[PLUG] Re: Unwire Portland public meeting tomorrow

Ronald Chmara ron at Opus1.COM
Thu Jul 28 01:38:44 UTC 2005


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On Jul 27, 2005, at 11:27 AM, Randal L. Schwartz wrote:
>>>>>> "Randall" == Randall Lucas <rlucas at tercent.com> writes:
> Randall> There will definitely be politicos and commercial vendors
> Randall> there.  It would be outstanding if we could get some strong
> Randall> representation from the F/OSS and Linux communities there as
> Randall> well.
> You mean so we can be there to protest the use of public funds to
> create a virtual monopoly against which private industry cannot offer
> alternatives?  Cool!

Uhm.....How would it be even *possible* to create a virtual monopoly, 
on wireless access, to which the private industry *cannot* offer 
alternatives?

Seriously, I don't see how this would even be technically possible. 
Even typical monopoly things like, oh, drinking water and electricity 
and phone services now have numerous *private* alternatives. Sure, the 
public utility drinking water is cheap, but "distilled water" sells 
like gangbusters, and if you don't like the power grid monopolies, you 
can go solar or use other generators, and voice services has 
cell/VoiP/skype/etc...

> No more monopolies.  Microsoft, government, anyone.  Free the
> airwaves.

WiFi uses free spectrum... er... and I'm pretty sure the City of 
Portland can't overrule the FCC.

> If the government's "net" chooses to censor connections to
> "unapproved" sites or services, or implements poor intrusive web
> proxying and filtering,, we'll never get a chance to have a third
> party provide an alternative.

Again, why not?

Heck, that situation has "incentives for private industry alternative" 
written all over it. I can already imagine the slogans: "Tired of your 
free public WiFi coverage sucking? For only 25 bucks a month, you can 
have citywide WiFi that doesn't suck!"

> And you can bet that the
> right wingers will want to make sure public airwaves aren't used to
> download "porn" or "abortion" information.  End of freedom.

"Tired of using a public WiFi network that filters out your favorite 
websites? Get citywide WiFi that doesn't suck for only 25 bucks a 
month!"

> If there is to be a citywide net, the market will provide it.  No need
> to use public funds.

Well, if that was true, the market *would* have provided it already, 
no? However, it seems that there was no need to provide it yet, as the 
market was quite happy to keep us locked into more expensive 
technologies (such as cell modems) that don't require larger 
infrastructure investments. As soon as there is market pressure from a 
public utility, private industry has an incentive to invest in building 
additional infrastructure in order to capture that market segment from 
the public sector, and offer a "better" product than an existing public 
service provides...

Think about "free" TV stations vs. cable. "Free" drinking fountains vs. 
bottled water. "Free" parks vs. private country clubs. "Free" public 
concerts vs. private concerts. "Free" downtown public transportation 
vs. cars. In all these cases, (and I'm sure many more), private 
industry offered alternatives, even though there was an existing 
"free/cheap" service, subsidized by the public. In some cases, private 
industry alternatives were actually *created* by the public investment.

> I presume this is why you want us there.
>
> Or were you intending some other common voice?

Common voice? In F/OSS? LOL!

- -Ronabop
- --
Ronin Professional Consulting LLC
4245 NE Alberta Ct.
Portland, OR 97218
678-522-1322/503-282-1370
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