IP: more on Qwest buckles

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 17:15:12 -0700
> From: "Andrew Russell" <andrew.russell () colorado edu>
> To: farber () cis upenn edu
> X-Sender: russelal () ucsub colorado edu
> Subject: Re: IP: Qwest buckles
>
> Dave -
>
> Joe Nacchio (Qwest Chairnan and CEO) gave a lunchtime speech today at a 
> conference on "The Regulation of Information Platforms" today at the 
> University of Colorado-Boulder. Most of the speech he complained about the 
> current regulatory framework and shared some of the problems he faces as 
> the plaything of capital markets and a man whose company needs government 
> subsidies to move us to a broadband future.
>
> In the beginning of his talk he noted that we would see the privacy 
> opt-in/out announcement in the papers tomorrow, and wanted to comment. 
> Among other things, he contrasted the freedom of information to the 
> freedom of privacy.  He cited the First Amendment as a support for freedom 
> of information, and then claimed that the freedom of privacy is not a 
> Constitutional right. The implication, of course, is that Jefferson, 
> Madison and the other Framers of the Constitution would have wanted Qwest 
> to profit from selling information about my account and behavior.
>
> Several audience members shuddered visibly.
>
> I turned to the woman next to me to see if she was as stunned as I was, 
> and she said the only reason Qwest would do this is because they found out 
> that Arizona was going to sue them.
>
> Incidentally - this is now a moot point - others have complained about the 
> problems with Qwest's opt-out customer service (either the number didn't 
> work, the office was closed, etc).  In the interest of giving credit where 
> it's due, several days ago I placed a phone call to opt out of their 
> information-selling scheme. The Qwest customer service guy was civil, 
> almost pleasant, and the entire call took less than a minute.
>
> Andy Russell

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