Hello Karl Peters,<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 12:16 AM, Karl E. Peters <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:karl.peters@bridgecompanies.com">karl.peters@bridgecompanies.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c"><div><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 10pt;"> Very well stated! I might just comment that in many areas very soon, and in more later, it will not even be cable, but rather wireless providers that carry most of the freight and are best positioned to capture their markets. <br>
In a brief moment of fairness to the cable TV companies though, they brought us MANY stations we would never have had, even in major broadcast markets, and for some more rural markets where even "local" stations were not clear, vastly improved viewing ability and convenience. Unlike the internet, however, what preceeded cable is still available for free if you live where you can recieve it and are satisfied with the limited choices. <br>
</span></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br>That is a fair observation. Often in presenting the Civil Society views most of us focus only on challenging the negative moves by business or government that what we write reads like an attempt to depict business or government as evil. The focus was in correcting what is wrong so the good things that needed to be said about cable companies did not feature in my comment, it is very fair on your part to have brought that up. <br>
<br>Most participants of the Civil Society are moderate, balanced people. I haven't seen many with a "holier than thou" attitude - holier than business and holier than governments. Multistakeholderism does not work by asking all other stakeholders to stay out of the room. Cable companies have done a lot of good work, telcos have done a lot of good work, proprietary business corporations in IT and Internet have done a lot of good work, but the problem is that many of these companies still fail to see how the magic works on the Internet. <br>
<br>At a point of time when hotmail, yahoo and several email services were running email services with rules such as log in at least once a month to keep your account alive and pay $240 a year for a premium account with TEN M E G A B I T S of storage, Google went online with most so called premium features inherently bundled in (pop access, 9 months between log ins, message forward) and threw in a Gigabit of storage for free. Why did google do something so foolish as to give away the equivallent in a tiered storage model of a possible $1000 or $2000 for free? Fools? Rather intelligent, very intelligent entrepreneurs. Just that what did not reach the minds of msn and yahoo reached the Google entrepreneurs and they had figured out that it probably cost them less than a dollar or some amount in that realm to per user to offer all this to the user. Even if it is a dollar per user it was still foregoing the 'preemium' revenues that were perfectly justifiable under the established norms of Internet business at that point of time. But those who continued to follow the yahoolike models progressed at a rate that paled in comparison with the revolutionary Google model. That is Internet's magaic business model that caused the likes of Google and Skype to climb way above the traditional enterprises with narrower models. (Here I have refrained from commenting on some finer aspects of the Google model that requires to challenged)<br>
<br>The Civil Society isn't asking the bandwidth providers shut down shop and disappear. All that it is asking them to do is try and figure out how the magic business models work on the Internet. Thuraya, by the traditional model ought to have been the richest telco in the world today, because by far its revneue model was superficially the most lucrative model - the user had to be something in the realm of $6 per minute even if he or she was calling the person next door. What happened? A more visible example is that the phone companies progressed to much higher levels of inherenet networth and market capitalization as they slided proices from a dollar or two per minute to a cent or two per minute (India).<br>
<br>We are pro-business in our suggestion that the business corporations move to the Internet model. The magic is intriguing but I can say that it works and works well. If you don't belive in the Internet magic and instead believe in archaic business practices and assume that you will have an internet with free access to eBay and Amazon (who will pay to you in bulk backdoor) and charge us to access anything worthwhile, the models will fail so miserably that it would hurt your own fortunes.<br>
</div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div><div class="Wj3C7c"><div><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 10pt;"> Bringing this analogy back to the internet, now; can you imagine a discounted internet service that only brings you ".org" access, for example, but for a cheaper price? Of course not! This foolishness evident in limiting access for cheaper services in the internet is exactly the battle the TLDA is waging for open access to bring quality-run non-legacy TLDs to a wider audience, as well. We will provide a carefully researched "recommended root" and the information needed to make the simple and free changes to recieve and offer "more channels" for the same price. Just as with cable networks, some will carry better programming or content than others. Some may well never be "watched" by most people; but everything will be available for those that need or desire it. The only resistance will come from those with a vested interest in a narrow and controlled market that funnels more of the money to fewer end profit makers. ICANN, with its relationship with NetSol and a few others is the perfect example of this narrow approach, solely in the interest of capturing more dollars.</span></div>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br>Without going into the nuances, in general, it is NOT unfair on the part of ICANN to 'capture' a share of the money from names and numbers. The trade reaps revenues from names and numbers and if ICANN charges at source a dollar or two, it would help ICANN financially sustain itself in the face of a growing administrative (or co-ordinative) burden. But in the process it should exercise all the caution not to revert the Internet back to the era of DNS war and cause the Internt to be an Internet of mutliple Network Solutions.<br>
<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div><div class="Wj3C7c"><div><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 10pt;"> It may well be this kind of narrowness that makes the "more channels" a feature the "renegade" providers can use as a lure to draw people from the traditional providers. ICANN has the choice to open up to the many well-run TLDs already operating as the initially intended "test beds" or to try to grasp ever tighter onto what it holds. It is the exactly that very tight grasp, though, that will force an ever increasing portion of their subjects to escape to fulfill their needs. ICANN can either lead the way as it was supposed to do, or get left behind with a few grains of sand in their tight grasp and their once controlled empire scattered all around them, running free.<br>
<br>Sincerely,<br>Karl E. Peters, President<br>Top--Level Domain Association, Inc.<br></span></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br>Thank you <br>-- <br>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy<br><a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy">http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy</a><br>
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-------- Original Message --------<br>
Subject: Re: [governance] The End of the Internet in 2012?<br>
From: "Sivasubramanian Muthusamy" <<a href="mailto:isolatedn@gmail.com" target="_blank">isolatedn@gmail.com</a>><br>
Date: Thu, December 18, 2008 11:52 am<br>
To: <a href="mailto:governance@lists.cpsr.org" target="_blank">governance@lists.cpsr.org</a>, "Fouad Bajwa" <<a href="mailto:fouadbajwa@gmail.com" target="_blank">fouadbajwa@gmail.com</a>><br>
<br>
Hello Fouad Bajwa,<br><br><br>It is an interesting article that explains in plain language how the big bandwidth providers are taking the Internet closer to the cable subscription model. Todd Lammle draws an analogy of how the free television progressed (or commercially degenerated) to an expensive subscription model. I recall an IGF workshop where Virginia talked the commercial compulsions on the user forcing the user to subscribe to 96 unwanted channels in order to get the four channels that he or she really wants to watch. <br>
<br>These are narrow business models, we as television viewers were bought into such models even before we realized what was happening. But on the Internet this may not really happen because we are all a little more experienced and educated now. <br>
<br>What sets the Internet apart is the way the user is increasingly becoming a formal part of the policy making process, The user is not going to be taken in unawares any longer. There are moves by the telcos and other bandwidth providers to reshape the Internet into one with unfair business models, but I don't feel that it is going to be easy for these interests to achieve what they want.<br>
<br>If such efforts persist and if the user is left with a sitation where there are no options or with a few unpleasant options, the user would not take it this time submissively. The unpleasant outcome for business may not manifest as NEO Internetworks providing pirated access - that may not happen given the present trends towards technologies and policies for greater security. What is likely to emerge is a user owned, alternate network(s) on social enterprise models that is (are) well inter-connected, more open, more legitimate and even more deeply rooted in the fundamental internet values. <br>
<br>There are business models, well within the present framework for neutral and affodable access, that could keep the bandwidth providers flourishing. Instead of focusing on such broader business models, some business interests lobby and even clandestinely work towards narrower business models, but on the Internet any progress by such business interests would be suicidal. <br>
<br>Same can be said of Government policies that are unbalanced. What happens when one Government tries to maintain some form of supremacy? Is that working with China? Beginning with China a few other nationas could fully or partially protest and that could lead to fragmentation of the Internet which would lead to a totally opposite outcome : rather than enhancing a nation's hold, it would end up totally breaking the Internet away from any possibility of any further benevolent influence.<br>
<br>It is not in the commerical interest of business coporations to work towards a cable-like model and it is not in the interest of Governments to seek to maintain an unbalanced form of control.<br><br>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy<br>
India.<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 9:22 PM, Fouad Bajwa <font dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:fouadbajwa@gmail.com" target="_blank">fouadbajwa@gmail.com</a>></font> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
An interesting article that has provoked me to even write a book on<br> the subject. What I see here is the emergence of Local or NEOn e<br> Internetworks or basically Internet NEO-Clans that will be providing<br> pirated or hacked access to consumers that will not be able to afford<br>
the huge charges imposed by corporations?:<br> <br> The End of the Internet by 2012?<br> <br> by Todd Lemmle <a href="http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/" target="_blank">http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/</a><br>
C<br> <br> </blockquote></div> user is driven against a wall, the adverse outcome may not really be the emegence of NEO clans providing hacked access, but rather an <br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 9:22 PM, Fouad Bajwa <font dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:fouadbajwa@gmail.com" target="_blank">fouadbajwa@gmail.com</a>></font> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">An interesting article that has provoked me to even write a book on<br> the subject. What I see here is the emergence of Local or NEOn e<br>
Internetworks or basically Internet NEO-Clans that will be providing<br> pirated or hacked access to consumers that will not be able to afford<br> the huge charges imposed by corporations?:<br> <br> The End of the Internet by 2012?<br>
<br> by Todd Lemmle <a href="http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/" target="_blank">http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/</a><br>
<br> <br> --<br> <br> Regards.<br> --------------------------<br> Fouad Bajwa<br> ____________________________________________________________<br> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:<br> <a href="mailto:governance@lists.cpsr.org" target="_blank">governance@lists.cpsr.org</a><br>
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