[governance] FW: TP: city government exercising policy on Google Applications / consumer rights / Consumer Protection Act / trial period

Tue Jul 12 10:17:16 EDT 2011

Internet exceptionalism is a techie's uptopia. Sociologically and 
politically it has little meaning or relevance. All or most large 
insitutional systems are a network of, or join,  private spaces or 
actions or initiatives or bodies. Market (as a space of legitimate 
trading) or  media or health services or the education sector, aren't 
they too interconnected private spheres? But how does that exclude 
application of the concept of publicness (which in a good part means 
some kind of government-ness) to these institutions or institutional 
systems. Are they not regulated, are they not taxed..... Internet is 
just another one of them. Unique in its own way, as are also all others 
in their particular ways.

Privateness or publicness is not the real issue in judging what is 
unique about the Internet. It is its globalness, represented in the 
phrase 'death of distance'. This features creates considerable 
challenges to its governance and we do need to grapple with them. 
However positing the Internet as intrinsically and uniquely 'private' 
and antithetical to any notions or institutions of public-ness is either 
naive or, if deliberate, a part of the neoliberal design of marketising 
all social institutions and relationships in a manner that benefits the 
already most powerful.

Parminder

On Tuesday 12 July 2011 07:08 PM, Daniel Kalchev wrote:
>
>
> On 12.07.11 15:19, Paul Lehto wrote:
>> On 7/12/11, Daniel Kalchev<daniel at digsys.bg>  wrote:
>>
>>> Internet has happened and was successful decades ago, only because 
>>> it is
>>> the largest independently owned PRIVATE network of networks in the
>>> world. Nobody own the Internet. Many own small parts of it. Governments
>>> resisted Internet for many, many years, throwing large amounts of money
>>> and political pressure as a means to stop it's development.
>> The internet originated in governmental efforts and could not exist
>> without the robust legal infrastructure and some physical
>> infrastructure provided by governments. Granted, the government
>> physical infrastructure component is more limited than in many other
>> areas, and governments have both been silent and/or had their further
>> involvement in the internet resisted in some powerful quarters, but
>> governmental silence or resistance to government does not mean
>> government doesn't play a formative role, past and present.
>
> This all is very complex and can be viewed very differently, depending 
> on what you know about the history of Internet development and 
> different scenarios in different parts of the world.
>
> Internet "originated" in the US, in a form of a USG initiative, or a 
> project. That project however was severely limited to military and 
> scientific usage. Then Internet came to Europe and the rest of the 
> world and it is there where Internet developed into what we know it 
> today.
>
> It was curious in say, 1992, when there was well developed Internet 
> infrastructure outside the US, providing access to everyone, yet the 
> "US part of the Internet" was strictly not available to individuals or 
> companies and all government contract insisted on ISO protocol 
> compliance - meaning, no TCP/IP protocols.
>
> Governments in most other countries were not much different. They were 
> completely ignorant and if they did something, that was to try to 
> protect the incumbent monopoly telecoms. Not surprisingly -- in most 
> countries governments had big say in that 'businesses' operation -- or 
> the other way around..
>
>
>
>> To give but one example:  Who would deny that ICANN was started by the
>> US government, or that even after "freeing" ICANN that the US
>> government in particular does not retain some forms of actual or
>> potential power or influence on ICANN?
>
> ICANN was created, because USG wanted to stop an outgoing attempt to 
> "steal" the Internet. I myself, although participating in the agenda, 
> could not claim I know all of the hidden agendas. But in any case, the 
> idea of ICANN to create private entity with wide stakeholder 
> participation. This was successful in some areas and not much in 
> other, but there are still chances.
>
>> Your CAPITALIZED assertion that the internet is PRIVATE combined with
>> its attempt to give all credit for the internet to the private sector
>> is a distortion of the facts, past and present.  The internet is
>> essentially "more private" than other sectors.
>
> English is not my native language. My usage of 'private' is to 
> indicate non-governmental. For example, I view university networks, 
> part of the Internet as 'private', although in many cases these are 
> created with taxpayer money and in some countries might be considered 
> government controlled.
>
>> But, what "private" really means in this area is that large corporate
>> "stakeholders" in the internet directly and de facto make the law of
>> the internet, via contracts and terms of service that are then
>> enforced by governmental courts around the world.
>
> This is true too. But again, my usage of 'private' does not envision 
> the large corporations, that often share the same board of directors 
> with a governments ministries and such. Internet is successful, 
> because it is not controlled by governments and by large corporations. 
> It is not so much about free trade, than for unrestricted (unlicensed 
> etc) connectivity. The 'small' internet participants combined are more 
> important than the few large players -- who, like governments, come 
> and go.
>
>> And, nor COULD the internet be entirely private, even in theory:
>> Even the most radical libertarian "free" market theorists agree that a
>> rather robust series of governmental involvement in the form of
>> contract laws and so forth are necessary structures to support "free,
>> private" markets.  There's a great deal of choice in how those
>> contract rules are drafted, and debate as to what rules best support
>> "free markets" even among like-minded theorists.
>
> There are several different issues here.
>
> One issue is with the government's role to create the framework for 
> day to day life. This is primarily why governments exist and why they 
> are granted so much power. This is also the reason people pay taxes, 
> obey laws etc. The governments need to be careful with the Internet 
> however, because it is so much different than other things they have 
> to regulate.
>
> The other issue is the desire of large corporations for more power. 
> They will do whatever it takes to lobby any government to pass laws 
> that suit their goals. So far, this has been fruitless, because in a 
> while they come to realize Internet is not reacting the way they 
> expect -- it is so much different.
>
> If you realize that Internet is an voluntary interconnection of 
> networks, each of which is independently (privately) owned and 
> operated, that there are groupings for various reasons, common goals, 
> even fights or wars -- you will see how similar this is to the society 
> that consists of interconnected individuals. There have been many 
> different models to manipulate individuals, with varying success. The 
> Internet might have already passed the capitalist and proletariat era...
>
> But how all this relates to taxation is a different topic. :)
>
> Daniel
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