Re: NYT's _Unmuzzling the Internet_

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"Vlad"  wrote:

<snip>

>I am all for helping congressmen "get a clue" at this moment in time.
>the Digital Telephony bill is not a declaration of war. when they try
>to tax Cyberspace or get the FCC to regulate it, or outlaw cryptography,
>*that* will be a declaration of war.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, and I try to resist forwarding
messages from other lists, but on cyberia-L, Mr. Nick Keenan wrote:

<snipped, forwarded message follows>
____________________________________

The FCC is now proposing a tax on ISP's -- in the name of "universal access"
!?? :O(.

They claim that since voice can be transmitted over the Internet, it falls
under the jurisdiction of the FCC.

Read about it in the Dec. 18 issue of Interactive Week
( http://www.zdnet.com/~intweek/print/951218/upfront/doc11.html)

>From the article:

>FCC Chairman Reed Hundt provided the tip-off earlier this year during a
>speech he gave in Washington at the Networked Economy Conference. Hundt said
>the commission would issue a Notice of Proposed Rule-Making sometime this
>year in order to re-examine how access charges are assigned and universal
>service is funded, said Mark Corbitt, Hundt's main technology adviser.
>
>The Internet community "should wake up [and] pay attention," Corbitt
>said. "This issue could hit them before they know it. I don't think
>most of them are even aware" that this is bubbling up through the agency.

____End forwarded message____

I would hope that we would flood them with comments during the period
after the "Notice of Proposed Rule-Making" appears, not that it will
help, as they have already made up their minds. The FCC (like the FDA)
should be defunded, not just "cut," whatever that word means anymore.
There are good economic reasons why this won't help "universal access"
any more than peanut subsidies help minority farmers, despite lies to
the contrary by various self-interested bureaucrats. As Republicans
said (before they became the majority party) "Cut Their Pay and Send
Them Home."
JMR

Regards, Jim Ray
 http://www.shopmiami.com/prs/jimray
             "Hooters GUYS? Washington -- GET A GRIP!"
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_______________________________________________________________________
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_______________________________________________________________________


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> The FCC is now proposing a tax on ISP's -- in the name of "universal access"
> !?? :O(.
> 
> They claim that since voice can be transmitted over the Internet, it falls
> under the jurisdiction of the FCC.

This is pretty stupid - I mean, even I know that it's all just data.  
Besides, it's irrelevent - if the FCC had jurisdiction over the net 
because it can carry digitized voice, then they could regulate what I 
scream out my back door.  Last time I looked, I didn't need a license to 
broadcast my voice out over the airwaves with my mouth...
- --
Ed Carp, N7EKG    			Ed.Carp@linux.org, ecarp@netcom.com
					214/993-3935 voicemail/digital pager
					800/558-3408 SkyPager
Finger ecarp@netcom.com for PGP 2.5 public key		an88744@anon.penet.fi

"Past the wounds of childhood, past the fallen dreams and the broken families,
through the hurt and the loss and the agony only the night ever hears, is a
waiting soul.  Patient, permanent, abundant, it opens its infinite heart and
asks only one thing of you ... 'Remember who it is you really are.'"

                    -- "Losing Your Mind", Karen Alexander and Rick Boyes

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