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> No company has the
> right to actively censor information from its clients.
What utter rubbish, if the company I work for was forced to give all
information to our clients we would be out of business! A company has a
right to decide what information is passed on to its clients.
>> What next, BMW being forced to give you the 180 horsepower engine for the
>> price of the 140 horsepower version, because it's no extra cost for them?
>> (they are the same engine)
>
> Your slippery slope argument is rather hilarious.
>
> What do car engines have to do with freedom of information and
> censorship?
I was replying to Andrew's point, which you conveniently deleted before
replying...
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On 21-4-2009 11:06, scott wrote:
>> I'm pretty sure that if ISPs started selling their bandwidth to the
>> highest bidders and blocking the rest, that would break at least a dozen
>> of fair commerce statutes. That's completely akin to boycotting.
>
> Happens already, here at work we pay extra to get guaranteed bandwidth,
> we have priority over people who pay the "cheap" residential rate.
>
>> Because of basic human rights of freedom of information, and fair
>> commerce principles?
>
> How about the human right to run a company in a way to maximise profits?
There is no such human right.
>> An ISP has no right to start censoring information
>
> You are talking like there is some basic human right that you should
> have access to every single website in existance? Why on Earth should
> that be the case?
1) because that is how the internet started and has been run for almost
it's entire existence. "I'll pass on you packages because I know someone
else will pass on mine if and only if everybody does that".
2) because you can not know which sites you can not see.
3) insert your slippery slope argument of your choice.
>> No, it's not like that. It's like your local newagent using technical
>> measures to stop you from accessing competitor publications.
>
> "Sorry, we don't sell that publication" is a perfectly valid and legal
> phrase. Same as how in pubs that sell Coke they don't sell Pepsi. Why
> should you be able to force companies to offer everything, if they don't
> want to that's their choice.
We don't sell is valid, but I think Warp was more thinking along the
lines of not selling and making sure nobody else can sell it. More like
Coke buying all the countries main distributors, and forcing them not to
transport Pepsi. Possibly legal in the US but definitely illegal in the EU.
Imagine also that it is not for something irrelevant like drinks but for
political relevant information.
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From: Warp
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:40:00
Message: <49ed9470@news.povray.org>
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scott <sco### [at] scott com> wrote:
> > No company has the
> > right to actively censor information from its clients.
> What utter rubbish, if the company I work for was forced to give all
> information to our clients we would be out of business! A company has a
> right to decide what information is passed on to its clients.
You really like to taunt, don't you? I do honestly think that you
understood what I meant.
I have to admit that you are really good at nitpicking.
> I was replying to Andrew's point, which you conveniently deleted before
> replying...
In the same way you ignored what he *meant* with is point and nitpicked
about the *literal* meaning of whatever he said, sidetracking to some
completely ridiculous slippery slope.
The only way you could nitpick any worse is if you took a dictionary and
started looking for the most obscure meanings of individual words written
by people and started using that as your counter-arguments.
--
- Warp
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From: Invisible
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:44:58
Message: <49ed959a@news.povray.org>
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>> Where's the problem?
>
> I was talking about the logic of argumenting that limiting choice is
> increasing choice.
And, as I said, this is basic politics. Claim to be doing something for
reason X when in fact you're doing it for reason Y.
I'm sure that at least one or two of these "green initiatives" are
actually being implemented because they make somebody quite a lot of
money, nothing to do with saving the plannet. Indeed, if it's making
somebody money, it's probably _harming_ the planet...
And besides, in the strictest sense of the word, you are increasing the
cardinality of the set of available products. You're removing the option
everybody wants so you can replace it with lots of more expensive
options that nobody wants. ;-)
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From: scott
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:46:33
Message: <49ed95f9@news.povray.org>
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>> You are talking like there is some basic human right that you should have
>> access to every single website in existance? Why on Earth should that be
>> the case?
>
> 1) because that is how the internet started and has been run for almost
> it's entire existence. "I'll pass on you packages because I know someone
> else will pass on mine if and only if everybody does that".
Sure, but that doesn't mean it's illegal not to.
> We don't sell is valid, but I think Warp was more thinking along the lines
> of not selling and making sure nobody else can sell it.
But they are not doing that. If the directive is passed through, there is
nothing to stop an ISP deciding to "sell" or pass-on every single website -
it's the individual ISP's choice.
> More like Coke buying all the countries main distributors, and forcing
> them not to transport Pepsi. Possibly legal in the US but definitely
> illegal in the EU.
I didn't get the impression that this was what the directive was going to do
at all. It seemed to me like (in your analogy) the directive would be
giving the distributors the right to decide what they transported, and if
they didn't want to transport (say) Pepsi they couldn't be forced to. It
just seems silly to me that something forcing that exists already.
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From: Warp
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:48:53
Message: <49ed9685@news.povray.org>
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scott <sco### [at] scottcom> wrote:
> > I'm pretty sure that if ISPs started selling their bandwidth to the
> > highest bidders and blocking the rest, that would break at least a dozen
> > of fair commerce statutes. That's completely akin to boycotting.
> Happens already, here at work we pay extra to get guaranteed bandwidth, we
> have priority over people who pay the "cheap" residential rate.
You really are the king of nitpicking, don't you?
Maybe I didn't express myself clearly enough. Is there something in the
word "to block" that I'm missing and could cause different interpretations?
Because I can't believe you are saying that your ISP is blocking access
to your competitors' websites from its clients.
> > Because of basic human rights of freedom of information, and fair
> > commerce principles?
> How about the human right to run a company in a way to maximise profits?
Have you ever heard of the concept of fair commerce? Fair competition?
Monopoly laws? Ring a bell?
> > An ISP has no right to start censoring information
> You are talking like there is some basic human right that you should have
> access to every single website in existance? Why on Earth should that be
> the case?
So you are saying that active censorship is perfectly fine from the
point of view of basic human rights?
> > No, it's not like that. It's like your local newagent using technical
> > measures to stop you from accessing competitor publications.
> "Sorry, we don't sell that publication" is a perfectly valid and legal
> phrase.
You really like nitpicking, don't you? You do understand what I'm
writing, but you are deliberately nitpicking, just for the sake of
argument.
> Same as how in pubs that sell Coke they don't sell Pepsi. Why
> should you be able to force companies to offer everything, if they don't
> want to that's their choice.
Clearly you don't want to discuss, you only want to argue. You don't
want to aknowledge you understand what I'm saying, you only want to
nitpick and split hairs.
Do you understand the concept of censorship?
--
- Warp
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From: scott
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:49:09
Message: <49ed9695@news.povray.org>
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> I have to admit that you are really good at nitpicking.
I have a great teacher :-)
>> I was replying to Andrew's point, which you conveniently deleted before
>> replying...
>
> In the same way you ignored what he *meant* with is point and nitpicked
> about the *literal* meaning of whatever he said, sidetracking to some
> completely ridiculous slippery slope.
Actually, I was just using an example to point out that his argument was
invalid. Without using the example, I would just say that there is no
reason why a company should have to do something just because it doesn't
cost them anything.
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From: Warp
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:57:02
Message: <49ed986e@news.povray.org>
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scott <sco### [at] scottcom> wrote:
> I didn't get the impression that this was what the directive was going to do
> at all. It seemed to me like (in your analogy) the directive would be
> giving the distributors the right to decide what they transported, and if
> they didn't want to transport (say) Pepsi they couldn't be forced to. It
> just seems silly to me that something forcing that exists already.
Yet it's nothing like that.
There's a very fundamental difference between choosing whose physcial
goods you transport and actively blocking information which would otherwise
be available (at no additional cost to the company).
If an ISP started censoring all websites related to a political party,
should they be allowed to do that? What if all the ISPs started blocking
all political parties except one? Should they be allowed to do that?
No, they don't have the right to actively censor information which would
otherwise be available.
--
- Warp
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From: scott
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 05:57:09
Message: <49ed9875@news.povray.org>
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> Do you understand the concept of censorship?
Yes, but when it costs a company money to provide the information, IMO the
company should not be forced to provide everything in existence for a fixed
price. That is not censorship, that is just business. If an ISP wants to
charge more for bittorrent than http, or more to access BBC iPlayer because
it generates 10x the bandwidth, they should be allowed to, and that has
*nothing* to do with censorship.
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From: scott
Subject: Re: The EU and the "Telecoms Package" directives
Date: 21 Apr 2009 06:02:25
Message: <49ed99b1@news.povray.org>
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> If an ISP started censoring all websites related to a political party,
> should they be allowed to do that? What if all the ISPs started blocking
> all political parties except one? Should they be allowed to do that?
It wouldn't be very popular, but IMO it shouldn't be illegal. An ISP is
just providing you a service for money, they should be legally allowed to
offer whatever service they want, whether they only give you access to 1
website, 1000, half, 99% or 100% of them. The ISP business is open and
follows market demands, they will provide for whatever the customers want.
> No, they don't have the right to actively censor information which would
> otherwise be available.
The point is it *wouldn't* otherwise be available, the ISP is providing you
a service which you are paying for, if you don't pay for it you don't get
access to the information at all. How does your "human right for all
information" work with half the population who can't even afford a computer,
yet alone an internet connection? Access to the entire internet is a costly
privilege, not a human right.
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