Don't you realize us po' folks on dialups are losing out on all that glorious Flash? 
Posted on 05/31/2004 6:46:28 PM PDT by wagglebee
John Kerry is not swaggering around with a Palm Pilot on his belt like former candidate Al Gore, but he’s more than anxious to project the image of the hip, computer-savvy guy who wants to spread the miracle of high-speed Internet to the darkest corners of the country.
The problem is that President Bush has also been riding the Internet bandwagon, promising to provide universal access to high-speed Internet by 2007. To help reach that target, he will order federal agencies to make it easier for companies to deploy the service. Furthermore, he is pushing Congress to make access to broadband permanently tax-free.
Kerry has been left with little more to do than take occasional potshots at the way Bush is proceeding down the Cyber highway – such as attacking Bush for not making the tax ban a part of earlier tax cut packages he offered.
Trying to keep Bush from stealing all the thunder, the Massachusetts senator is also pushing a bill already pending in Congress aimed at helping deploy broadband to underserved areas.
“The Bush broadband policies don’t do anything to provide the new resources that will be needed to deploy broadband in rural and urban areas and they are not addressing the regulatory barriers that prevent deployment,” explained a Kerry campaign spokesperson.
'Universal Service'
Part of the Kerry plan will likely include defining broadband as a universal service, a government program that helps funnel funds to subsidize service in low-income and expensive rural areas.
But adding high-speed Internet access to that category would be a potentially expensive way of expanding broadband investment, say detractors.
Meanwhile, the record shows that Kerry is a member of the Congressional Internet Caucus, a bipartisan group of over 150 members of the House and Senate working to educate their colleagues about the promise and potential of the Internet.
The Caucus also encourages members to utilize the Internet in communications with constituents and supports efforts to put more government documents online. The Internet Caucus Advisory Committee and the Internet Education Foundation host regular events and forums for policymakers, the press, and the public to discuss important Internet-related policy issues.
However, when the Senate voted recently to restore a ban on taxing Internet connections for four years -- stopping short of the permanent ban approved by the House, Kerry was one of only four senators who missed the vote.
Back in October 1998 when Kerry did answer the roll, he voted against allowing states to require companies who do business in their state solely by phone, mail, or the Internet to collect state sales taxes.
In 1996, Kerry voted Yes on telecomm deregulation.
Competing for Techie Support
For sure, the candidates’ stances on tech issues are hardly going to be the fulcrum upon which the election in November turns, but there a lot of cool voters out there in techie world and the guys with the deep pockets are -- to be sure -- plugged in to the issue.
Some of those coveted high-tech executives are backing George Bush’s re-election, figuring that Bush’s policies would be better for their businesses -- and therefore the country -- than what Democrat John Kerry proposes:
“I would say the conundrum is that for everyone to do well in the country, American businesses have to prosper again,” said cellphone pioneer Craig McCaw.
Former Microsoft executive Bob Herbold said Bush was the “spiritual force” behind a tax credit that has spurred research and development.
Peter Neupert, chairman of Drugstore.com, said he supports Bush’s decision to back electronic access to consumer health records. But Kerry has hardly struck out with the techies, attracting the backing of top executives of Google, E-Loan and Yahoo – all of whom have endorsed him for president. And Rob Glaser, chairman and CEO of RealNetworks, has given about $1 million to independent liberal political groups moving to defeating Bush in November.
However, the Bush camp has corralled the really big guy – Microsoft’s Bill Gates, who was savaged by the Clinton Justice Department and swayed by the skeptical Bush who signaled his distaste for the federal government’s antitrust case against Microsoft when he said he stood “on the side of innovation, not litigation.”
Sure enough during Bush’s first year in office, the feds agreed to settle the case with Microsoft.
Cachet
Not to be outdone, Kerry has reportedly tapped Apple CEO Steve Jobs as an informal advisor on technology issues. “Jobs is the man” in technology, Antony McShane, a Chicago-based intellectual property (IP) and technology attorney recently told MacNewsWorld, adding that the CEO’s addition to the Kerry campaign could add some needed cachet in this arena.
In the meantime, however, it may the High Court rather than either candidate that will decide if the poor folks stranded in the countryside get to rapidly download.
In a recent ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court said that states can bar cities and local governments from offering their own communications services.
About 150 local governments have built telecom networks -- many are electric utilities based in rural areas, where local phone companies provide no — or limited — broadband service.
Although these municipal governments are filling a need that the private sector isn't, the Court apparently buys the argument from the phone companies that they should not have to compete with the governments that regulate them.
Because cities have no inherent federal right to provide telecommunications service, only states can grant or rescind that permission, the Court said.
The upshot: Ruling could narrow phone and high-speed Internet choices for rural residents,
‘The Digital Divide’
From the Senate floor Kerry has said:
“[A]ffordable high-speed Internet access is becoming an important national economic necessity. In order for our businesses – from the largest to the smallest – to sell products and services on-line, they all need to be able to reach more people faster through the Internet.
“Businesses located outside of urban centers – the only place where broadband is widely deployed – are losing out.
“Consumers, too, face this same type of digital divide. In order to benefit from the often lower costs of purchasing products over the Internet, consumers need to be able to complete their purchases with confidence that their transactions will be completed quickly and correctly. This is the commercial aspect of the digital divide.
“I am proud to have worked closely with Senator Rockefeller and Senator Snowe to introduce legislation that would address the critical problem of connecting businesses and homes in high-poverty areas of cities to the Internet by creating a tax credit for companies that deploy high-speed…”
Something tells me that the FCC would write traffic tickets and give free playstations to schoolchildren if they thought they could get the funds to do it.
So much for having good reliable internet. We all know what happens when government tries to regulate an industry. Oh, wait a second, the net's already messed up...hahaha, silly me (sigh).
Agreed. From what part of the Constitution do they draw the authority to raid the treasury and provide free internet?
Actually, the Telecommunications Act is what is holding back free enterprise on this. Because of the LAT lines set up to define long distance, those trying to provide DSL have to contract with the long distance companies just to cross one foot of line. I lobbied for a bill that would remove this restriction but it died in the Senate.
Ok, that's it, I've had it. I'm going to stop being an achiever and let myself fall onto the poor/welfare rolls so I can have government falling over itself to take care of me.
Haven't you heard? We're "compassionate" and it's "for the children".
That implies the Universal Service Fee won't be just for telephones, you'll be taxed for internet access as well. Looks like this time, Kerry was for it after he was against it.
Don't you realize us po' folks on dialups are losing out on all that glorious Flash?
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JOHN KERRY = Enemy of Vietnam Vets
http://www.TheAlamoFILM.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1320
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'Kerry has hardly struck out with the techies, attracting the backing of top executives of Google, E-Loan and Yahoo – all of whom have endorsed him for president. And Rob Glaser, chairman and CEO of RealNetworks, has given about $1 million to independent liberal political groups moving to defeating Bush in November.'
BAH!! And I have been putting the google toolbar on every pc I get near! Now I have to go and take em all off again!
Apple - Sucks. They've managed to get the rich and computer illiterate to buy their over-priced hardware on snob-appeal alone.
Yahoo - Sucks. Ads, ads, ads. And from what I'm hearing, most of the pop-ups on Yahoo are either bashing Bush or pushing for Kerry. Not to mention that their search engine sucks, too.
RealNetworks - Sucks. Hard. Don't get me started on Real! Their crappy media players are crammed with enough spyware to crash a teraflop-speed supercomputer. Not to mention the fact that it tries to change the file associations for EVERY type of media file you might have, including images (Quicktime pulls this crap, too. See above.), AND you have to run MSCONFIG or Services Editor to make it stop running on startup.
Google I can't figure out, though. Must be because it's run by a couple of kids who got rich quick and still have leftist "ideals" muddying-up their heads.
I don't want to go off on a rant here, but as far as this whole scheme of "universal broadband access" goes, I'll pass. I don't want any more entitlement programs, EVER. Besides, in case you haven't noticed, the Internet is chock full of USDA Grade-A MORONS.
It's like this: Half of these Philistines can't figure out that the reason they can't get on the Net to buy their cheap ceramic knick-knacks on E-Bay is because they didn't plug the modem to the phone outlet. What is going to happen when these same idiots are tasked with having to set up their own high-speed wireless networks?
Madness! That's what will happen! Having most of them on slow, crappy dial-up access acts kind of like a firebreak for viruses, worms, and assorted computer-nasties. It's an imperfect firebreak (witness the havoc wrought by Sasser and its ilk), but imagine if every single chucklehead with dial-up suddenly had broadband, capable of spreading those nasties hundreds of times faster than their tortoise-like dial-up access. It would be the Internet version of Armageddon, Ragnarok, and Yawmid Din, all rolled into one.
And yes, I admit, freely, that I firmly believe that some people should not have access to any information technology more advanced than counting on their fingers and toes. If you can't even tie your own shoes, you have NOOOO business even attempting to use or operate a computer.
Don't believe me? I've seen it all.
I'm sure Bill Gates is happy to hear that - especially after he had to bail liberal pothead Jobs's company out of bankruptcy a few years back, to the tune of $125M if I recally correctly...
...top executives of Google, E-Loan and Yahoo – all of whom have endorsed him for president. And Rob Glaser, chairman and CEO of RealNetworks, has given about $1 million to independent liberal political groups moving to defeating Bush in November.
I keep hearing stuff like this, about the various Internet edifices - their controlling agents are a bunch of leftist scum. (No surprise, of course - look at the average computer geek - with few exceptions, if he's not a fat doper, he's a faggot).
So my question is... what is the necessary procedure for utilizing and draining as much of the resources from these cornhole establishments like Yahoo and Google, without allowing them to garner any remuneration in the process? How do they make their money - and how do I use them (in order to use up their resources) without doing anything that causes them to make money in the process??
I rather like the bush plan because it does more to encourage companies to provide it. That being said how urban centers dont have a public library with high speed access nowadays?
Never, ever click on an advertisers link on Yahoo or Google. As far as I can tell, that is their sole source of revenue; if the advertisers derive no benefit from their ads, then "poof" they quit buying ads.
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