from Bits and Bytes On Surfing the Internet, and Other Kid Stuff (Bob

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

from Bits and Bytes [ by the way Metcalfe co-invented the ethernet - Boggs
was there also in case we forget .. djf]


On Surfing the Internet, and Other Kid Stuff (Bob Metcalfe)


As the Internet enters its 25th tax-supported year, I say it's done
already. It should be privatized. Let's clear the way in cyberspace
for a new generation of entrepreneurs. I'm with Bill Gates, who
recently said in a San Francisco speech that the National Information
Infrastructure (NII) shouldn't cost taxpayers another red cent.


Many Internauts say commercializing the lnternet would destroy it.
That it's too fragile to endure free markets. That the profit motive
will lead to exploitation of the information have-nots. That the
future of our democracy depends on federally funded information
interstates with mandated universal access and guaranteed freedom of
speech. That surfing the Internet is fun, fun, fun -- please, Daddy,
don't take the T-bird away.


Whenever they catch me talking up commercialization, my many friends
in the Internet bureaucracy ask whether I've been on Mars. They point
out that most traffic on the Internet is already commercial, so what
am I worried about?


Well, I worry that Intercrats have been colonizing the Beltway since
the 1970s. That those directing the Internet's evolution do seem naive
about, unprepared for, disinterested in, and sometimes ideologically
opposed to commercializing cyberspace. I worry that unbilled
commercial traffic will soon bring the Internet to its knees. I worry
about Interprises now starting up as if their packet plumbing will
grow with them, and as if federal support for NII will not, with all
the good intentions in the world, pave their information superhighway
to hell.


Frankly, commercial traffic notwithstanding, what we're seeing is
still amateur night on the Internet. I see today's many new
Interpreneurs sitting brightly behind just so many lemonade stands in
cyberspace. (SOURCE: InfoWorld 11/1/93, p. 67)


(Bob Metcalfe, the publisher of InfoWorld, invented Ethernet in 1973.
Elsewhere in the article he urges all interested parties to join the
debate. As a first step he recommends reading Clinton's NII Agenda
Document. I heartily concur. If you're on the Internet, you can use
File Transfer Protocol (FTP) to anonymously access agenda.asc in the
/pub directory at ftp.ntia.doc.gov. Or just call the NII Office in
Washington at (202) 482-1840. See the Stupid Email Tricks section for
access using FTP Mail.)