The Internet must not be proprietary

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Monopolies are bad.

I agree. Unfortunately the trend in North America is that choices are decreasing. This need not be a bad thing as long as the 'remaining' market players do a good job. But history has shown that once competition decreases, quality of service goes down, prices go up and the customer is left with less choice to go elsewhere when he wants to.

A good example is Microsoft. Despithe the 'decent' job they do at providing 'good enough' software in a near lock-in situation on the marketplace, the sad fact is that we all know so much more could have been achieved in the last 15 years. But competition (and thereby a lot of potential for creative inventions and parralel progress) has been pushed out of existance by Microsoft, partly by legal means, partly by illegal means. And largely by unethical means as we all know. So customers have suffered due to a big company abusing its power, and getting away with it. Supported by government (note that only the EU is standing up for customers in the marketplace, the US government doesn't step in).

Governments do indeed have a role in the marketplace.

As for the internet - the prospect of ultimate control of the internet by profit driven companies is scary. It will lead to less choice inevitably. Also for free speech.

Posted by: nizuse   Posted on: 11/24/07 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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