Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Christian Stalberg" <cstalberg AT internet-lab.com>]

 

----- Original Message -----

From: William A. Franklin

To: Progressive Students and Faculty

Sent: Saturday, May 20, 2006 12:27 AM

Subject: [progress] IMPORTANT - NPC Call Reminder: Net Neutrality (5/19) IMPORTANT

Read this and weep.  The attached NewYorker item, cited below, tells much of the story.

This affects your pocketbook!!!  And how do I know, I worked for 17 years for AT&T

as it strugged to keep its old ways and money flows despite changes in technolgies

and advances in technologies.  Do you like those flat rate computer connectivity and

VOIP phone prices?  If you dont fight this thing, your fees will likely more than 2X or

3X in the next few years, for no good reason.

 

ACTION: Call and write those simpering idiots in both houses of Congress and tell them

you want NETWORK NEUTRALITY.

 

Lets  talk about the ultimate goal of these bastards.  Remember how the phone company

works - it meters your calls.   Local services you suppsosedly get for a fixed price per

month, plus all the fees etc. which hide raises in prices which the phone companies dont

want to discuss.  If you call long distance, you pay another set of fees, but these fees

are "metered" by the minute at so much a minute.  So, the longer your call, the more

you pay.  If you do not have "wide area service" and call beyond your not well

defined local area, you pay a metered fee--get you coming and going, and we

aint got to long distance yet.  The issue:  Flat Rate fees for service (like DSL or

Cable) or variable metered by the minute rates like the phone companies.

 

The phone company invested billions and billions of your money into network

based switching and billing systems, all of which were needed ONLY if the game was

smart networks.  And, they did it because they couldn -guaranteed the income by

monopoly.  Same thing going on here.

 

You remember all those "free cell minutes" on weekends, evenings.  They are calculated into

the total package price.

 

These metered services brought in most of the revenues for the phone companies.  They want

"smart network" and "dumb endpoints", so they can charge money for services imposed in

the network on the dumb endpoints.  AT&T and the Bastard Bells simply want to reverse

history and go back to smart networks, where they control the sale of endpoints to make

them really dumb, and collect metered income for services imposed in the network, including

basic access fees above some base rate for access.  Which means you pay for the minutes

connected and the guys with the pipes/wires make billions on these fees. 

 

This plan has been in the works since AT&T and others lost the IP dumb network fight in

the 1980-now.  And the introduction of Voice over IP has devastated the metered long

distance business.  Further innovation on the "smart endpoint" business, from computers,

to cell phones, to VOIP and many more has exploded and with it, taken fees from what

used to be AT&T and Bell Bastard revenues, plus things they never thought about, or

would allow if they did think of it.  Innovation took place despite Bell Labs and AT&T who

rested on their laurels and did absolutely nothing, assuming they were owed a living.  These

same dorks also put in so much fiber cable we have millions of times more than will

ever be used as technology in many cases bypassed cable (like DSL and Cable).

 

This is an attempt to turn back the clock radically, to say 1975 when AT&T staffed with

roughly twice the work force it  needed and simply went to the customers and imposed

price hikes for whatever they thought up - no competition allowed.  In those days, AT&T and

the Bastard Bells also dictated precisely what was allowed to be hooked to the telephone

lines, until it lost the Carterphone decisions in 1956 and 1968, disabling AT&T's phoney

excuses.

 

If you think that Congress or FCC cares one way or another, think again.  Given the

amounts of money pumped into Congress (both sides and both parties)  and the White House,

of course the ideal is screw the little guy and gal who cannot understand the lies and scam

being imposed to provide these jerks with revenues based on little or no changes to the

networks, pure profit.  And over time, they will again try to disallow connection of smarter

and smarter equipments on portions of the networks the can reach and control

 

This is the real thing.  The internet was paid for by the people.  It deserves to continue

as a dumb network and allow the innovation on the endpoints.  It has taken us 30 years

to rid ourselves of a monopoly tyrant.  They have plotted even longer to retake what

they think is theirs. 

 

Write your congressperson, sorry asses, and explain what is happening while they

sleep and wait for campaign contributions to flow in from the phone companies

based on monies you will have to pay them.

 

Bill Franklin

 

William A. Franklin
806 Warwick Court
Burlington, NC  27215
336-263-2062 cell
866-842-1504 Fax
336-222-0126
wafranklin AT earthlink.net

 

 

 

 

 

 

---

From: Angie Schiavoni [mailto:angie AT newprogressivecoalition.com]
Sent: Friday, May 19, 2006 4:35 PM
To: wafranklin AT earthlink.net
Subject: NPC Call Reminder: Net Neutrality (5/19)

 

NPC All-Member Call

Campaign to Save the Internet: “Net Neutrality”

While the “Net Neutrality” debate is raging in Congress, NPC members are campaigning to prevent cable and telephone companies from becoming gatekeepers of the Internet.

Join Josh Silver, Executive Director of Free Press and others involved in the www.savetheinternet.com campaign to learn what’s at stake and how to get involved.

When:             Tuesday, May 23^rd at 11am PST/2pm EST
RSVP:              If you haven’t already, please click here to RSVP

Click here to read an article from The New Yorker about this debate.

About Free Press
Free Press is a national nonpartisan organization working to increase informed public participation in crucial media policy debates, and to generate policies that will produce a more competitive and public interest-oriented media system with a strong nonprofit and noncommercial sector.

Executive Director Josh Silver founded Free Press with Robert McChesney and John Nichols in 2002 to engage public involvement in U.S. media policy debates. He has published extensively on media policy, campaign finance and other public policy issues.

 

 

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