And it has been illegal for a municipality to grant exclusivity to a cable franchise since 1992. States grant telco franchises, which have been non-exclusive since 1996.
That's great! But I assume it isn't retroactive, i.e. existing telcom monopoly franchise grants are still in effect until they run out.
Actually, I suppose that explains why my cable company is ramping up to provide telephone in my area soon. Hurrah!
California screwed up de-regulation by making it impossible for utilities to pass on rate increases to customers, while at the same time California electric companies were prohibited from entering into long-term contracts for purchasing power. Try reading California Energy Crisis: What's going on, Who's to Blame, and What to do.
I know what "Basic IP Dialtone" is. The difference between IP and voice is that IP text data can be analyzed by machine. If you don't think the right-wing and left-wing nuts would try to clamp down on porn going over your "Basic IP Dialtone", you must have been asleep for the last few years as we have fought off Internet censorship law after law, not to mention mandatory filtering at schools and libraries!
In northern Montgomery County, Maryland, trash is private. Infact, my mother-in-law just switched to a trash service with better service. Competition in action.
Running 10-20 fibers to each house is no big thing. I concur that running 10-20 sewer/water/gas/electric lines might be a bit tough.
U.K. British Telecom has been told by our telecomms regulator (OFTEL) to open up the local loop to competitors, but it's dragging it's heels
Well, I guess you are now getting the rewards of having set up the monopoly socialist BT in the first place! As the US is for setting up the monopoly Bell System!
As long as the bells control the lines, they can play all sorts of games to keep others off. If the state controls them, and leases management back to the bells, suddenly the state can effectively police the lines to ensure everyone has a chance.
The local governments currently grant monopoly telecom franchises. They do this theoretically to provide service to all, and to not allow telecom providers to cherry-pick the best customers. In truth, the monopolies were granted also due to political influence of the telecom providers...
If you truly want competition, you need to throw away the notion of "universal service." I personally think this is the way to go. No monopoly franchises. No subsidies. No regulation. Everyone pays the true price of hooking them up, and all telecom providers are invited to the party to compete, be they coax, fiber, or twister pair.
The local governments think monpolies are just fine. How are you going to change their viewpoint?
I want a basic IP dialtone. I think it should be provided as infrastructure by local government.
I'm sorry, this is the most ignorant concept I can imagine. If you would like to see what government-sponsored Internet looks like, talk to Europeans whose PTTs finally were de-nationalized.
Moreover, I can assure you that your local government will not carry alt.binaries.pictures.erotica...infact, they will probably only provide you with "filtered" Internet that meets the "moral requirements of government." And when your Internet goes down, they will proceed at "government speed" to fix the problem, the kind of speed that comes from workers whose jobs are 100% safe no matter what they do, and they have no stock options.
Why is my $40/50 going towards crap like this?
Because you cost these companies $40/50 a month. The ones that don't charge you that will go out of business. "Extras" are thrown in to try to justify the price. But trust me, many many ISPs around the country are close to going under, and trying desperately to find new revenue avenues.
Internet-as-commodity is already bringing about a consolidation in the ISP market. The few mom & pops left will always have to charge more than the national/international players.
That said, while dialup IP prices are steady, you get a heck of a lot of Internet for your buck over broadband. Cable modem users I know are seeing real 1 Mbps download rates for under $100 per month. DSL users I know are getting 500kbps downloads for $30-$50 per month.
But where's the free market for "innovation" when the "wireless" options cited by the college kid author are, indeed, virtually nonexistent, under a government spectrum policy (remember, the airwaves are REGULATED) that is now aimed at maximizing license auction revenues?
There are plenty of unlicensed and trivial-to-get license bandiwdth available for wireless broadband. The tough part is building the network. Look at Metricom Ricochet, which just went under, for instance, whose last-mile was Part 15 unlicensed 900 MHz and delivered better-than-ISDN to mobile receivers.
With regards to satellite, you can get broadband Internet service from geostationary satellites today. For much of the US, this is your only solution.
In the near future, we can expect stratospheric airships or solar-powered aircraft to provide a satellite-like service to major cities without the ping-time issues of geostationary.
Of course, I share the feeling that the FCC should make it illegal for any locality to grant monopoly telecom franchises, including phone/cable/fiber-to-home.
Rural residents should pay the true cost of their rural lifestyle, while those of us who choose to live in high-density areas should benefit from a range of services provided by a competitive market.
Well look at what happened in the OS market with microsoft
Yes, I can run MacOS, Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, BeOS, and about a thousand other OS's.
Currently, I can only get DSL, and it is a toss-up between Covad (who will probably go under soon), or Verizon.
Keep in mind GOVERNMENT REGULATION GOT US TO WHERE WE ARE TODAY WITH BROADBAND. Specifically, the granting of local monopoly telecommunication franchises. Our government created little Microsofts back in the 30's. Thanks guys!
Re:Free Markets, Public Works, and Monopolies
on
Rhythms Flatlines
·
· Score: 3, Informative
To whit, why do "natural monopolies" exist, what makes them a "natural monopoly,"
"Natural Monopolies" exist because of local governments granting monopoly franchises. Period.
Areas with competiting telecom providers (such as multiple cable companies) generally have lower prices.
The whole "natural monopoly" BS happened in the early part of the century as power companies and the Bell System got monopoly franchises through their political influence.
While there are hypocrites in every endeavor, I'd like to point out that _if_ life begins that conception, then it is non-negotiable whether it is acceptable to experiment on fetuses.
The main problem with this viewpoint is that animals are life as well, yet even most pro-lifers don't have a problem with us experimenting on animals.
Of course you may say, "but it is _human_ life," but this is also questionable. Does a human need a heartbeat? Does a human life need a brain?
The embryos involved in this research are, for all practical purposes, brain dead. They are vegetables. They have no heartbeat, no heart, and no internal organs whatsoever.
A fetus with a heartbeat and brain is quite another matter. Moreover, a fetus that can survive outside the womb, even with advanced technology, is also a very different matter.
But an embryo will not turn into a person without implantion into a womb. It is a potential life only if you take great effort. You can't just walk down the street implanting embryos into women.
On the other hand, abortion is a change in the current situation. A pregnant woman left alone will bring a human life into the world. An early embryo left alone will not.
Those of you who believe that telephone service should be a regulated monopoly, you are killing the independent DSL industry.
The FCC should mandate that no local or state entity should be able to grant a monopoly telecommunications franchise, period.
Re:TV over Internet still a fair ways away
on
HDTV Over IP
·
· Score: 2
The problem is that multicasting hasn't been in the interest of Internet carriers. However, it is in the interest of satellite IP carriers such as Cidera...read about their multicast initiative
And as an evil content provider, I can also assure you that we wouldn't bother selling popunder space unless it did have a significant positive influence on the bottom line.
Pop-unders have doubled my ad income, and we see about $2-$3 CPM for them. However, we use an ad provider that 1) only sends on pop-up per session and 2) doesn't send an individual user the same pop-up more than once per week.
So we sell 10 or 20 times as many banners and pop-ups, but the pop-ups still make us about the same amount of income as banners.
I'm hoping to lose popunders as soon as we can land an effective audio or video ad deal, but the market just isn't there yet.
Economic Freedom in Sub-Saharan Africa says:...Sub-Saharan Africa remains by far the least economically free of all regions: None of the 36 countries graded received a "free" rating, and only five--Benin, Mali, Botswana, Namibia and Mauritius--were found to be "mostly free." The decline in Zimbabwe's score caused it to slip into the "repressed" category, where it joined Guinea-Bissau. South Africa's score worsened as well, with increased government regulations bumping it to the "mostly unfree" category, along with 28 other African nations.
The editors suspended grading for six African nations--Angola, Burundi, Congo, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Sudan--due to the unreliability of data caused by either their civil unrest or "prolonged state of anarchy." They will be included in future editions once "political stability returns."
Africa Betrayed: George Ayittey, a native of Ghana, recalls the exhilaration that swept the continent when colonialism ended. But soon native African leaders began plundering their nations' economies, imprisoning political opponents, and blocking economic progress.
Although those leaders rejected capitalism because of its mistaken identification with colonialism, Africa actually has a tradition of markets and decentralization. Ayittey lays out that tradition before describing the Colonial Era, the march toward tyranny, the de facto apartheid, the military regimes, the intellectual repression, the corruption, and the dubious conduct of the West.
"Friends of the Earth" Europe say: "The commercial use of nuclear fusion is pure fantasy. Already 25 years ago the same people had predicted that in 50 years fusion would be a viable energy resource, but it seems like we are always 50 years away from fusion becoming economic. The European Council has to stop this waste of millions of taxpayers money."
"Friends" of the Earth wants to "Terminate existing tokamak reactors, cancel construction of the similar spherical torus reactor, and adhere to a withdrawal from the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) program."
Sierra Club The dangers posed by the probable releases of tritium used by fusion plants, the problems with decommissioning these plants, and their high costs lead the Sierra Club to believe that the development of fusion reactors to generate electricity should not be pursued at this time.
China - These guys are the only REAL nucleat power left other than the US - ICBM's and well mainitained - huge conventional forces HOWEVER China is the least likely to use the weapons as it doesnt fit with their national Psyche or their view of the world - they are by tradition a defensive nation and thus these weapons are seen as defensive only.
When the Chinese Communist leadership is up against the wall, are you sure they wouldn't risk it? If Taiwan declares independence (same thing), and the US decides to provide defense for Taiwan, are you sure they wouldn't risk it?
Another cynical thought - Star Wars #1 took out the USSR Communists, maybe Star Wars #2 will take out the Chinese Communists...
What's the worst that can happen if the environmentalists are wrong about Global Warming? People have to make sacrifices unnecessarily? Boo hoo.
The worst thing that can happen is a global depression, including mass starvation. Here is the core of the issue: there is no way, I repeat no way, that we can significantly reduce human-produced greenhouse gas emmissions without a MASSIVE economic catastrophe.
Even stabilizing US CO2 emmissions at 1990 levels by 2010 would require at least a $0.50 per gallon gas tax increase, as well as fuel cost increases of nearly 50% for electrical generation. Studies show that this kind of CO2 emmission reduction would cause US GDP to decrease by 1 to 2 percent annually, with nearly a million lost jobs. And this in a country that shouts "monopoly" when gas prices go up a few cents...
But of course, stabilizing CO2 emmissions at 1990 levels is not enough. It would only slow down warming while simultaneously we destroy the world economy. And of course, most of these numbers are pulled "out of the air", and I think they probably underestimate the true tax levels required to reduce CO2 emmissions. I still can't explain SUVs.
And that doesn't even include the economic damage required to reduce methane emmissions from Asia (more greenhouse potent than CO2). Perhaps China would just round up and shoot all the rice farmers. Actually, they have pretty good experience at politically inspired mass starvation already...
So we're stuck in a situation where we either have disaster due to global warming or due to economic failure. The truth is that politics being what it is, most nations would not accept political solutions to CO2 and methane emmissions, with the possible exception of Western Europe:)
So this leaves another alternative: innovate out of the problem. Don't destroy the economy now, hold out until we have a solution (such as a pure hydrogen/oxygen economy).
We can look into sequestration to some extent as well. Globally, farms are becoming more productive, and farmland can be returned to dense biomass forest. Algae sequestration can be looked at as well.
Verizon's CDPD coverage maps are sort of... errr.. innacurate, and I never got even close to the promised 19.2 K even in the (few) areas where the service actually worked. I have a Novatel Merlin card
I had Ricochet service in DC, but my application was fairly mobile (in a vehicle), and the cell hand-off always seemed to fail. In downtown San Francisco, coverage was dense enough that this was less of a problem, but in suburban DC I would have to re-connect every minute or so while driving.
I went to Verizon CDPD with the Sierra Aircard 300. It's firmware looks like a NIC to the PC, so the connection is more solid...it reconnects automagically so you don't have to.
I found CDPD coverage to be much better than Ricochet, and did though CDPD was a little bit slower, I prefered CDPD...especially on the Amtrak going from DC to New York.
That said, I was hoping that the new high-speed Ricochet would come to DC. The DC suburbs are home to many Net-head early adopters (think MAE East, AOL, etc.)
The problem is that the incumbent local exchange carriers still have a monopoly franchise in most areas. Yes, they are "supposed" to decouple lines for people like Covad, but it is on the ILEC's terms - their CO, their lines.
If the FCC would simply make it illegal for a municipality to grant any monopoly telecommunications franchise, this could all be over with. FTTH!
The modern view is that all Egyptians were required to give up a month or so for "national service". Considering the leader of the country was a god, it was the least they could do:)
Slaves were probably not the major builders of the pyramids and temples, it was done by ordinary citizens. Of course, you could call them serfs, since their work on the pyramids was basically required, a tax of sorts. True slaves (owned, bought, sold) were rare before the Ptolemaic period, and were mainly house servants.
About four thousand expert stone sculptors worked on the pyramids year round. During the Nile floods, ninety-five thousand citizens did the heavy work.
Slashdot Mirror
And it has been illegal for a municipality to grant exclusivity to a cable franchise since 1992. States grant telco franchises, which have been non-exclusive since 1996.
That's great! But I assume it isn't retroactive, i.e. existing telcom monopoly franchise grants are still in effect until they run out.
Actually, I suppose that explains why my cable company is ramping up to provide telephone in my area soon. Hurrah!
California screwed up de-regulation by making it impossible for utilities to pass on rate increases to customers, while at the same time California electric companies were prohibited from entering into long-term contracts for purchasing power. Try reading California Energy Crisis: What's going on, Who's to Blame, and What to do.
I know what "Basic IP Dialtone" is. The difference between IP and voice is that IP text data can be analyzed by machine. If you don't think the right-wing and left-wing nuts would try to clamp down on porn going over your "Basic IP Dialtone", you must have been asleep for the last few years as we have fought off Internet censorship law after law, not to mention mandatory filtering at schools and libraries!
In northern Montgomery County, Maryland, trash is private. Infact, my mother-in-law just switched to a trash service with better service. Competition in action.
Running 10-20 fibers to each house is no big thing. I concur that running 10-20 sewer/water/gas/electric lines might be a bit tough.
The REAL problem with hunger in the world stems from a local lack of freedom, democracy, and capitalism.
U.K. British Telecom has been told by our telecomms regulator (OFTEL) to open up the local loop to competitors, but it's dragging it's heels
Well, I guess you are now getting the rewards of having set up the monopoly socialist BT in the first place! As the US is for setting up the monopoly Bell System!
As long as the bells control the lines, they can play all sorts of games to keep others off. If the state controls them, and leases management back to the bells, suddenly the state can effectively police the lines to ensure everyone has a chance.
The local governments currently grant monopoly telecom franchises. They do this theoretically to provide service to all, and to not allow telecom providers to cherry-pick the best customers. In truth, the monopolies were granted also due to political influence of the telecom providers...
If you truly want competition, you need to throw away the notion of "universal service." I personally think this is the way to go. No monopoly franchises. No subsidies. No regulation. Everyone pays the true price of hooking them up, and all telecom providers are invited to the party to compete, be they coax, fiber, or twister pair.
The local governments think monpolies are just fine. How are you going to change their viewpoint?
I want a basic IP dialtone. I think it should be provided as infrastructure by local government.
I'm sorry, this is the most ignorant concept I can imagine. If you would like to see what government-sponsored Internet looks like, talk to Europeans whose PTTs finally were de-nationalized.
Moreover, I can assure you that your local government will not carry alt.binaries.pictures.erotica...infact, they will probably only provide you with "filtered" Internet that meets the "moral requirements of government." And when your Internet goes down, they will proceed at "government speed" to fix the problem, the kind of speed that comes from workers whose jobs are 100% safe no matter what they do, and they have no stock options.
Why is my $40/50 going towards crap like this?
Because you cost these companies $40/50 a month. The ones that don't charge you that will go out of business. "Extras" are thrown in to try to justify the price. But trust me, many many ISPs around the country are close to going under, and trying desperately to find new revenue avenues.
Internet-as-commodity is already bringing about a consolidation in the ISP market. The few mom & pops left will always have to charge more than the national/international players.
That said, while dialup IP prices are steady, you get a heck of a lot of Internet for your buck over broadband. Cable modem users I know are seeing real 1 Mbps download rates for under $100 per month. DSL users I know are getting 500kbps downloads for $30-$50 per month.
But where's the free market for "innovation" when the "wireless" options cited by the college kid author are, indeed, virtually nonexistent, under a government spectrum policy (remember, the airwaves are REGULATED) that is now aimed at maximizing license auction revenues?
There are plenty of unlicensed and trivial-to-get license bandiwdth available for wireless broadband. The tough part is building the network. Look at Metricom Ricochet, which just went under, for instance, whose last-mile was Part 15 unlicensed 900 MHz and delivered better-than-ISDN to mobile receivers.
With regards to satellite, you can get broadband Internet service from geostationary satellites today. For much of the US, this is your only solution.
In the near future, we can expect stratospheric airships or solar-powered aircraft to provide a satellite-like service to major cities without the ping-time issues of geostationary.
Of course, I share the feeling that the FCC should make it illegal for any locality to grant monopoly telecom franchises, including phone/cable/fiber-to-home.
Rural residents should pay the true cost of their rural lifestyle, while those of us who choose to live in high-density areas should benefit from a range of services provided by a competitive market.
Well look at what happened in the OS market with microsoft
Yes, I can run MacOS, Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, BeOS, and about a thousand other OS's.
Currently, I can only get DSL, and it is a toss-up between Covad (who will probably go under soon), or Verizon.
Keep in mind GOVERNMENT REGULATION GOT US TO WHERE WE ARE TODAY WITH BROADBAND. Specifically, the granting of local monopoly telecommunication franchises. Our government created little Microsofts back in the 30's. Thanks guys!
To whit, why do "natural monopolies" exist, what makes them a "natural monopoly,"
"Natural Monopolies" exist because of local governments granting monopoly franchises. Period.
Areas with competiting telecom providers (such as multiple cable companies) generally have lower prices.
The whole "natural monopoly" BS happened in the early part of the century as power companies and the Bell System got monopoly franchises through their political influence.
While there are hypocrites in every endeavor, I'd like to point out that _if_ life begins that conception, then it is non-negotiable whether it is acceptable to experiment on fetuses.
The main problem with this viewpoint is that animals are life as well, yet even most pro-lifers don't have a problem with us experimenting on animals.
Of course you may say, "but it is _human_ life," but this is also questionable. Does a human need a heartbeat? Does a human life need a brain?
The embryos involved in this research are, for all practical purposes, brain dead. They are vegetables. They have no heartbeat, no heart, and no internal organs whatsoever.
A fetus with a heartbeat and brain is quite another matter. Moreover, a fetus that can survive outside the womb, even with advanced technology, is also a very different matter.
But an embryo will not turn into a person without implantion into a womb. It is a potential life only if you take great effort. You can't just walk down the street implanting embryos into women.
On the other hand, abortion is a change in the current situation. A pregnant woman left alone will bring a human life into the world. An early embryo left alone will not.
I also have no problems with connecting to outside hosts on the standard SMTP port through Verizon DSL, but others swear they can't.
Those of you who believe that telephone service should be a regulated monopoly, you are killing the independent DSL industry.
The FCC should mandate that no local or state entity should be able to grant a monopoly telecommunications franchise, period.
The problem is that multicasting hasn't been in the interest of Internet carriers. However, it is in the interest of satellite IP carriers such as Cidera...read about their multicast initiative
And as an evil content provider, I can also assure you that we wouldn't bother selling popunder space unless it did have a significant positive influence on the bottom line.
Pop-unders have doubled my ad income, and we see about $2-$3 CPM for them. However, we use an ad provider that 1) only sends on pop-up per session and 2) doesn't send an individual user the same pop-up more than once per week.
So we sell 10 or 20 times as many banners and pop-ups, but the pop-ups still make us about the same amount of income as banners.
I'm hoping to lose popunders as soon as we can land an effective audio or video ad deal, but the market just isn't there yet.
Economic Freedom in Sub-Saharan Africa says: ...Sub-Saharan Africa remains by far the least economically free of all regions: None of the 36 countries graded received a "free" rating, and only five--Benin, Mali, Botswana, Namibia and Mauritius--were found to be "mostly free." The decline in Zimbabwe's score caused it to slip into the "repressed" category, where it joined Guinea-Bissau. South Africa's score worsened as well, with increased government regulations bumping it to the "mostly unfree" category, along with 28 other African nations.
The editors suspended grading for six African nations--Angola, Burundi, Congo, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Sudan--due to the unreliability of data caused by either their civil unrest or "prolonged state of anarchy." They will be included in future editions once "political stability returns."
Africa Betrayed: George Ayittey, a native of Ghana, recalls the exhilaration that swept the continent when colonialism ended. But soon native African leaders began plundering their nations' economies, imprisoning political opponents, and blocking economic progress.
Although those leaders rejected capitalism because of its mistaken identification with colonialism, Africa actually has a tradition of markets and decentralization. Ayittey lays out that tradition before describing the Colonial Era, the march toward tyranny, the de facto apartheid, the military regimes, the intellectual repression, the corruption, and the dubious conduct of the West.
They ALREADY block outgoing Port 25 traffic
I'm on Verizon DSL, and we're not blocked on port 25 currently.
Are there any fusion protest groups yet?
Against the National Ignition Facility
"Friends of the Earth" Europe say: "The commercial use of nuclear fusion is pure fantasy. Already 25 years ago the same people had predicted that in 50 years fusion would be a viable energy resource, but it seems like we are always 50 years away from fusion becoming economic. The European Council has to stop this waste of millions of taxpayers money."
Green groups say Fusion is a Scam
"Friends" of the Earth wants to "Terminate existing tokamak reactors, cancel construction of the similar spherical torus reactor, and adhere to a withdrawal from the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) program."
Sierra Club The dangers posed by the probable releases of tritium used by fusion plants, the problems with decommissioning these plants, and their high costs lead the Sierra Club to believe that the development of fusion reactors to generate electricity should not be pursued at this time.
a Missle Defense System that will be based off of a network of airborne 747 jumbo jets in similar to that in Real Genius with Val Kilmer.
Hmmm...I wonder if that could be used to vaporize human-sized targets? Fidel? Sadam? Barney?
China - These guys are the only REAL nucleat power left other than the US - ICBM's and well mainitained - huge conventional forces HOWEVER China is the least likely to use the weapons as it doesnt fit with their national Psyche or their view of the world - they are by tradition a defensive nation and thus these weapons are seen as defensive only.
When the Chinese Communist leadership is up against the wall, are you sure they wouldn't risk it? If Taiwan declares independence (same thing), and the US decides to provide defense for Taiwan, are you sure they wouldn't risk it?
Another cynical thought - Star Wars #1 took out the USSR Communists, maybe Star Wars #2 will take out the Chinese Communists...
What's the worst that can happen if the environmentalists are wrong about Global Warming? People have to make sacrifices unnecessarily? Boo hoo.
:)
The worst thing that can happen is a global depression, including mass starvation. Here is the core of the issue: there is no way, I repeat no way, that we can significantly reduce human-produced greenhouse gas emmissions without a MASSIVE economic catastrophe.
Even stabilizing US CO2 emmissions at 1990 levels by 2010 would require at least a $0.50 per gallon gas tax increase, as well as fuel cost increases of nearly 50% for electrical generation. Studies show that this kind of CO2 emmission reduction would cause US GDP to decrease by 1 to 2 percent annually, with nearly a million lost jobs. And this in a country that shouts "monopoly" when gas prices go up a few cents...
But of course, stabilizing CO2 emmissions at 1990 levels is not enough. It would only slow down warming while simultaneously we destroy the world economy. And of course, most of these numbers are pulled "out of the air", and I think they probably underestimate the true tax levels required to reduce CO2 emmissions. I still can't explain SUVs.
And that doesn't even include the economic damage required to reduce methane emmissions from Asia (more greenhouse potent than CO2). Perhaps China would just round up and shoot all the rice farmers. Actually, they have pretty good experience at politically inspired mass starvation already...
So we're stuck in a situation where we either have disaster due to global warming or due to economic failure. The truth is that politics being what it is, most nations would not accept political solutions to CO2 and methane emmissions, with the possible exception of Western Europe
So this leaves another alternative: innovate out of the problem. Don't destroy the economy now, hold out until we have a solution (such as a pure hydrogen/oxygen economy).
We can look into sequestration to some extent as well. Globally, farms are becoming more productive, and farmland can be returned to dense biomass forest. Algae sequestration can be looked at as well.
Your good civillian; I mean you do not have the harm.
What happen?
Some one set us up the bomb!
Verizon's CDPD coverage maps are sort of... errr.. innacurate, and I never got even close to the promised 19.2 K even in the (few) areas where the service actually worked. I have a Novatel Merlin card
I had Ricochet service in DC, but my application was fairly mobile (in a vehicle), and the cell hand-off always seemed to fail. In downtown San Francisco, coverage was dense enough that this was less of a problem, but in suburban DC I would have to re-connect every minute or so while driving.
I went to Verizon CDPD with the Sierra Aircard 300. It's firmware looks like a NIC to the PC, so the connection is more solid...it reconnects automagically so you don't have to.
I found CDPD coverage to be much better than Ricochet, and did though CDPD was a little bit slower, I prefered CDPD...especially on the Amtrak going from DC to New York.
That said, I was hoping that the new high-speed Ricochet would come to DC. The DC suburbs are home to many Net-head early adopters (think MAE East, AOL, etc.)
The problem is that the incumbent local exchange carriers still have a monopoly franchise in most areas. Yes, they are "supposed" to decouple lines for people like Covad, but it is on the ILEC's terms - their CO, their lines.
If the FCC would simply make it illegal for a municipality to grant any monopoly telecommunications franchise, this could all be over with. FTTH!
The modern view is that all Egyptians were required to give up a month or so for "national service". Considering the leader of the country was a god, it was the least they could do :)
Slaves were probably not the major builders of the pyramids and temples, it was done by ordinary citizens. Of course, you could call them serfs, since their work on the pyramids was basically required, a tax of sorts. True slaves (owned, bought, sold) were rare before the Ptolemaic period, and were mainly house servants.
About four thousand expert stone sculptors worked on the pyramids year round. During the Nile floods, ninety-five thousand citizens did the heavy work.