Oh, and another thing - you say city dwellers should subsidize the farmers? Can't they do that at the marketplace, directly, instead of relying on the state? The farmer will raise prices to what he needs to get what he needs, and the consumer will buy it. Cost of living. Look it up.
That's kind of part of the cost of doing business. How is Sears supposed to know what their customers want, without a phone line? Is the government supposed to give them that phone line? Come on.
They compete with anyone else they have to compete with. If competition is not an issue, then it's no problem to raise prices to fund such things. All costs must be passed to the consumer, or they move be eliminated.
I'm not saying every single person has to pay the cost of telecom infrastructure; only those outside the network that the local market has allowed them to build at a reasonable cost. Why should someone living in the middle of nowhere (farmer or not) get to pay just as much as someone across the street from the phone company, when it cost far more money to wire and maintain the connection to the person in the middle of nowhere?
A phone line is not that expensive. All I propose is that the costs of wiring those outside of the local area be absorbed by those customers, not everyone else. If they can't handle that, then they need to raise the price of their food. It's all about COST OF LIVING. And if they can't compete at that price, so be it. If no one can afford the food at that price, maybe THEY should move closer to the farm. A few extra bucks a month on the phone bill is going to be easy for any business to absorb, and they will have to, considering how important a phone line is.
Capitalism is full of simple checks and balances like this. You don't have a right to any service simply by virtue of where you live. If that were the case, I could live in the middle of Alaska and demand that Anchorage build cable out to me at no extra cost to me. Farmer or not. Subsidy gets us nowhere.
Oh, wow, such a solid definition. I can imagine that a 18 year old babysitter could easily sue a single dad for videotaping her, no matter the reason, in his own house.
Yes, the porno thing is bad, and there's no way it could possibly pass - the Internet, like it or not, is private domain now, just like the cable and rail network, and for better or for worse, that's how it should be. This bill would be in essence either nationalize/monopolize Verisign and the other.com operators, or would force them to change their practices for purposes of limiting free speech, instead of saving lives. (which is what most regulations are for)
And since when did the US Federal Government have the ability to create new TLDs?
But what about the first part of this? No videotaping someone without their consent except on public property? First, we have to deal with the thorny issue of public property. Is someone standing on a rooftop in public? Or in a private, but open-access, park? What if you film someone entering a building, going from public to private space?
Second of all, don't we have these inconvenient little judicial and political divisions called STATES that typically handle this? And handle it they do, or should; there are many states that ban audiotape without permission, and I must assume that there are at least some that ban videotape without permission, or are pondering the idea. This is no realm for the Federal government to get involved; it's not an interstate crime to simply tape someone.
Third of all, as others have so astutely pointed out, this bill could be - and would be - used to ban hidden camera expose`s. Food Lion? Fraudulent auto repairmen? Abusive nursing home employees?
And fourth of all... what if the private property the taping is taking place on is your OWN? Would it be legal to invite someone into your house and tape them without their knowledge? If not, this would singlehandedly kill the entire babysitter videotaping movement.
Much like most laws, this one is worthless and shouldn't be given a second glance.
That said, should it be legal or illegal to film someone from your home, through their window, into their home? That should be up to the states to decide, but in my personal opinion, that's why God invented curtains and blinds. Privacy is a right, but it cannot be an assumed right. You can't go out into a low-fenced backyard naked and assume you have a right not to be stared at or taped. Like all rights it requires vigilance. Put up curtains and a taller fence. And if the guy goes through more extraordinary measures to tape you, sue him for *stalking*.
Same goes for if someone plants a camera in your home. First, sue for trespass. If a landlord, sue for breach of contract and trespass. And then sue for stalking.
The unfortunate thing is, almost all state laws that prohibit audiotaping without permission don't count for videotape. Plant a hidden camera in a woman's bedroom and, as long as it doesn't have a microphone, you have done virtually nothing illegal. (except the possible breaking and entering and trespass; hence why I mentioned the landlord) Such a practice would also be violating my comment on privacy; your property is your castle, and much as most state self defense laws don't require you to retreat if on your own property, nor should you have to be vigilant about privacy from within your own property.
I find it interesting explicit exceptions are made for security cameras, such as those in a department store dressing room. I guess it's OK if the person recording without permission is a corporation. But, then again, perhaps this applies to my above argument as to whether or not it would be legal to secretly videotape babysitters - maybe the exception applies to that as well.
That's enough rambling for now.
Disclaimer: A good portion of this post is based on the Slashdot synopsis of the story; I see no mention of 'public property' anywhere in the senator's press release.
You don't seem to understand. Allow me to spell it out; Cairo is in Africa, yes? But, physically, it is only a few hundred miles from Tel Aviv. And, unlike Casablanca and Gibraltar, you can easily make that trek by land.
So my question is, does Cairo get hit with this extra charge simply by virtue of being in Africa, neglecting the fact that it is physically very close to Asia and Europe? If Tel Aviv ISPs are NOT being hit with this, why not?
My whole statement is, is Africa being defined as sub-Saharan Africa for the purpose of this article? Or is it explicit that any nation in Africa, no matter how close to Spain or the Middle East they may be, is automatically going to be charged these fees?
Ummm... how best to put this. Of course farmers can't live in the city; but why should the citydwellers subsidize their phone and cable service? They're selling food; let the money from that pay for things, and let the charges be passed directly to the consumer, instead of a government subsidy or tax.
And if that renders the farmers unable to compete, then so be it. It's all part of the cost of doing business, and if others can supply the same goods for cheaper, then why bother subsidizing them?
If the African ISPs *truly* are unable to survive due to all this, then they seem to be in the wrong business; if that's the case, it would seem demand doesn't account for cost.
I'm sure Marx has many very interesting things to say about capitalism. Whether or not they have any merit is a discussion not meant for this place.
As for this whole "sharing and mercy" fiasco, you may want to read "Atlas Shrugged", by Ayn Rand. You'll find that she has some interesting things to say about how the gap between "doers" and "don'ters" [...] is self-perpetuating, mostly because the Welfare system doesn't allow for the concepts of "merit" or "achievement" - exactly the qualities that are supposed to separate humans from beasts in the first place.
So, what you're saying is that Offspring didn't pay attention to the contract they signed and then, when they wanted to do something that the contract didn't allow, they were "opressed by 'The Man'"?
Hmm... is the industry at fault for protecting what they own or are the Offspring at fault for giving up "their music" when it was convienent for them to do so to make money and then decide to complain when they'd rather be the "cool" band who gives away music?
Good questions. However, I think they signed their contract before the work-for-hire law passed, and while I'm not wholly versed on it, it would seem that law would supercede the contract.
I question the wisdom of anyone who signs a contract to give over 100% of their rights to their music. Offspring has always seemed more sensible than that to me.
I did say they were oppressed, and yes, it may have been contractual. It may have just been muscling, too, and until we see Offspring's contract, we will never know. I simply pointed it out comparing with the story about the band that released their CD online six months before commercially available.
Either way, it's strongman tactics like this, and this is only one of them, that are giving the RIAA a poor reputation.
I remember when The Offspring wanted to release a hit song from, I believe, Americana, in MP3 form, before the CD was available in stores. Their music; their right. Right?
Unfortunately, since Congress made music work-for-hire, the recording company had the right to keep them from doing what they wanted with their own music.
Hey, the topography of the Internet has always been a bit screwy. I remember that to ping the University of Maryland in College Park from my ISP's location in Greenbelt - Physically about 4 or 5 miles apart on the east coast of the United States - required the packets to travel to the far west coast, through San Francisco. This was about 9 years ago, and things have improved since then, but the point remains.:)
Doesn't apply only to Internet topography, either. Kind of like how to take a train from New Orleans to Dallas (physically 520 miles apart) you have to go through Chicago (making the total length ~1800 miles), or how almost every Northwest Airlines flight goes through Detroit, no matter where your departure and arrival points are.
Let's say you have someone living out in the middle of nowhere. And they want cable. Should the rest of the subscribers have to pay so that they can get their connection at the same price as everyone else? Or, should they have to foot the bill for the extras, like extra cabling, extra service costs, etc? No matter if they DO or not, but in my eye, it would seem only right that people with special needs like that pay their own way. Otherwise, move closer to town or go without cable.
Africa is the same way. Like it or not, but as far as the Internet is concerned, it's still a very small number of people in the middle of nowhere, as far as cabling and backboning goes.
As others have said, small ISPs don't get paid by the big ones for each email, do they? Then why is it special when an ISP in Africa is treated in the same fashion? At this point in time, by necessity any ISP in Africa is small, compared to almost any ISP in America.
According to the article, there's 4 million people hooked up to the Internet, across 54 countries. This doesn't seem to me to be a big enough population to even able to begin to think about dictating prices and policies. The person in the middle of nowhere is complaining.
The article claims that International Telecommunications Union regulations ensure that telephony costs between Africa and "the West" are split 50:50. Unless this arrangement is universal, Africa's telephone system has clearly been heavily subsidized. There's NO mention made in this article if ITU regulations apply to the Internet in other places, yet it's simply assumed that they should apply in Africa. A blatant omission, and poor journalism.
And another comment; how is Africa defined? Do ISPs in Casablanca and Cairo have this same problem? What differentiates an ISP in Cairo from one in Tel Aviv or Istanbul? The only country named in the article is Kenya, and no mention made at all of the countries that are physically close to Europe.
I, unfortunately, do not truly know what the economics behind all this are, and others can handle whether or not this is even a plausible argument. This is simply a critique of the article, and a suitable analogy.
A politically correct article designed to elicit appeals to repair the 'digital divide.'
Wow, I guess no huge corporations should start up in tiny countries with a small government.
Good quote from the father of modern communism, btw. I don't propose ownership of the government, I propose destruction of it. And if some group, be it society or corporation, rises up and begins using force to execute its edicts, then it has become a de facto government. Just because something is not named a government does not make it so. And just like the previous government, it will be dismantled by any means necessary. The price of freedom, my friend. The only state of lack of coercion is a non-governmental system. If a group coerces, it has ceased to be a non-governmental system, and it must be reverted back to that.
And are we not fascist by FDR's definition now, with massive corporate ownership of politicians? Come now. -
Mmm, democracy. That great tool of the Worker that allows him to tell the Big Bad Company how to run their business. But when the Big Bad Companies try to use democracy to tell the little Worker how to run HIS life, suddenly things are bad. I guess democracy means freedom for me, not for thee.
Democracy is being voted off the island.
And what is this 'original promise?' Free exchange of information? And who, pray tell, was going to pay for the hugeass cables that connect everything? I guess you figure it can all be done cooperatively.
I refer you to the Great Leap Forward.
Democracy is a farce. Wake up.
PS - You're right. They should differentiate between bought and real results. And newspapers publish corporate press spokesmen as newsworthy all the time. Because, usually, it is. -
We run a small online store that has to compete with the likes of.. well, some larger folks. (All names hidden to protect the guilty) And we've found that, right now, the best 'advertising' we get is by purchasing certain keywords. We have monitored a definite correlation between renewing our purchase, and new orders.
The search engines are run by private companies as FREE services, and be damned if the government or Ralph Nader is going to tell them how to run their business. -
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, and another thing - you say city dwellers should subsidize the farmers? Can't they do that at the marketplace, directly, instead of relying on the state? The farmer will raise prices to what he needs to get what he needs, and the consumer will buy it. Cost of living. Look it up.
That's kind of part of the cost of doing business. How is Sears supposed to know what their customers want, without a phone line? Is the government supposed to give them that phone line? Come on.
They compete with anyone else they have to compete with. If competition is not an issue, then it's no problem to raise prices to fund such things. All costs must be passed to the consumer, or they move be eliminated.
I'm not saying every single person has to pay the cost of telecom infrastructure; only those outside the network that the local market has allowed them to build at a reasonable cost. Why should someone living in the middle of nowhere (farmer or not) get to pay just as much as someone across the street from the phone company, when it cost far more money to wire and maintain the connection to the person in the middle of nowhere?
A phone line is not that expensive. All I propose is that the costs of wiring those outside of the local area be absorbed by those customers, not everyone else. If they can't handle that, then they need to raise the price of their food. It's all about COST OF LIVING. And if they can't compete at that price, so be it. If no one can afford the food at that price, maybe THEY should move closer to the farm. A few extra bucks a month on the phone bill is going to be easy for any business to absorb, and they will have to, considering how important a phone line is.
Capitalism is full of simple checks and balances like this. You don't have a right to any service simply by virtue of where you live. If that were the case, I could live in the middle of Alaska and demand that Anchorage build cable out to me at no extra cost to me. Farmer or not. Subsidy gets us nowhere.
Oh, wow, such a solid definition. I can imagine that a 18 year old babysitter could easily sue a single dad for videotaping her, no matter the reason, in his own house.
Yes, the porno thing is bad, and there's no way it could possibly pass - the Internet, like it or not, is private domain now, just like the cable and rail network, and for better or for worse, that's how it should be. This bill would be in essence either nationalize/monopolize Verisign and the other .com operators, or would force them to change their practices for purposes of limiting free speech, instead of saving lives. (which is what most regulations are for)
And since when did the US Federal Government have the ability to create new TLDs?
But what about the first part of this? No videotaping someone without their consent except on public property? First, we have to deal with the thorny issue of public property. Is someone standing on a rooftop in public? Or in a private, but open-access, park? What if you film someone entering a building, going from public to private space?
Second of all, don't we have these inconvenient little judicial and political divisions called STATES that typically handle this? And handle it they do, or should; there are many states that ban audiotape without permission, and I must assume that there are at least some that ban videotape without permission, or are pondering the idea. This is no realm for the Federal government to get involved; it's not an interstate crime to simply tape someone.
Third of all, as others have so astutely pointed out, this bill could be - and would be - used to ban hidden camera expose`s. Food Lion? Fraudulent auto repairmen? Abusive nursing home employees?
And fourth of all... what if the private property the taping is taking place on is your OWN? Would it be legal to invite someone into your house and tape them without their knowledge? If not, this would singlehandedly kill the entire babysitter videotaping movement.
Much like most laws, this one is worthless and shouldn't be given a second glance.
That said, should it be legal or illegal to film someone from your home, through their window, into their home? That should be up to the states to decide, but in my personal opinion, that's why God invented curtains and blinds. Privacy is a right, but it cannot be an assumed right. You can't go out into a low-fenced backyard naked and assume you have a right not to be stared at or taped. Like all rights it requires vigilance. Put up curtains and a taller fence. And if the guy goes through more extraordinary measures to tape you, sue him for *stalking*.
Same goes for if someone plants a camera in your home. First, sue for trespass. If a landlord, sue for breach of contract and trespass. And then sue for stalking.
The unfortunate thing is, almost all state laws that prohibit audiotaping without permission don't count for videotape. Plant a hidden camera in a woman's bedroom and, as long as it doesn't have a microphone, you have done virtually nothing illegal. (except the possible breaking and entering and trespass; hence why I mentioned the landlord) Such a practice would also be violating my comment on privacy; your property is your castle, and much as most state self defense laws don't require you to retreat if on your own property, nor should you have to be vigilant about privacy from within your own property.
I find it interesting explicit exceptions are made for security cameras, such as those in a department store dressing room. I guess it's OK if the person recording without permission is a corporation. But, then again, perhaps this applies to my above argument as to whether or not it would be legal to secretly videotape babysitters - maybe the exception applies to that as well.
That's enough rambling for now.
Disclaimer: A good portion of this post is based on the Slashdot synopsis of the story; I see no mention of 'public property' anywhere in the senator's press release.
You don't seem to understand. Allow me to spell it out; Cairo is in Africa, yes? But, physically, it is only a few hundred miles from Tel Aviv. And, unlike Casablanca and Gibraltar, you can easily make that trek by land.
So my question is, does Cairo get hit with this extra charge simply by virtue of being in Africa, neglecting the fact that it is physically very close to Asia and Europe? If Tel Aviv ISPs are NOT being hit with this, why not?
My whole statement is, is Africa being defined as sub-Saharan Africa for the purpose of this article? Or is it explicit that any nation in Africa, no matter how close to Spain or the Middle East they may be, is automatically going to be charged these fees?
Ummm... how best to put this. Of course farmers can't live in the city; but why should the citydwellers subsidize their phone and cable service? They're selling food; let the money from that pay for things, and let the charges be passed directly to the consumer, instead of a government subsidy or tax.
And if that renders the farmers unable to compete, then so be it. It's all part of the cost of doing business, and if others can supply the same goods for cheaper, then why bother subsidizing them?
If the African ISPs *truly* are unable to survive due to all this, then they seem to be in the wrong business; if that's the case, it would seem demand doesn't account for cost.
I'm sure Marx has many very interesting things to say about capitalism. Whether or not they have any merit is a discussion not meant for this place.
As for this whole "sharing and mercy" fiasco, you may want to read "Atlas Shrugged", by Ayn Rand. You'll find that she has some interesting things to say about how the gap between "doers" and "don'ters" [...] is self-perpetuating, mostly because the Welfare system doesn't allow for the concepts of "merit" or "achievement" - exactly the qualities that are supposed to separate humans from beasts in the first place.
So, what you're saying is that Offspring didn't pay attention to the contract they signed and then, when they wanted to do something that the contract didn't allow, they were "opressed by 'The Man'"?
Hmm... is the industry at fault for protecting what they own or are the Offspring at fault for giving up "their music" when it was convienent for them to do so to make money and then decide to complain when they'd rather be the "cool" band who gives away music?
Good questions. However, I think they signed their contract before the work-for-hire law passed, and while I'm not wholly versed on it, it would seem that law would supercede the contract.
I question the wisdom of anyone who signs a contract to give over 100% of their rights to their music. Offspring has always seemed more sensible than that to me.
I did say they were oppressed, and yes, it may have been contractual. It may have just been muscling, too, and until we see Offspring's contract, we will never know. I simply pointed it out comparing with the story about the band that released their CD online six months before commercially available.
Either way, it's strongman tactics like this, and this is only one of them, that are giving the RIAA a poor reputation.
I remember when The Offspring wanted to release a hit song from, I believe, Americana, in MP3 form, before the CD was available in stores. Their music; their right. Right?
Unfortunately, since Congress made music work-for-hire, the recording company had the right to keep them from doing what they wanted with their own music.
Hey, the topography of the Internet has always been a bit screwy. I remember that to ping the University of Maryland in College Park from my ISP's location in Greenbelt - Physically about 4 or 5 miles apart on the east coast of the United States - required the packets to travel to the far west coast, through San Francisco. This was about 9 years ago, and things have improved since then, but the point remains. :)
Doesn't apply only to Internet topography, either. Kind of like how to take a train from New Orleans to Dallas (physically 520 miles apart) you have to go through Chicago (making the total length ~1800 miles), or how almost every Northwest Airlines flight goes through Detroit, no matter where your departure and arrival points are.
Let's say you have someone living out in the middle of nowhere. And they want cable. Should the rest of the subscribers have to pay so that they can get their connection at the same price as everyone else? Or, should they have to foot the bill for the extras, like extra cabling, extra service costs, etc? No matter if they DO or not, but in my eye, it would seem only right that people with special needs like that pay their own way. Otherwise, move closer to town or go without cable.
Africa is the same way. Like it or not, but as far as the Internet is concerned, it's still a very small number of people in the middle of nowhere, as far as cabling and backboning goes.
As others have said, small ISPs don't get paid by the big ones for each email, do they? Then why is it special when an ISP in Africa is treated in the same fashion? At this point in time, by necessity any ISP in Africa is small, compared to almost any ISP in America.
According to the article, there's 4 million people hooked up to the Internet, across 54 countries. This doesn't seem to me to be a big enough population to even able to begin to think about dictating prices and policies. The person in the middle of nowhere is complaining.
The article claims that International Telecommunications Union regulations ensure that telephony costs between Africa and "the West" are split 50:50. Unless this arrangement is universal, Africa's telephone system has clearly been heavily subsidized. There's NO mention made in this article if ITU regulations apply to the Internet in other places, yet it's simply assumed that they should apply in Africa. A blatant omission, and poor journalism.
And another comment; how is Africa defined? Do ISPs in Casablanca and Cairo have this same problem? What differentiates an ISP in Cairo from one in Tel Aviv or Istanbul? The only country named in the article is Kenya, and no mention made at all of the countries that are physically close to Europe.
I, unfortunately, do not truly know what the economics behind all this are, and others can handle whether or not this is even a plausible argument. This is simply a critique of the article, and a suitable analogy.
A politically correct article designed to elicit appeals to repair the 'digital divide.'
Wow, I guess no huge corporations should start up in tiny countries with a small government.
Good quote from the father of modern communism, btw. I don't propose ownership of the government, I propose destruction of it. And if some group, be it society or corporation, rises up and begins using force to execute its edicts, then it has become a de facto government. Just because something is not named a government does not make it so. And just like the previous government, it will be dismantled by any means necessary. The price of freedom, my friend. The only state of lack of coercion is a non-governmental system. If a group coerces, it has ceased to be a non-governmental system, and it must be reverted back to that.
And are we not fascist by FDR's definition now, with massive corporate ownership of politicians? Come now.
-
Mmm, democracy. That great tool of the Worker that allows him to tell the Big Bad Company how to run their business. But when the Big Bad Companies try to use democracy to tell the little Worker how to run HIS life, suddenly things are bad. I guess democracy means freedom for me, not for thee.
Democracy is being voted off the island.
And what is this 'original promise?' Free exchange of information? And who, pray tell, was going to pay for the hugeass cables that connect everything? I guess you figure it can all be done cooperatively.
I refer you to the Great Leap Forward.
Democracy is a farce. Wake up.
PS - You're right. They should differentiate between bought and real results. And newspapers publish corporate press spokesmen as newsworthy all the time. Because, usually, it is.
-
We run a small online store that has to compete with the likes of .. well, some larger folks. (All names hidden to protect the guilty) And we've found that, right now, the best 'advertising' we get is by purchasing certain keywords. We have monitored a definite correlation between renewing our purchase, and new orders.
The search engines are run by private companies as FREE services, and be damned if the government or Ralph Nader is going to tell them how to run their business.
-