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

Wed Jul 13 11:01:04 EDT 2011

While at it, I must respond to two more issues raised by Milton

One, about practicality of working 10000 tax jurisdictions. While we do 
believe that there is a possibility of better coordination through 
global treaties etc, a pat reply is: if global systems can so 
aggressively be built to trace and obtain  private IP related 
entitlements vis a vis Internet based virtual flows/ exchanges of 
thousands of corporations, why cant public entitlements be traced and  
obtained.

Second, Milton writes somewhere that his prime issue is with regulation 
which is what this thread started with. Milton, are you seriously 
against application of consumer protection law vis a vis Internet based 
commercial transactions (the Taiwanese instance that started this 
debate)? If not, who should make, apply and enforce such law if not the 
local jurisdictions to which you seem clearly opposed?

I am completely unable to understand how someone can be arguing against 
the local government's right (indeed, obligation) to protect its 
citizens against economic or other injustices and offences that may be 
caused through the use of the Internet just because it is the Internet. 
Does this also extend to cyber crime? If someone over and through the 
Internet causes damage to my data and my laptop, or even its software, 
should I have no recourse? What exactly are you driving at?

Parminder

On Wednesday 13 July 2011 07:52 PM, parminder wrote:
> Phillipe (and Milton)
>
> Everyone agrees that there is a new situation and new forms of tax 
> regimes need to be worked out (while obviously means that, as you say, 
> old ones are difficult to work/ enforce) .... I did not see anyone 
> claim otherwise in the present discussion. However, the newness of the 
> situation and need for appropriate response should not be used as an 
> excuse to declare some part of our social  structure as out of bounds 
> for taxes, polity and public systems. This is the sole point of 
> contention in this debate. This is what Milton and Daniel seem to be 
> trying to do.
>
> Milton says 10,000 jurisdictions cannot work. He wants to keep 
> ignoring the fact that Michael, who initially raised the issue, lee 
> and I, have said that we should therefore work towards some kind of 
> global agreement to see that is most practical as well as fair to all. 
> Milton however does not come out with any alternative system of 
> taxation and legitimate regulation of Internet activity while he keeps 
> saying it is silly (BTW, Milton, you have said it enough number of 
> times now) that 10000 jurisdictions should apply. So, he, and 
> apparently some others here, want to simple use this 'new situation' 
> opportunity to declare an important and growing part of our social 
> structure and systems simply out of bound for taxes, polity and public 
> systems. Now, Milton, if this is not so, can you specially spell out 
> what new arrangements do you propose that are fair and just to all 
> (yes, including social and economic justice), instead of keeping on 
> vaguely referring to new publics or whatever it is. You especially owe 
> us your exact response to and recommendation for this new situation, 
> including the appropriate tax and regulation regime, since you have 
> been accusing Paul of abstractness, and saying that you will only 
> engage if clear facts are referred to, and accusing some others, 
> including me, of ducking real issues . So maybe it is your turn to 
> de-abstract and mention the new governance regime that you propose.
>
> Parminder
>
>
>
> On Wednesday 13 July 2011 06:41 PM, Philippe Blanchard wrote:
>> I follow-up Daniel's analysis.
>> In his example, he clearly demonstrates that we are in a situation for which the classical rules based on physical territory cannot apply. Eventhough those rules proved useful, they were designed more than 200 years ago (Beaumarchais- 24 January 1732 – 18 May 1799-  worked on Intellectual property consideration and set the basis of main of our current IP laws).
>>
>> We all know that those rules cannot longer apply as is and the question is then  to review what is the scope that can embrace the fact we are moving, we buy "stuff " in one country to be used in another country... and when those "stuff" are intangibles, their materiality (or lack of) clearly conflicts with the classical, material rules we used to abide by.
>>
>> I am afraid we cannot go further if we still try to cut&paste rules that were designed hundreds of years ago to the world we now live in. Internet governance and intangibles taxation require the creation (or the mobiilization) of a meta-structure, above the national levels... And for me, it needs to be a UN-type agency.
>>
>> Philippe
>>
>>
>>
>> On Jul 13, 2011, at 2:53 PM, Daniel Kalchev wrote:
>>
>> Interesting discussion indeed.
>>
>> What is an application? What you pay for, when you buy software? Aren't you paying for the right to use the application? How are taxes collected on rights to use? Who is taxed -- the party that gives the right, or the party that receives the right?
>>
>> Does the application have physical location? Does it reside on my iPad flash storage and if it does, can I take it from there and put it in another physical place? Or does it reside "somewhere" in the Internet cloud?
>>
>> What if the application is web based, "resides" and "runs" somewhere, but I "use" it here?
>>
>> Could you also explain to me who collects taxes when:
>>
>> Apple in California sold me the application.
>> I purchased it while in Oslo (Norvay), then used it while staying at the Frankfurt (Germany) airport and continued to use it back home in Varna (Bulgaria).
>>
>> Internet does not have 'place' and it also does not do anything with 'physical' objects. Both these things are the foundation of the current taxation system.
>>
>> Daniel
>> ____________________________________________________________
>> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>>     governance at lists.cpsr.org
>> To be removed from the list, visit:
>>     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>>
>> For all other list information and functions, see:
>>     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
>> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>>     http://www.igcaucus.org/
>>
>> Translate this email:http://translate.google.com/translate_t
>>
>>
>> ____________________________________________________________
>> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>>       governance at lists.cpsr.org
>> To be removed from the list, visit:
>>       http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>>
>> For all other list information and functions, see:
>>       http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
>> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>>       http://www.igcaucus.org/
>>
>> Translate this email:http://translate.google.com/translate_t
>>
>>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20110713/9b76dc38/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.cpsr.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t