We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

US Ignite: The Future of the Internet is Government Controlled

Click here to access article by Susanne Posel from Occupy Corporatism

Whenever I see or hear the words "public-private partnership", alarm bells go off in my head. This is how the latest initiative coming from the executive branch is being packaged and sold along with extravagant claims of improved broadband service. The author expresses her skepticism:
...do not let the corporate-funded dog-and-pony show fool you. As the US government begins plans to take-over, re-shape and sell back to you through corporate relationships, a new version of the internet, we should all we wary.
Sascha Segan of PCMag is very doubtful. He writes:
The broadband crisis in the U.S. is about slow, expensive connections in the "last mile" to people's homes, not about backbone capacity and 3D medical imaging. The government could do something about that, but it won't.
Craig Settles of Fighting the Next Good Fight is openly critical:
Will the government require the organizations that lease the land to build open access networks? Let’s cut to the chase. Broadband in the U.S. sucks in large part because we have little or no competition to the dominant telco or cableco at the local level. If this Executive Order lacks an open access requirement, incumbents can just roll into cheap deals courtesy of the Feds and then freeze out any meaningful competition.  Think it won’t happen? Then you haven’t been paying attention.