Slowly, I step out of the Intercity train to Amsterdam, en route to university; I’m tired, I need some coffee. I check my watch and realise my metro leaves in 3 minutes, so I need to hurry in order to and buy me a coffee-to-go, and make it on time to the metro platform. I pick up my pace to run, as Mike Skinner would say.
There’s a huge queue in front of the coffee stand. I mumble something unfriendly under my breath about the people waiting in line, which relieves my usual morning crossness a little bit; however, as always, it somehow does not make the queue any shorter or faster. Painstakingly slow, the minutes pass by, and sooner rather than later, I see line 50 arrive– and leave. Again, I curse the queue; again, futile. Damn, now I need to call Lisa I’ll be late. But she’s on a different network.
Reluctantly I take my phone out of my pocket, and browse through my phonebook until I reach the ‘l’. My right thumb hovers over the ‘call’ button for a few seconds, while my brain is calculating what this little joke is going to cost me. She’s on KPN, I’m on T-Mobile. KPN, The Netherlands’ biggest mobile operator, made a monster-deal with the 2nd biggest operator, Vodafone, about 18 months ago which led to all the troubles we have today. T-Mobile, in my country a smaller competitor in the mobile market, like so many other mobile operators, was left out of the KPN-Vodafone deal, basically limiting its possible potential to being nothing but a minor player, having only roughly 3 percent of the market, while KPN-Vodafone together own about 90 percent.
Calling with a Vodafone account to a KPN account and vice versa is painless; it costs the same per minute and per call as calling to other Vodafone customers. However, if you’re stuck on one of the other operators, like so many who happened to have signed a two-year contract right before the megadeal was struck, you have to cough up. You were left with two evils: pay 5 times as much per minute as well as per call when calling to KPN-Vodafone customers than when those customers call among each other; or, accept commercials being inserted into your conversations every minute. And of course, one at the very beginning.
I opted for the former of the two evils. Many simply signed a second mobile contract to be relieved of the fuss; I cannot afford that. After completing my calculation, I come to the conclusion calling is in fact cheaper than sending a text message. We complete the conversation in 5 seconds, roughly telegram-style. Very upsetting when talking to one of your best friends. I’ll never get used to it.
A little later, during lunchtime; me and Lisa are sitting on the benches in the main hall of the Free University. I humbly apologise for the call, like I always do, and she does her usual ‘It’s ok, you can’t help it sweety’-line. I know it’s not the end of the world, but unpleasent it is, still. We chat away, forget about the stupid call, one of many, and go on to have a great day.
—
When I get home, I am relieved to jump behind my laptop, fire up MirandaIM, and be able to talk to all my friends, at once, without commercials, without paying extra to talk to Lisa, without all the fuss the mobile world in my country is enduring.
I sigh. How happy I am the United States did the right thing when backing Net Neutrality a few years ago, setting a precedent for the rest of the world. It saved the world so much fuss.
Disclaimer: This story was fictional. This was deductable via linguistic means, but I guess that rather complicated structure was a bit too much for some. Hence, this disclaimer.
If you do not mind my asking what is the rate for calls from T-Mobile to KPN?
For me (in the US) the cost is the same no matter who I call in the CONUS.
This whole thing was hypothetical, of course. I thought that was pretty obvious. I was trying to show what a lack of net neutrality could lead to.
Edited 2006-06-25 23:24
Could you add a disclaimer to the bottom? I was seriously confused untill I read the comments. Because I was trying hard to remember hearing anything about the KPN-Vodafone deal.
I thought it was going to be about the lack of caffeine, nice plot twist.
Regular Shyamalan over here.
Yeah, I was one that found it “a bit too much.” Didn’t realize it was a fictional metaphor about NN until reading the comments. To be fair, though, the only hint was the part about the US formalizing NN, and I just figured that was a quick-witted jab at a current event.
I didn’t think that the story was hypothetical. It reminded me of the situation here in Israel, where the three major cellular companies (Cellcom, Pelephone, and Orange) have a huge fixed fee (“Connectivity charge” they call it) for calling outside your network, let alone do text messaging. Also, the fourth provider, Amigo/MIRS, is no very accessible from outside, so it is not rare to see people that posses two or three phone from different companies.
If you are going to post a fictional example it would be nice to add a disclaimer for simpletons like myself. I thought you were using a real world example to point out the benefits of net neutrality.
Thanks for the clarification though.
EDIT: Maybe I am alone in this but I know very little about the phone rates in Europe. That my quadband worked fine over there and prepaid cards are cheaper is about the extent of my knowledge. When I read a news site I generally expect to read facts I guess.
Edited 2006-06-25 23:33
Thom’s sunday thing is op-ed…Ever read the editor’s little thing in your newspaper? It usually has to do with current affairs or a response to something that was mentioned in the last issue. It’s rarely anything but an opinion.
Don’t expect facts when reading opinions…you’ll always be disappointed.
While this article is a nice exercise in creative writing, I think it falls a bit short of offering any supportive evidence that the current draft of net neutrality legislation is right way to go. There are so many issues and arguments at hand, from the US global economic position, to our telecom infrastructure with regard to domestic emergencies and homeland security, to getting broadband access in rural areas (build out reqs), freedom of info, to capitalism in general. Check out the testimonies on cspan, read some info on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_neutrality. That’s where I’d start. The suggestion that without net netreuality we are doomed to incompatible services and market monopolies seems naive to me. However, as a hypothetical example… yes, I think it seems probable.
There are so many issues and arguments at hand, …
I personally am very confused about network neutrality. Almost everything I read about it makes me favor it. I want the internet to be like a sidewalk–no one limits who can walk on it, or when, or where, and no one collects tolls.
But the problem is–most of the politicians who support it, especially those often highlighted at http://www.savetheinternet.com/ seem to be the enemies of freedom on other issues.
I know that that veers into politics, which we studiously avoid here. But apparently network neutrality is a very political issue.
I honestly thought this was going to be about the effects of coffee and being cross in the morning. I’m dissapointed.
p.s. seriously, I thought it was going to be about coffee.
Yeah, I was hoping for some coffee stuff too. Then again, if t’was about coffee, some posters will go out and ask:
WTF?!?! I Thought this is OSNews not CoffeeNews or FoodNews!
🙂
hehe, man I so thought this was about coffee, or the lack of it.
I’ll bet that’s really good coffee in Amsterdam too.
I went and made a cup as soon as I started the 2nd paragraph…
Im extremely happy about net neutrality in the us, because there are 4 major cariers in my area(Verison, Cingular, Sprint, Tmoble, in order of popularity), and i have friends on all 4, paying extra would kill me more than my data plan (stupid cingular…1mb a month..)
from all that time on the #skyos channel i really believe you hated the US or was it just me
criticism != hate
I know it was made up, But I don’t think it’s very easy to follow. Maybe it was just a bad analogy, since you are talking about cell phones. Maybe it’s just they way they are different in different countries. In the US, it cost the same to call anyone, though with some plans people on the same carrier are free. And text messaging only cost you if you sign up for it, just an add on to your plan, otherwise it’s free. Doesn’t stop it from being an annoying way to contact someone.
Still, I thought this story was going to end with someone beating you down for being an impatient angry person talking on a phone while in line. I can’t stand those people. Really wish starbucks would add something to stores that makes cell phones non-functional. Or at the very least add “coffee nazi” where bad behavior in line, such as cell phone talking, or making your order complicated results in a one year ban from starbucks.
i thought it was about “people always have to find something to bitch about” and I was about to agree wholeheartedly!
Lets say they were included in the deal Every carrier is treated fairly and pays the same amount. But we all know T-mobile has the cheapest data plans…. now all of a sudden the network is dragging because of all the internet traffic that tmobile customers generate. So without tmobile knowing you just ‘accidently’ start dropping certain traffic. Next week the traffic slows down from internet surfers on Tmobile but you leave the ‘accidental’ packet filter in place. Doesn’t this also deal with net neutality?
What about that damn american idol voting? What about uploading photos and video from the phone to yahoo photos?
All net neutrality issues in my mind….
as far as it not being applicable….
Where/how do you think those cellphones get routed to califorina from virgina or from paris to madrid. I am sure it hits a hard link and passes thru various networks also and the same thing could applyI would think.
I dont think it is simply about the providers and what they pay though even though that is certainly where it all starts to breakdown and it is the first concern. I am waiting for micrsoft to partner with a tier1 and block all firefox traffic!
Ok, let’s see what I thought during reading this short and not really good thing:
– first I thought, this guy is stupid, if there’s a long line and 3 minutes to go, why does he stand in, is there no other place to get coffee in AMS ?
– then I thought, this guy is stupid, he’s thinking about cell phone costs when the issue is about talking to his girlfriend
– then I thought, this guy is stupid, he lives in AMS, probably earns 5x or more than I do, and can’t afford to just make phone calls without such fuss about prices ? (this is not about whether it could be cheaper or not)
– then at the end I thought, well, if this is everything this guy could come up as a story to back the net neutrality issue, than he’d really need some more coffee
– first I thought, this guy is stupid, if there’s a long line and 3 minutes to go, why does he stand in, is there no other place to get coffee in AMS ?
No, not at that station, no.
then I thought, this guy is stupid, he’s thinking about cell phone costs when the issue is about talking to his girlfriend
She ain’t my GF.
– then I thought, this guy is stupid, he lives in AMS, probably earns 5x or more than I do
I don’t live in A’dam, and trust me, I don’t make 5 times as much as you do. I’m a poor student.
then at the end I thought, well, if this is everything this guy could come up as a story to back the net neutrality issue, than he’d really need some more coffee
Or you need to make less assumptions.
This one was simply a bit more complicated than usual columns/articles here.
Isn’t the issue something like this?
Right now everyone connecting to the net buys a connection of some sort, with defined bandwidth parameters, and after that, what they do on it is of no concern to the bandwidth suppliers. In particular, if your traffic is search engine traffic, movies, code downloading, the bandwidth supplier has nothing to say and charges the same commercial terms. It makes no difference at the moment which site you visit, its all bits.
This is exactly like the phone system model. I buy 5 10 or 20 phone lines. The calls I make or receive and their profitability are of no concern to the phone company. The phone company has nothing to say about who I call, except by their location and tariffs. It cannot, for instance, charge one rate for calls to mail order, and another for calls to stockbrokers, in the same city.
It is also the postal service model. If I am receiving checks for 000’s of dollars, it makes no difference, I and my sender pay exactly the same, the going rate for a letter.
Now, if net neutrality goes, this could stop. We could then gradually slip into a different model, in which a bandwidth supplier would charge differently (or give different service levels, which is the same thing) based on their judgment of the value of the traffic.
There are two objections to this. First that the model is all wrong. It destroys predictability and opportunities for profit seeking behaviour. It moves cash flow for applications away from users of communications to providers.
Second, it makes censorship easy. It could just turn out that to access politically incorrect sites is very slow, that they find it very expensive to get connectivity, they end up in a special sort of usage code tariff. Precedents are many. If something can be used for censorship, it will be.
This is presumably the point of Thom’s comparison between mobile operators and the net in his imaginary future. In this imaginary future, net neutrality has vanished for mobile operators, but remained for the net. So there are innumerable complexities and price barriers for interconnection in mobiles, but none on the net. The article is asking: do you really want to see the net become like the imaginary future mobile scenario?
If not, do something about it.
PS. We may all want to learn that irony does not fly with OSNews readers….
Grief! Most of the people here are critiquing editorial style or lamenting that the article wasn’t about coffee. But you, Mr. Alcibiades, you are actually addressing the issue that the article was about.
kids these days are spoiled. I remember 300 baud modems. There should be some penalty for hogging bandwidth or people abuse it. I pay for a phone. Why should people get free phone service by abusing the internet?
It’s sad you think about phone-costs when trying to call one of yer, supposedly, best friends. For me it made your entire editorial less valid than it could’ve been.
Anyways… Does this mean the editorial on what’s wrong with Explorer will be posted next week?
It’s sad you think about phone-costs when trying to call one of yer, supposedly, best friends. For me it made your entire editorial less valid than it could’ve been.
Don’t take everything so damn literally. This is a column, reality is spun to serve a point I’m trying to make.
Go out and buy a newspaper every now and then, and read the columns in there. You’ll see similar premises.
Does this mean the editorial on what’s wrong with Explorer will be posted next week?
Yup.
Go out and buy a newspaper every now and then, and read the columns in there. You’ll see similar premises.
So your point is that something is okay as long as others do it too? Whatever works for you I guess…
So your point is that something is okay as long as others do it too? Whatever works for you I guess…
*sigh* My point is that columns, allthough not always of course, allow more freedom to play with reality to convey a point than a normal article does. If you expect everything that’s written to be an accurate, 100% representation of reality– you’ll be in for a surprise.
Don’t take everything so damn literally. This is a column, reality is spun to serve a point I’m trying to make.
Go out and buy a newspaper every now and then, and read the columns in there. You’ll see similar premises.
I detect some morning crossness.
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Here in switzerland the main phone company is offering an MSN-enabled gadget that for 15EUR a month allows unlimited IM on the go.[1]
I thought it was quite a stupid thing to own, but if you think to how much teenagers use sms (and how much they cost individually) I guess it’s quite a sweet deal.
What about IM integration on cellphones? Is it feasible? I think I would be quite interested in such thing.
[1]http://www.ogo.ch/
And here I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, even Thom had recognized that monopolies aren’t a good thing for consumers.
Unfortunately it turned out it was just a rather weak article about net neutrality.
To anyone interested in this matter, if you want to know how to make a far more convincing argument in support of net neutrality, check out the post by Tim Berners-Lee on the subject:
http://dig.csail.mit.edu/breadcrumbs/node/144
Thom,
Please explain to me what this fictional drivel has to do with operating systems and the news thereof. You seem to consider this site, conveniently called “OSnews” to be your own personal outlet for whatever irrelevant thought comes up in your mind. This is not your personal blog. Can we have Eugenia back?
Please explain to me what this fictional drivel has to do with operating systems and the news thereof.
Since when does stuff about Net Neutrality not belong on OSNews? Did you post the above also in the other topics on the subject here, on OSNews?
Other than that, we have said many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many times that OSNews is about more than just operating systems. It even says so on our about page.
“Since when does stuff about Net Neutrality not belong on OSNews? Did you post the above also in the other topics on the subject here, on OSNews?”
Should I have? I will, if you want to. Well, lets not, I have better things to do. This specific case irked me though. The issue is important, maybe important enough for OSnews. This fictional drivel, which I keep calling it despite you being its author, is not. Personally, I think you’re all to glad to have a larger reader platform in OSnews then you’d ever get elsewhere, so more and more you start posting your own views, interpretations, columns and whatnot on the OSnews site instead of on a more appropriate location, like your personal blog.
Even though you say so on the “about” page that OSnews is about more than just operating systems, fine. But should that include fantasy writing? Where is the limit here? How far out of whack does it have to go for the editor team (is there any, besides you anyway?) to disapprove the thing? I mean, I assume noone has to approve anything you write, you just slap it on the front page, but would you have allowed such a piece if it was written by, say, me?
Want to write crap like this and have it read? OSviews.com, kuro5hin.org, etc are more appropriate, IMO. Maybe you should consider seperating your position as editor and as opinion writer on this site.
I think you are misunderstanding the concept of “the media”. The point of the media is not only to give you the news unbiased, but ALSO to give reflections on that news, personal opinions, whatever. That’s what articles are for.
Are you seriously suggesting the media stop writing opinional pieces? I don’t get you, I’m sorry.
But should that include fantasy writing?
If that fantasy is used to convey a point strongly related to the website and its focus– why not?
“Are you seriously suggesting the media stop writing opinional pieces? I don’t get you, I’m sorry.”
Obviously. Forget it, I’m not going to try and explain it to you either. Don’t make assumptions of what I do and don’t understand about the concept of “the media”. The difference between your stuff and opinions and editorials I read in “the media”, is that the latter hold credibility, at least for me. They’re written as opinions and editorials, not as farfetched fantasy novels. But maybe that’s just because I pick and choose the media I read. Too bad that OSnews is degrading to a medium I choose not to.
“If that fantasy is used to convey a point strongly related to the website and its focus– why not?”
Too bad you forgot to make the actual point you want to convey. Maybe I missed it, I dunno, but I’m used to reading articles which make sense.
Awww you won’t be reading anymore?
That’s too bad…
When Thom says; ‘pick up a newspaper’. He doesn’t mean a porn mag (The Sun?). If you read a REAL (UK) newspaper like the Times, or Telegraph. You’ll notice that many of the columns are written in this style. This is because they are aimed at intelligent people who appreciate a bit of gentle whit in their life.
Stephen
“what this fictional drivel has to do with operating systems”
The evolution of the Internet will be the most significant single determinant of the world to which operating systems have to adapt. The most significant single factor which will determine the future of the Net is whether it will remain ‘neutral’, ie keep the common carrier model, or evolve to some kind of closed partitioned and access/content censored model.
Its very hard to form a clear view of the way a non-neutral Net would affect OSs, but it certainly would. Its much easier to see what a non-neutral net would look like. Once we understand that better, we may start to be able to visualize the effects it would have on other areas. Its important to do.
This is what the fiction has to do with OSs. Now, whether its good or bad fiction is a different matter.
Nice piece, keep it up Thom!
Nice piece, keep it up Thom!
It’s funny, your comment looks like a spam.
No I am serious, I receive the same exact comments on my blog, and they are spam.
Were you trying to illustrate the drawbacks of Net Neutrality?
Typical how must disinterest there is.People only start to realize something when it’s to late.The environment,life forms that have been driven into extinction,new deseaces dueto global warming to name a few.
The net should be as neutral as any postal service.The quality of service varies ofcourse depending on how much you want/can afford.But more important noone should be able to influence the service itself you are entitled to.I guess many are to busy with themselves and their little eco-system.
Edited 2006-06-26 14:04
Thom – We have different views on quite a few things. But that’s ok. If everyone thought and felt the same about things life would be EXTREMELY boring.
As for the story. I really liked it. It shows how not having net neutrality or not having competition are very bad things.
The story also reminded me of my recent trip to Amsterdam, Germany, and a couple other countries. Very good memories of my vacation there. It’s good to get out of the U.S. and see how other people live.
As for the policies of America, we may be “represented” but they often times don’t represent or create policies that reflect how the “average American” wants things.
‘As for the policies of America, we may be “represented” but they often times don’t represent or create policies that reflect how the “average American” wants things.’
Amen to that. The Texas-Wyoming posse in the Casa Blanca, the Congress, and Supreme Court are `way` out of touch with the core of the people in the U.S.
It’s so easy to judge the top open-percent from a foreign shore. Oh well. May be they can milk a bull or play in a plop toss.
As for me, I’ll continue to work on people’s broken windows and clean out the raw sewage that’s on their drives.
You know you shouldnt go to coffeeshops before writing a story, dont you?
j/k
Ps: If you dont get it, go read up on coffeeshops in the Netherlands.
Why is the disclaimer at the end?
Reminds me of the Itchy and Scratchy epsiode with the warning at the end “This program contained scenes of violence and should not have been watched by kids”