxed us based on traffic, I'd be forced to stop playing Starcraft. It would simply shift internet use from high-bandwidth uses to low-bandwidth ones, and would unnecessarily and artificially limit some uses.
Also, how would you define "ISP"? If I'm in a computer lab, and I do FTP between two different computers in the lab, is that internet traffic? How about if they are in different rooms? Different buildings on the same campus? The decentralized nature of the 'net would make it difficult to determine which transactions should be taxed. And unless they come up with a clear standard as to who has to meter usage, it would be relatively easy to fall through the cracks. The attempts to solve this kind of problem would do a lot of damage to the net, and would result in stagnation and rising costs. This is a very bad idea.
I doubt this would ever come into effect, and if it did, there would be no way to impose it. People would just turn to ICQ or AOL or the millions of other messaging tools. Second of all, it would take millions of dollars to implement a software system capable of tracking those emails. Also, Im SURE there would be many ways around it. I agree with the others who say this is just a paranoid rumor.
---------------------------
---------------------------
The last I read about this (which I admit is early 1997), the exact opposite is true, which is that 1st Class and priority mail essentially subsidize the delivery of bulk e-mail (or at least the junk mail end of things), with other bulk rate mailings for business (zip sorted, 500 piece or larger) somewhere around the breakeven point.
Anyway, I don't want to get in a pissing match about statistics, but am wondering if you could point me to your sources of information so that I can update my knowledge base.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
It's one thing that the government makes us pay postage to deliver paper mail, as that is paying for a service rendered.
Likewise, when I use the telephone, I pay the phone company to be able to use the service of the telephone line. This is taxed by both the federal and state government.
When I by a pen, I pay a sales tax to purchase the pen. The paper that I write I paid sales tax on also.
Do I need to pay an additional tax because I happen to write on that paper with a pen??? Or do I pay an additional tax because I happen to sing on the phone instead of 'talk' on the phone.
The question is, do I have to pay a tax on something that I've already paid a tax on the first place, that being the phone line. Is double taxation fair?
What's the difference between me singing, using Spanish, or using audio packets??
Are we smart enough to see this as an insult to our sense of freedom??? Are we angry enough to value our vote??? Are we persistent enough as a group to take the trouble and time to elect people to represent us and our views to office???
i realize fully that this is a complete hoax, but if it were planned, is it technically possible?
aside from the "honor system", this seems impossible.
how can the US govt tell which packets are eMail without wiretapping every single section if the inet backbone? they can't
they could, in theory, install software on every single mailserver in the US that maintained a count of every person's eMail activities, but how would they enforce that that software stay running? they couldn't
what about anonymous mailers? if i don't like someone, i can just run up a $100 bill on their eMail tax real quickly..
what would a tax like this do to "free" eMail services? would you have to submit a tax form every time you signed up for one?
i can imagine the list would go on and on..
i just don't see how the internet can be taxed for anything other than e-Commerce and an additional tax on ISP bills.
just my 2
-fred
On the post office's website a week or two ago, they had a press release denying any rumors in a chain email or something that said the exact same thing. this doesn't necessarily mean anything, buti remember it specifically saying that the post office would not support such an idea.
Generally, the post-office is a lot more than just a mail delivery center though; you get yr passport there can register to vote, and a lot of other government services use the Post office as their outlet.
In addition, though the web has been the hottest topic o' the century (well, except if you lived before the second half of this decade..then it was OJ, then the Moon, then JFK, then Charles lindbergh....) email doesn't have the legal status, nor the widespread use of good ole paper. Plus, email doesn't have a home base like paper mail would. What about international eMail, etc.?
This all assumes there'd be a way to track it, and so far, echelon hasn't been admitted to here in the states. Since the internet is composed of a million different servers from different secotrs of the economy, public and private, it'd be hard to track eMail, let alone pick out its originator, unless the ISP got involved, or servers were tracked...anyways, the more this is thought about, the more it becomes another internet rumor...or some stupid politicians...
chimchim
Spoon!
OK, since this is being passed off as a legitimate topic, can someone please link to a legitimate site that mentions such a plan. I got an e-mail a week or so ago along these same lines involving the US Postal Service, then searched google and found the SAME letter, except it involved the Canadian Post. The politician's name was even the same, though the Canadian letter called him a Montreal politician, and the US letter called him a Washington politician.
It's just a chain-e-mail hoax.
*Happy Days* are here again!
-M
but not in the way you think. Its not the US it
was the UN a little bit ago. Some bureucrats without anything else to do wrote up a little paper on how a penny an email would solve world hunger or some other BS. It's nothing more than a way for the UN to stuff its pockets imho.
If this was seriously proposed in congress I'm sure they'd just add a percentage tax to net access like they do to cigs and booze regardless of how much email your little fingers can type out.
At the risk of coming to this party very late, I work in the government, in a position to know about these things, and there is NO, absolutely NO PLAN, NO thought, NO inkling, NO notion, NO consideration, NO conception, and NO whim to place any tax of any kind on e-mail. Ever. Period.
This UN plan was real, but as it turns out, they had heard the USPS was considering it, and that's where they got the idea. As the UN doesn't actually have any taxing authority, this was pretty amusing anyway.
Please file this away as one of the many internet myths that we shouldn't waste our time on. There are many more important issues like gov't encryption controls, the FBI restricting the growth of technology because of security fears (they have a lot of friends up here) and Scientologists attacking web-speech.
THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal...
We need a 3rd Internet. Internet 2 will be for research institutions, and so forth. Internet 3 will be for people who don't have their heads up their... er computer enthusiasts who don't want to put up with all of the other bull... It just seems like a good idea.
But, there is a legitimate possibility of a tax being levied on the Internet and that is a sales tax. Senator Fritz Hollings has introduced legislation that would levy a national sales tax of 5 percent on every interstate sale. While this covers mail-order catalogs and telephone sales, there is no doubt that its main focus is e-commerce.
You can read the text of the bill here.
The bill would take the money generated by the national tax and fund grants to pay teachers' salaries. It flies in the face of Rep. Chris Cox's Internet Tax Freedon Act, which called for a three-year moritorium on taxation of the Internet.
A side note
While nobody likes new taxes, they may eventually be neccessary. The primary beneficiary of sales taxes are state and local governments, not the big, bad feds everyone loves to hate. Sales taxes represent more than 36 percent of the budget of state and local governments.
That pays for things like schools, police and firefighters. We have to have those services. If the economy moves more and more to the e-commerce model, local governments will either tax this new economy or die.
But, that being said, I think we are a while off before taxation becomes neccessary. While e-commerce is growing at an incredible rate, it is still a small part of the total economy, and we don't want to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.
We do not have an absolute right to a tax-free Internet. Intellectual freedom? Yes. Academic freedom? Yes. Freedom from taxation? It is up to us to look at the situation and use our heads. No one likes new taxes, but we all like things like roads, schools and the ability to walk on the streets late at night.
HipNerd
Hipnerd
the staff at slashdot needs to get some more weekend news-adder people because i check this web page every 5-30 min, when i'm online and there is no new content, and i cry for a little and then go back to surfing the web.
SuPz.orG
Would the tax be on the sender or the receiver? If the sender, how could you do that? E-mail just works through the SMTP protocol, which is trivial. Any Linux user probably has an SMTP server on their machine, and any who don't can spoof it with telnet.
If the receiver, I can see the anti-spam groups being up in arms about that one. Can you imagine being taxed, by the Government, for receiving a get-rich-quick mail??? IMHO, that just won't fly with anyone.
Free e-mail servers may move off-shore, if taxes are imposed, and there is NOTHING that can be done to stop them.
If the tax is on bytes sent, compress your e-mail and pay less tax for exactly the same message. If it would cost more to collect than they'd get, anyway, this would massively inflate the difference.
What could anyone do to monitor e-mail? Scan port 25? So, have your mail server also use port 1025! Or some other "unofficial" port. So long as your friends know what port you use, they can patch their sendmail, qmail or zmailer to use it, and you can trade untaxed e-mails to your heart's content.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
--
This hoax has been circulating for at least
2 1/2 - 3 months. I would expect slashdot
to do at least _minimal_ screening for this
type of thing.
Next thing you know, we'll be seeing warnings
for the Good Times virus in AskSlashdot.
Anyone who hears any of this "I heard that
blah blah blah computer blah blah government
blah blah virus blah blah cyberwar" crap
should check out these sites before they
pass this stuff on:
Computer Virus Myths home page:
http://kumite.com/myths/
(has info on this email BS too)
Hoax du Jour
http://korova.com/virus/hoax.htm
The Crypt Newsletter
http://sun.soci.niu.edu/~crypt/
These three sources alone are enough to disprove
almost all of the computer related "mass-hysteria"
type of misinformation which pervades all levels
of media from the net, all the way to newsprint
and TV.
Please think before you spew out the latest rumor.
Especially if you are a "news website."
-- Bret
Big Business is a much bigger threat than the government. You can vote the government out, You can't vote Bill Gates out.
Baloney. Bill Gates does not have an guarunteed income of 2 trillion dollars a year whether his "customers" like it or not. Bill Gates cannot write laws. He cannot throw people in jail.
In some cases businesses do these things, but always with the help of the government. If the government weren't so big, it wouldn't have so many favors to give out to businesses. So it remains true that only the government can pose a real threat to our freedom. Corporations cannot coerce you without government help.
I can't believe that old scam came up on _Slashdot_... I saw it a while ago on the Mitnick mailing list, but there it was quickly battered down. Please understand that this would not be possible, and I even think there are official statements claiming that they do not want anything like that.
Putting tax on E-mail would be like charging people for speaking...
ObTopic:
This makes no sense at all. While (I think) the post office may be running a slight surplus at the moment, it has not been a substantial source of government revenue in this century. In any event, the cost of delivering first class letters sent by ordinary joes/janes is substantially subsidized by bulk rate mail, so to the extent people send e-mail instead of first class postal mail, the government is actually farther ahead by a few pennies.Suggested substitute topic: In order to make Area 51 even more secret, the government is considering deleting the number 51 from the official list of positive integers. Discuss among yourselves.
I do not support the taxing of email . . . just wanted to get that out of the way.
Onto my real point. How would they do that? Would ISPs be required to log all of the email messages that people send? This alone would be a huge task to put to ISPs that would cost them money. Second would be the issue of logging such emails from the standpoint of privacy.
How would the taxes be collected? Would it be added on to the bill you pay your ISP, would it be put on your W2? What if your ISP was not your email provider (free email abounds)?
Needless to say, I think that it would cost twice as much to manage the thing as it would gain in revenue.
The other question that comes to mind is what about all of us who run Linux and Sendmail? I run my own sendmail and IMAP server on a dedicated connection. I am about to give a couple of friends account because they are moving. Would I be required to log the number of email that left my box (something I really don't know how or want to do), and then collect the money from them and me (something that I WON'T do).
This is a really bad idea IMHO. If someone would explain the logistics behind such a proposal, at least it could be debatable from an ethical/political standpoint as to whether or not it would be beneficial, but without any such logistics worked out, it's nothing . . .
The USPS has neither the resources nor the jurisdiction to do this; it's just another in a long string of chain e-mails that morons forward around without knowing anything about it.
In general, Internet taxes won't work. There are only two real models that could work: charge the ISPs a tax, which they would pass on to subscribers (I imagine AOL and others would fight this tooth and nail), or a national sales tax on purchases made over the Internet. Taxing things such as e-mail or bandwidth would be impractical.
That won't stop legislators from trying, though...