Comments on: Do We Trust The Government With The Internet?

By: George

George — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 23:31:28 +0000

Love the inset photo! Thanks John for threading back to 1999, Pirates of Silicon Valley days!

It seems to me, the internet has changed the world and if you follow the news of late, in ways we never dreamed of! On a world scale, its managed so far with neutrality with minimal oversight, let's not screw this one up, please!

Finally, the internet has repositioned the power of information exchange, do we really need to add agency costs or censorship? We have to be careful not to let lobbyists get in front of this one...

By: Directory News

Directory News — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 18:37:12 +0000

So the FCC gets to decide whether a given packet is “lawful”. Some day a jackass like Ed Meese is going to be back in charge, and “lawful” can easily turn into just as much of a regulatory landgrab as “indecent” or “equal time”.

By: poco

poco — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 08:00:40 +0000

The big straw man here is that there isn’t any competition. Maybe not for very high speed and very low cost at any location, but that is another issue.

By: kier

kier — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 04:33:43 +0000

Another point is that ensuring net neutrality necessitates some kind of long-term vision trumping short-term appetite for profit and avoidance of potentially costly infrastructure investments. Corporations are almost by definition not inclined to make those sacrifices willingly.

By: Randy Addison

Randy Addison — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 03:12:50 +0000

The government shouldn’t put their noses on the internet. The internet is a group of computers in a large network. So, the government doesn’t own a single part of the internet. They do not have the rights to control it.

By: don kopp

don kopp — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 16:30:08 +0000

The real big problem with the government running anything is that it will be less efficient and ultimately cost more.In Illinois the other day I saw 4 state trucks with a total of 12 people picking up trash on the side of the road 1 was working the other 11 were sitting in the trucks! efficiency in action

By: Jordan

Jordan — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 22:16:22 +0000

John, I think the real question is, Should we trust the government, more than Google to run the internet?

Just think of the power, besides financial Google really has. They can track information, traffic, control information, i.e. search results and affect hundreds and thousands of livelihoods of those who depend on search engines for a living for either traffic or adsense income. I am far from anti Google, but when you think about it, the power of the internet already lies in a small handful of peoples hands already. By putting it in the hands of the government, isn't really going fix any problems now is it?

By: Douglas J Gregory

Douglas J Gregory — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 02:39:04 +0000

Fantastic info.
I have grabbed your RSS feed and subscribed to your information.

Thank you,
Doug

By: BryanL

BryanL — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 23:29:29 +0000

interesting comparing this view of government to the brouhaha about the PATRIOT act.

The fact is that you do have a means to vote them out - with only one vote. If you don't like the I'net you get, you find another vendor.

Action via vote is a much tougher issue in part because it is communal. Talk to Wisonsin voters about how tough it is to get their vote expressed right now, for example.

The big straw man here is that there isn't any competition. Maybe not for very high speed and very low cost at any location, but that is another issue.

There is competition, it is fierce, and anyone who looks has many options and alternatives available for I'net service. That is what keeps it 'honest' in ways governmental regulation can never do.

By: Chris Horn

Chris Horn — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 22:42:32 +0000

If you haven't already read it, I strongly recommend Stephen Wu's Master Switch on the history of the US management of its information economy http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d.html/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/182-7414466-5208050?a=0307269930