From: tallpaul@pipeline.com (tallpaul)
Date: Sun, 31 Dec 1995 01:00:20 +0800
To: "Ed Carp [khijol SysAdmin]" <erc@dal1820.computek.net>
Subject: Re: Zensoren ueber Alles
Message-ID: <199512301554.KAA25650@pipe4.nyc.pipeline.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


On Dec 30, 1995 00:04:01, '"Ed Carp [khijol SysAdmin]"
<erc@dal1820.computek.net>' wrote: 
 
 
> 
>This "Tall Paul" fellow said: "Based on other news reports, I conclude
that CompuServe lied in both areas." 
> 
>So?  Companies lie all the time - the bigger the company, the bigger the  
>lie, in my experience.  Companies are like governments - they will get  
>away with what they can until caught.  Even then, they rarely stop - it  
>just goes undercover. 
> 
 
I was not presenting a political analysis behind CompuServe's actions, nor
writing a simple personal opinion. I was presenting what I considered an
factually correct objective observation of their actions.   
 
>> It did none of these things. It cut off all customers to an enormous
number 
>> of groups. It inferrentially violated property rights (i.e. contracts)
to 
>> customers promised internet access and now provided only a crippled
version 
>> thereof. And it lied about the whole thing.  
> 
>Again, so?  All that it will do is to drive people away from Compu$erve  
>into the arms of other service providers.  Maybe some of them will even  
>figure out what a *real* ISP is... 
> 
 
How accurate is Carp's conclusion. Not very, in my opinion. The inaccuracy
develops from the excessively narrow economic focus of Carp's thinking. It
is an analysis that ignores the *social* implications of the CompuServe
decision, treating the entire matter almost as something that would only
interest CompuServe, Microsoft, AOL, and Prodigy stockholders. 
 
Among the other effects *already* visible, the decision has: 
 
1) Led to an enormous amount of anti-net publicity by incompetent editors
on the national news; 
 
2) Furthered the development of hysteria and hysterical organizing; ("I
don't care if it is censorship," said one mommy interviewed on the national
news. "It is good for my children.") 
 
3) Furthered the developmet of the right-wing "family rights" crowd; ("We
need to follow Germany's lead," said one official from one of the "family
rights" crowd interviewed on the national news.) 
 
4) Promoted more dishonesty as a perfectly reasonable and perfectly
acceptable means of engaging in social discourse; 
 
I predict it will also be used for additional attacks on issues of
encryption, privacy,  and anonymity. That is, I think we will see
statements like "We need to be especially vigilant to make sure that the
perverts are not smuggling banned material into the country via the
internet. This means we have to block encryption, monitor user accounts
even more carefully for potential perverts, etc. etc. 
 
Finally, I am not sure that Carp's economic analysis of the CompuServe
decision is correct. The large internet service providers (LISP) form an
oligopoly and, I think, the LISP all abandon hopes that they can become a
monopoly. One form of oligopolistic co-operation is the creation of market
niches within acceptable bounds of market share for each of the
oligopolistic corporations. That is, CompuServe just launched a huge
organizing effort to grab the "family" niche within the LISP market. I do
not have the facts needed for a detailed quantfiable analysis of the LISP
oligopoly (and frankly would not want to devote the time to such an
analysis even if I did.) So I'll conclude here by stating that CompuServe's
market share may increase because of their decision as parents move from
the "family hostile" MSN/AOL/etc. to the "family friendly" CompuServe. 
 
If sexual hysteria is much stronger than views against censorship, for
freedom of speech and inquiry, then we may see the other LISP groups
emulate CompuServe to protect their oligopolistic market share. That is, if
*significant* portions of AOL/MSN/etc. customers are motivated by sexual
hysteria and start moving their accounts to CompuServe we will see
AOL.MSN/etc. become equally "family friendly" to stop the customer shifts. 
 
     --tallpaul