"Today there are at least 8 million people in the US that don't have jobs and most of them will never work again. They could easily be working in farm fields weeding."
And raising the price of food to $10/loaf of bread, or $10/lb for potatoes... This won't even add up to a percentage point for the top 5% of the wealthy - which will make them targets for most people, who will be starving, because they can't afford food. The wealthy won't understand why the poor are hostile, and will call them lazy, inferior and/or jealous.
The answer taken by the US Government will be:
a) Heavy-handed, jack-booted thugs to keep the poor and starving in line b) Tax cuts for the wealthy c) Unending wars for oil d) forced prison-labor from multiple "Wars On Whatever" e) all of the above
Rates would remain the same. 1st tier would be wealthy. Available bandwidth would stay the same, or even drop as demand grew. Why? Reduced competition, and if you can get paid without investing in more infrastructure (an expense, something to be increased only when FORCED, if you want to maximize profit), you do.
That's why regulation to preserve competition is necessary, and why the libertarian fantasy is just that: fantasy.
The goals are opposed. (The companies may adapt) Is that so hard to see?
One goal is to limit access and reap the rewards of scarcity by hiking rates. This limits expenses and keeps the income, meaning higher profit. (verizon)
Another goal is to use ubiquity to profit by volume, as OPPOSED to scarcity. (google, facebook, netflix).
If they cooperate, competition is lost.
If they compete, one or the other goal will be eliminated. The market is all ABOUT minimizing competition (co-opting or eliminating), because competition lowers profit. The only way for both models to exist in the market is regulation.
That can't be - mergers are the engine that drives the famous free market competition - after all, only regulation slows down mergers, and regulations are the antithesis of 'freedom'. It's not as if maximizing profit (the goal of corporations) doesn't mean minimizing competition or anything...
At last! an interesting comment. It assumes there will be a transition to the cloud though. I'm not so sure. I have a feeling the cloud is already here, and remote access to data and applications is all that will happen. Cloud not dominated by big players replacing IT, but rather cloud services provided _by_ IT.
ROFLMAO! Yeah if all you use is word and excel. Oh and maybe Access. Cloud makes sense if you work out of your basement. You don't want an advantage over your competitors? Custom software? Business models that don't come out of a textbook? THAT'S how you think competition works?
Heheh. Think like that and you will have LOTS of time to submit posts to/.. Until you run out of money for your cable modem and phone, that is.
"Stuff written for the cloud is intended to be portable and easy to move."
BWAHAHAHA! Yeah FROM your datacenter TO the cloud vendor's. What, you think Microsoft is going to make it easy to move data they are hosting to Google?
What IS that cloud around your head, anyway?
"There is motivation for the cloud company to service your needs - i.e. you need more stuff done, you pay for more services. You don't have the same motivation with an internal IT department."
What? You ARE high, aren't you? IT shops don't want to be paid more, be provided with more equipment and more capacity? We're GEEKS man! YOu obviously have no idea of what you are talking about, and are projecting.
And of course being a little customer for a big provider, they will be more responsive, eh? Amazon will turn on a dime to get your business - until the ink dries on the contract. Managers that get played like you would be (or have been?) are MEAT and DRINK for bigger players.
If you truly believe that "most of the day-to-day work of an IT department unnecessary", I have a bridge for sale at a good price. A couple of PCs and a wireless router do not an IT professional make. In fact, folk who believe that are the ones that cause the most damages to corporate resources.
Further, you might want to think that it's not always the best idea to outsource strategic infrastructure to the lowest bidder - and the lowest bidder is going to win any competition. And if you buy the salesman's spiel that 'their goals are your goals', maybe you'd like to consider an extended warranty or a lease on that bridge.
It's TSO all over again. TSO and mainframes failed not because they were slow - they weren't. It's not because they didn't work, they did. It was because the apps the middle manager wanted to run (lotus 1-2-3) weren't there. So we got PCs and HUUUUUUGE complexity from departments buying software and installing it in the face of IT reqs, then demanding integration with core systems. And if you think you are going to get one company's 'cloud app' to integrate to another company's 'cloud app' and provide data in the cloud to you custom app that provides you with business advantage (because homogenous environments provide no advantage over others with the same environment) quicker/better/cheaper than a project run by local IT, well I gotta tell you we have bridges in designer colors now.
I'm saying further government intervention in the market is unjustified. I do NOT think that knee-jerk 'deregulate' reactions are justified by this either.
"And, when you are done getting that phone, you will be paying for the contract discount for others because there is no discount for providing your own phone."
*shrug* So? The non-contract plans are still cheap and available with varied terms and prices and usable with advanced phones. There are even plans for seniors and those on fixed incomes that provide 911 service and a small amount of minutes for free (carriers are required to subsidize) What more should the government do? I just don't think this is any reason for 'action'.
"For many self-employed people some sort of cell phone is necessary. It wasn't true some time ago, but nowadays you often need to be able to answer the phone no matter where you are. It doesn't have to be an iPhone, but it does have to be signed up with a cell phone carrier. "
Yes, perhaps - but if necessary, it can be written off. And you don't need to get a cell phone with a contract, and it doesn't have to be an iPhone, so I don't think that line of reasoning applies.
"This means that, as a practical necessity, many people need to sign a contract"
No. Contract-free phones are available and cheap. This thread was about unlocked phones having little effect on what is paid for access, while increasing what is paid for the phone. Even further, I do believe there are contract-free Android smartphones.
"This means that the free market doesn't work"
What most free marketeers call a 'free market' is more like an unfettered market. They take an extremist's view. That is NOT my view, however. From what I have seen, the free market works best when there are limits and regulations. Let businesses duke it out, sure - but keep them in the ring. Keep them from using knives and guns or other items that may harm the audience. Keep the audience from doing the same and harming the competition.
The free market works. Unfettered markets don't.
For an unfettered market to work,all things must be luxuries (consumers must be free not to buy), all transactions must be perfectly reversible (poisoning the water the land or air for a quick buck - or killing workers - must be 'fixable' for the same price or less as the profit made), and all markets must be infinite (labor must always be free to go get another job, for example). Having no regulation means that businesses in the course of maximizing profit will minimize competition. And when competition is marginalized or eliminated, there will be no motivation to improve or keep a lid on price, ultimately leading to economic disaster.
So you work in a job that requires you to have a smartphone but doesn't provide it, and if you are self employed you 'absolutely' need one but can't write it off, and it MUST be an iPhone?
For a change I agree with an AC spouting "free market!". Even though the telephony market is contracting and will soon be a duopoly in the states. Unless you believe a smart phone should be the common baseline for communications, that is. Unless you think it's impossible to support yourself in any way without a smartphone.
And even if a smartphone is necessary to live (ha!), Boost mobile (for example) has non-contract Android service, IIRC.
Unless cell becomes the only way, until Apple and the big carriers hold an abusive monopoly on service, companies should be free to price themselves out of the market, and idiots should be free to spend their money on luxury goods. The government should only get involved when you are dealing with non-luxury items, if then.
ROFLMAO. So unless we submit to anticompetitive acts by corporate collectives, we will all be "unusable, poorly trained garbage that can not compete in the real world", eh?
"Corporations, large and small, employee people in a competitive environment"
Competitive? Got some news fr you, my sophomoric friend. The only reason there is a competitive environment is due to regulation. That's right. Profit is all about maximizing price and minimizing delivery. Competition minimizes price and maximizes delivery. Maximizing profit means minimizing competition; this is done by either destroying or co-opting your competitor. EVERY, and I mean EVERY time in history where mercantile interests have been able to run free, the people have suffered - the freer the mercantile interest, the worse it gets for the people. Last time in the US we ended up with workers rioting with shotguns, and corporations employing mercenaries to keep the workers in their place.
"Who owns the phone lines, who owns the cable lines? Not you. It is called private property"
Nope. The ROW was taken from the people by the government and given to companies eventually designated 'natural monopolies'. In return for their service, they get considerations like tax breaks. Had to be done that way too, because the people wouldn't sell their land, and no common infrastructure was possible otherwise. In other words, the privilege, the infrastructure you enjoy was due to government regulation, NOT private industry. We'd still be using 19th century technology without government regulation.
"all governmental organizations, that are nothing but a drain on the tax payers pockets"
ROFL the republicans really did a number on your head, didn't they? So - all things should be corporate, forever? Can you think of nothing that should not be regulated by profit? Certainly healthcare/insurance should - it goes with out saying that when you make the most profit by not providing coverage but receiving big premium you get the very best medical service... And no companies would ever think of price-fixing in an unregulated environment. And no corporation would ever poison the land or the sea for the sake of a quick buck in your unregulated, government-free world, would they? ROFL dude, pass that over here, it must be some powerful stuff...
"Viva the Government, for with out them, you would not have that computer you are working on, would be unable to communicate anywhere in the world. you would walk, and live to be about 40, if you were lucky."
"If a sufficiently large alternative infrastructure were created"
Out of pixie dust and wishes, no doubt. Because homeowners just LOVE to allow utilities across their properties, and one would NEVER EVER (read, always) hold blocks, neighborhoods or cities' infrastucture plans hostage. That means NO building without - unless, of course the government forces the issue. Of course, if THAT happened, the right wing would be screaming, right? Just like they scream if equal access to existing government-mandated, funded, and ultimately maintained (through tax breaks) ROW and infrastructure is proposed. The right defends monopoly in the name of competition, and then screams 'but its not a free market' as if they were actually interested in either freedom or competition as opposed to corporate entitlements that suck the lifeblood out of consumers and into the pockets of politicians.
We have the best government that money can buy, and the corporations have the most money. Regulation is the correcting hand of the market, but right-wing parrots have been taught to cry 'free market'! 'free market'! 'awwwk'! and to vote AGAINST the invisible hand that corrects the market, to their own detriment, and to the detriment of the defense, health, economy and ultimately the nation itself.
So good luck with that 'alternate infrastructure'. If any become possible, expect right wingers to ban it or co-opt it out to existing players at the expense (but not benefit) of taxpayers.
Slashdot Mirror
And then they will use these patents to block competition.
"Today there are at least 8 million people in the US that don't have jobs and most of them will never work again. They could easily be working in farm fields weeding."
And raising the price of food to $10/loaf of bread, or $10/lb for potatoes... This won't even add up to a percentage point for the top 5% of the wealthy - which will make them targets for most people, who will be starving, because they can't afford food. The wealthy won't understand why the poor are hostile, and will call them lazy, inferior and/or jealous.
The answer taken by the US Government will be:
a) Heavy-handed, jack-booted thugs to keep the poor and starving in line
b) Tax cuts for the wealthy
c) Unending wars for oil
d) forced prison-labor from multiple "Wars On Whatever"
e) all of the above
Take your time and show your work.
Were these the patented sequences?
Rates would remain the same. 1st tier would be wealthy. Available bandwidth would stay the same, or even drop as demand grew. Why? Reduced competition, and if you can get paid without investing in more infrastructure (an expense, something to be increased only when FORCED, if you want to maximize profit), you do.
That's why regulation to preserve competition is necessary, and why the libertarian fantasy is just that: fantasy.
The goals are opposed. (The companies may adapt) Is that so hard to see?
One goal is to limit access and reap the rewards of scarcity by hiking rates. This limits expenses and keeps the income, meaning higher profit. (verizon)
Another goal is to use ubiquity to profit by volume, as OPPOSED to scarcity. (google, facebook, netflix).
If they cooperate, competition is lost.
If they compete, one or the other goal will be eliminated. The market is all ABOUT minimizing competition (co-opting or eliminating), because competition lowers profit. The only way for both models to exist in the market is regulation.
That can't be - mergers are the engine that drives the famous free market competition - after all, only regulation slows down mergers, and regulations are the antithesis of 'freedom'. It's not as if maximizing profit (the goal of corporations) doesn't mean minimizing competition or anything...
^^^^^^^^ This. Civilization needs stable climate. This rock has too many people.
At last! an interesting comment. It assumes there will be a transition to the cloud though. I'm not so sure. I have a feeling the cloud is already here, and remote access to data and applications is all that will happen. Cloud not dominated by big players replacing IT, but rather cloud services provided _by_ IT.
We'll see though!
"Just like you don't have to worry about how electricity gets delivered to you. You just use it."
The difference is, electricity has been around long enough that people using it know not to lick electrical sockets.
ROFLMAO! Yeah if all you use is word and excel. Oh and maybe Access. Cloud makes sense if you work out of your basement. You don't want an advantage over your competitors? Custom software? Business models that don't come out of a textbook? THAT'S how you think competition works?
Heheh. Think like that and you will have LOTS of time to submit posts to /.. Until you run out of money for your cable modem and phone, that is.
"You cost money and produce no business"
And THIS is where they are wrong. If you all use the same software, there is no business advantage. If you have custom software you need IT.
Unless you think Amazon, Google or Microsoft is gonna be writing software just for little old you.
Obviously there is something wrong with 'business school' in this country. Wait. Look around. Yeah. OBVIOUSLY.
"Stuff written for the cloud is intended to be portable and easy to move."
BWAHAHAHA! Yeah FROM your datacenter TO the cloud vendor's. What, you think Microsoft is going to make it easy to move data they are hosting to Google?
What IS that cloud around your head, anyway?
"There is motivation for the cloud company to service your needs - i.e. you need more stuff done, you pay for more services. You don't have the same motivation with an internal IT department."
What? You ARE high, aren't you? IT shops don't want to be paid more, be provided with more equipment and more capacity? We're GEEKS man! YOu obviously have no idea of what you are talking about, and are projecting.
And of course being a little customer for a big provider, they will be more responsive, eh? Amazon will turn on a dime to get your business - until the ink dries on the contract. Managers that get played like you would be (or have been?) are MEAT and DRINK for bigger players.
Yup. So then, you expose your corporate data to the internet, it takes a year and 1000000, and it's a big success.
If you truly believe that "most of the day-to-day work of an IT department unnecessary", I have a bridge for sale at a good price. A couple of PCs and a wireless router do not an IT professional make. In fact, folk who believe that are the ones that cause the most damages to corporate resources.
Further, you might want to think that it's not always the best idea to outsource strategic infrastructure to the lowest bidder - and the lowest bidder is going to win any competition. And if you buy the salesman's spiel that 'their goals are your goals', maybe you'd like to consider an extended warranty or a lease on that bridge.
It's TSO all over again. TSO and mainframes failed not because they were slow - they weren't. It's not because they didn't work, they did. It was because the apps the middle manager wanted to run (lotus 1-2-3) weren't there. So we got PCs and HUUUUUUGE complexity from departments buying software and installing it in the face of IT reqs, then demanding integration with core systems. And if you think you are going to get one company's 'cloud app' to integrate to another company's 'cloud app' and provide data in the cloud to you custom app that provides you with business advantage (because homogenous environments provide no advantage over others with the same environment) quicker/better/cheaper than a project run by local IT, well I gotta tell you we have bridges in designer colors now.
*shrug* Those comments are depressingly accurate though.
I'm saying further government intervention in the market is unjustified. I do NOT think that knee-jerk 'deregulate' reactions are justified by this either.
"And, when you are done getting that phone, you will be paying for the contract discount for others because there is no discount for providing your own phone."
*shrug* So? The non-contract plans are still cheap and available with varied terms and prices and usable with advanced phones. There are even plans for seniors and those on fixed incomes that provide 911 service and a small amount of minutes for free (carriers are required to subsidize) What more should the government do? I just don't think this is any reason for 'action'.
No.
"For many self-employed people some sort of cell phone is necessary. It wasn't true some time ago, but nowadays you often need to be able to answer the phone no matter where you are. It doesn't have to be an iPhone, but it does have to be signed up with a cell phone carrier. "
Yes, perhaps - but if necessary, it can be written off. And you don't need to get a cell phone with a contract, and it doesn't have to be an iPhone, so I don't think that line of reasoning applies.
"This means that, as a practical necessity, many people need to sign a contract"
No. Contract-free phones are available and cheap. This thread was about unlocked phones having little effect on what is paid for access, while increasing what is paid for the phone. Even further, I do believe there are contract-free Android smartphones.
"This means that the free market doesn't work"
What most free marketeers call a 'free market' is more like an unfettered market. They take an extremist's view. That is NOT my view, however. From what I have seen, the free market works best when there are limits and regulations. Let businesses duke it out, sure - but keep them in the ring. Keep them from using knives and guns or other items that may harm the audience. Keep the audience from doing the same and harming the competition.
The free market works. Unfettered markets don't.
For an unfettered market to work,all things must be luxuries (consumers must be free not to buy), all transactions must be perfectly reversible (poisoning the water the land or air for a quick buck - or killing workers - must be 'fixable' for the same price or less as the profit made), and all markets must be infinite (labor must always be free to go get another job, for example). Having no regulation means that businesses in the course of maximizing profit will minimize competition. And when competition is marginalized or eliminated, there will be no motivation to improve or keep a lid on price, ultimately leading to economic disaster.
So you work in a job that requires you to have a smartphone but doesn't provide it, and if you are self employed you 'absolutely' need one but can't write it off, and it MUST be an iPhone?
I call bullshit.
For a change I agree with an AC spouting "free market!". Even though the telephony market is contracting and will soon be a duopoly in the states. Unless you believe a smart phone should be the common baseline for communications, that is. Unless you think it's impossible to support yourself in any way without a smartphone.
And even if a smartphone is necessary to live (ha!), Boost mobile (for example) has non-contract Android service, IIRC.
Unless cell becomes the only way, until Apple and the big carriers hold an abusive monopoly on service, companies should be free to price themselves out of the market, and idiots should be free to spend their money on luxury goods. The government should only get involved when you are dealing with non-luxury items, if then.
There ain't no justice. Get used to it. None of the powerful want to change that, and so it won't.
ROFL. If it's for a jury trial, you might as well shout "I'm guilty". After all, the FBI wouldn't use it if it didn't work....
Heh. Oh I agree. IBM does two things well: Shooting themselves in the foot, and reloading.
ROFLMAO. So unless we submit to anticompetitive acts by corporate collectives, we will all be "unusable, poorly trained garbage that can not compete in the real world", eh?
"Corporations, large and small, employee people in a competitive environment"
Competitive? Got some news fr you, my sophomoric friend. The only reason there is a competitive environment is due to regulation. That's right. Profit is all about maximizing price and minimizing delivery. Competition minimizes price and maximizes delivery. Maximizing profit means minimizing competition; this is done by either destroying or co-opting your competitor. EVERY, and I mean EVERY time in history where mercantile interests have been able to run free, the people have suffered - the freer the mercantile interest, the worse it gets for the people. Last time in the US we ended up with workers rioting with shotguns, and corporations employing mercenaries to keep the workers in their place.
"Who owns the phone lines, who owns the cable lines? Not you. It is called private property"
Nope. The ROW was taken from the people by the government and given to companies eventually designated 'natural monopolies'. In return for their service, they get considerations like tax breaks. Had to be done that way too, because the people wouldn't sell their land, and no common infrastructure was possible otherwise. In other words, the privilege, the infrastructure you enjoy was due to government regulation, NOT private industry. We'd still be using 19th century technology without government regulation.
"all governmental organizations, that are nothing but a drain on the tax payers pockets"
ROFL the republicans really did a number on your head, didn't they? So - all things should be corporate, forever? Can you think of nothing that should not be regulated by profit? Certainly healthcare/insurance should - it goes with out saying that when you make the most profit by not providing coverage but receiving big premium you get the very best medical service... And no companies would ever think of price-fixing in an unregulated environment. And no corporation would ever poison the land or the sea for the sake of a quick buck in your unregulated, government-free world, would they? ROFL dude, pass that over here, it must be some powerful stuff...
"Viva the Government, for with out them, you would not have that computer you are working on, would be unable to communicate anywhere in the world. you would walk, and live to be about 40, if you were lucky."
There. Fixed that for you.
ROFLMAO!
"If a sufficiently large alternative infrastructure were created"
Out of pixie dust and wishes, no doubt. Because homeowners just LOVE to allow utilities across their properties, and one would NEVER EVER (read, always) hold blocks, neighborhoods or cities' infrastucture plans hostage. That means NO building without - unless, of course the government forces the issue. Of course, if THAT happened, the right wing would be screaming, right? Just like they scream if equal access to existing government-mandated, funded, and ultimately maintained (through tax breaks) ROW and infrastructure is proposed. The right defends monopoly in the name of competition, and then screams 'but its not a free market' as if they were actually interested in either freedom or competition as opposed to corporate entitlements that suck the lifeblood out of consumers and into the pockets of politicians.
We have the best government that money can buy, and the corporations have the most money. Regulation is the correcting hand of the market, but right-wing parrots have been taught to cry 'free market'! 'free market'! 'awwwk'! and to vote AGAINST the invisible hand that corrects the market, to their own detriment, and to the detriment of the defense, health, economy and ultimately the nation itself.
So good luck with that 'alternate infrastructure'. If any become possible, expect right wingers to ban it or co-opt it out to existing players at the expense (but not benefit) of taxpayers.