Discuss Digest, Vol 2, Issue 31

[Robert L Krawitz]

   Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:14:52 -0500 (EST)
   From: "Rich Braun" <richb at pioneer.ci.net>

   The point I am making is that given the economics and politics of
   providing residential ISP service, there will always be a tendency
   toward monopoly control of the last-mile segment of cable or
   spectrum reaching your house.

   If you don't understand or agree with that point then I guess you
   can argue on the basis of private contract law.

As long as that last half mile is copper or glass, that's probably
true, although it's unclear to me how that applies here.  AOL is still
doing quite nicely, and Speakeasy is doing fine (albeit on a smaller
scale).  Then you have the competition between cable and phone
company, and there's still WiFi in some areas, which in all likelihood
is only going to grow.

   My position is that given the lack of options for access to a range
   of cost-effective services, consumers through the enactment of
   public laws must override unreasonable clauses in private ToS
   contracts.  (There is a parallel with landlord-tenant law: chapter
   186 of the Massachusetts General Laws renders void a wide variety
   of clauses that a landlord might attempt to impose in the terms of
   a lease.)

I would take exception to the lack of options.  I have Speakeasy
(which doesn't have such onerous terms), and my snailbox is full of
offers from RCN and Verizon for their broadband products.

   Sure, you can argue that I should just dump Comcast if I don't like
   their ToS.  Ten years ago, I didn't like what the existing ISPs
   were selling, so I went out and started my own ISP and offered a
   different ToS.  Times have changed (*fundamentally*) and no one is
   starting ISPs anymore.  Someone mentioned RCN in this thread: even
   with billions of dollars in capital, that company is unlikely to
   succeed.  This has nothing to do with the costs of offering variety
   in ToS contracts; it has to do with the nature of the beast: public
   rights of way are required to deliver this service, and he who has
   control over them gets the customers.  Unless the government
   specifies otherwise, a monopoly provider can also dictate whatever
   ToS it wants.  Internet service has yet to be entirely monopolized
   but you (or at least most people who read this) can see the obvious
   trend in that direction: declining service quality, increasing
   restrictions, decreasing provider choices, and higher prices.

I'm seeing just the opposite -- improving service quality and speed,
and certainly no increase in prices.

   I don't like spam any more than anyone else--I've posted details
   here about my spam-blocking configuration; search the blu.org
   archives.  Blocking port 25 at the sender or receiver is a
   knee-jerk political reaction rather than an effective technical
   solution.  Putting reasonable limits on traffic volume might be a
   better policy, and I know there is a lot of research being done on
   a trusted-sender mechanism to provide identity tracking.  (Even if
   the latter were implemented, I'd still want to be able to receive
   mail on port 25 from non-trusted senders, and filter it through my
   SpamAssassin software.)

Quite honestly, I'm a lot more bothered by these "reasonable" limits
on traffic volume and general no-server (ftp, web) policies than I am
by blocking of port 25 outbound.  Stringent traffic limits hit very
directly at someone who wishes to publish something privately (or who
wants to download a Linux distribution) on the net, which has freedom
of speech implications.  If you're so concerned with privacy, I'm
baffled as to why you would favor trusted sender mechanisms and
identity tracking.

-- 
Robert Krawitz                                     <rlk at alum.mit.edu>

Tall Clubs International  --  http://www.tall.org/ or 1-888-IM-TALL-2
Member of the League for Programming Freedom -- mail lpf at uunet.uu.net
Project lead for Gimp Print   --    http://gimp-print.sourceforge.net

"Linux doesn't dictate how I work, I dictate how Linux works."
--Eric Crampton