The Internet Has Not Changed Everything
I recently came across this “Digital Republic” speech by “David Bollier at the Free Culture Forum [www.fcforum.net] in Barcelona, Spain, on October 30.” While there are a lot of nice sentiments in the speech – “a genuine power to participate and to control important dimensions of our lives, to build our own communities” – the whole thing comes across as the sort of college dorm-at-3am soliloquy by somebody who has just discovered that buzzwords can make the most ordinary thing sound profound.
The speech could be boiled down to…
We are people who do stuff! On the internet! And we are not gonna let The Man hold us down with the chains of capitalism, nor will we be beholden to profits!
P.S. Dear government, please send money.
The fact is that people have always been free to create art without a “corporate middleman”, question the media and do their own reporting, organize and protest, make their content free and pursue unconventional business models.
This is not new. Pointing out that people can also do this on the Internet does not mean The Internet Has Changed Everything. It just means people can continue doing these things in a different medium.
But then the whole glib thing smuggles in a new premise. See if you can spot it.
“At bottom, they refuse to acknowledge the value of what we are creating — or they see our commons as a threat. And so they exclude us from policy deliberations, subsidize and protect the archaic business models of corporate giants; and they try to criminalize our sharing, copying and creative transformations of works. They want to make our fundamental personal and cultural practices — our commoning — illegal.”
It turns out, they’re not so concerned with creating their own commons (which they have always been able to do), so much as imposing their commons on people who do not necessarily want it.
Don’t misunderstand. I am sympathetic to this love of a commons and of a right to be your own entrepreneur. Digital Society lays out the premise on our Issues page that “In a digital society, everybody can be a platform.”
But it is dangerous to learn to love freedom before you learn to appreciate responsibility. There is – and will always be – an important place for “the commons”, but the Internet has not rendered obsolete the social contract marriage of respect for both individual freedom & individual rights. Despite the Brave New World enthusiasm of the free culture idealists, the Internet is not so very different from the analog world.
So, given that the Internet hasn’t changed everything, maybe you can tell me why the right wing is constantly talking about “internet taxes” and dreaming up concepts like the FCC has no right to regulate the internet?
The Internet has never existed in its own right. The Internet is nothing more than the ability of computers to communicate using the telecommunications network. There is no such thing as “internet taxes,” because sales over “the internet” are just catalog sales, same as through traditional mail or over the phone.
The FCC doesn’t regulate “the internet” but certain aspects of the telecom network. Of course, since this site exists to serve Big Telecom and the Republican Party, you’ll never take note of any of this. Your opinions are bought and paid for like the rest.
Reactor
-1 relevance
+1 acrobatics!
Reactor: “maybe you can tell me why the right wing is constantly talking about “internet taxes””
If you follow the news at all, you’d know that it was a Democrat in congress proposing to implement Internet taxes. If the “right wing” is talking about Internet taxes, they’re talking about opposing it.
“If the “right wing” is talking about Internet taxes, they’re talking about opposing it.”
—————
George, I guess I have to make it simpler for certain right wingers, like you: There is no “Internet,” so there is no such thing as an “Internet tax.” What people call “the Internet” consists of the ability of computers to communicate with each other, using the same telecom network that phones use.
What you corporate right-wingers call “Internet taxes” are actually “sales taxes,” no different than sales taxes applied to any other form of catalog sales. The right wing wants a tax exemption for an order conveyed by a router, as opposed to one conveyed by a phone switch or the U.S. Postal Service. Now, George, is that simple enough for you? Sheesh.
The reason this is appropriate here is because Jon Henke, another corporate shill, has written that “the Internet is not so very different from the analog world.” Given the corporatist and right-wing penchant for word games and naked hypocrisy when these are in their interest, it’s worth pointing out that you people are ready to declare “the Internet” a Brave New World when it suits your selfish interests, but The Same Old Thing when it doesn’t.
Actually, Reactor, your idea that “Internet taxes” are “sales taxes” is just plain wrong.
“Internet taxes” are actually “use taxes”. If you buy goods from out of state and have them shipped to your home, you are supposed to pay use taxes. But unfortunately for cash strapped states, nobody does. I say unfortunately because sales tax revenue is way down but use tax revenue should be way up.
So the idea of the Internet tax, which George pointed out was proposed by Democrat Bill Delahunt, is an effort to force Internet based retailers (like Amazon, which doesn’t have physical stores, thus the name Internet based reatailers) to collect the use taxes that you should be reporting.
The other idea they have come up with would force Internet based retailers to provide the government with a list of all of your purchases so the state could assess your use tax and give you a bill. That is also strenuously opposed by us nutty right wingers.
As for “The right wing wants a tax exemption for an order conveyed by a router, as opposed to one conveyed by a phone switch or the U.S. Postal Service”, that’s not true either.
It was actually a little group called the Supreme Court back in 1992 that held that mail order companies (without physical stores) did not have to collect sales tax. That wasn’t a “right wing” exemption.
That precedent has been the basis for Internet “sales” tax regulation since the earliest days. That’s why some stores (like Target, for instance) collect sales tax and some (like Amazon) do not. It all depends on whether they have an actual presence.
The right wing would like to continue that exemption, not create a new one.
The Delahunt bill is an effort to make a national standard as opposed to having scattershot rules. New York, for example, currently has a challenge in front of their supreme court because they passed a law that said an Amazon affiliate was the same as a physical storefront, so Amazon has to collect taxes.
Next time you pontificate and throw aspersions, you should make sure you have your facts straight.
@Reactor
It’s rarely a good idea to respond to somebody who offers nothing but scorn, but I’ll take the point that George and Turk did not cover:
You said: “The FCC doesn’t regulate “the internet” but certain aspects of the telecom network. Of course, since this site exists to serve Big Telecom and the Republican Party, you’ll never take note of any of this. Your opinions are bought and paid for like the rest.”
I take note of this. You are correct, there are parts of the network that the FCC would regulate and parts that they would not. However, it’s not at all clear where that line is drawn and whether it will continue to be drawn there. Is it just the last mile? Do their regulations extend beyond the last mile? How do you define “the Internet” sharply enough that there is a clear, bright line between what is and is not regulated?
You also seem to miss the fact that I (and we) have frequently written things that are critical of ISP’s, praise web companies or may line up closer to Democrats than Republicans. I think you need to turn down the confirmation bias a bit.
Mr. Henke, a few things are clear from reading this site.
1. This is a corporatist, right-wing ideologue site. You relentlessly shill for one viewpoint: Whatever the big corporations want is good, and all taxes are bad.
2. You have little, if any, actual knowledge of what the telecom network actually is, or how it works.
3. You are broadly unfamiliar with even the basics of telecom regulation, which has existed from the very beginning.
When ideology and ignorance are joined, disaster follows. We’ve seen this time and again over the past decade. This site, and its authors, and manfestly unqualified to be pontificating on telecom issues, yet you do so anyway. Why? See point #1.
Mr. Turk, there is no such physical entity as “the Internet.” You and the other authors here, all of whom don’t even know the basics about the telecom network, are aggressively stupid, meaning that you know nothing and refuse to be educated because you find actual knowledge a threat to your ideology.
“Internet” sales are catalog sales. The only difference between an “Internet” order, a telephone order, and a mail-in order is the means by which the order is conveyed. Two of them — a phone order and an “Internet” order — arrive via the telecom network. One of them arrives via the U.S. postal service.
You and the rest of the corporatist right wing refuse to acknowledge basic facts. You treat “the Internet” as a special entity when it suits the interest of those who sign your paychecks. You treat it as nothing new when it suits the interest of those who sign your paychecks.
This leaves the interest of those who sign your paychecks as the only constant element of the equation, which makes “digital society” nothing other than a propaganda tool for those who sign your paychecks. Your “opinions” are bought and paid for. This isn’t exactly unique, but something can be common yet still quite sad.
@Reactor
You really need new talking points.
First, I have pointed out repeatedly that there is no such thing as the internet. What we call the Internet is nothing more than voluntary interconnection agreements between public and private networks. That’s exactly why the idea that we have to “save” or “protect” the Internet is incredibly stupid. There is, as you say, no Internet to save or protect.
I also completely agree on the Internet as catalog argument. That agreement has little to do with state coffers, though. Lawmakers are pursuing new taxes, and creating the distinction because catalogs, frankly, were never that successful. People, until very recently, preferred a trip to the store. Now that they don’t, government is trying to rework the rules so they can keep fleecing the people.
Use taxes always applied to mail and phone orders as well. But like I said, it never amounted to much in actual revenue, so states ignored it. Well guess what? They’re over it. Now they want your money.
Given a choice between Amazon handling my personal order history over to bureaucrats or requiring online retailers to collect use taxes, I’ll pick the latter.
That has nothing to do with the interests of the “corporatist right wing”, it has to do with my wanting to protect (to the extent anyone can, anymore) my personal information. I have chosen to use Amazon. I have not chosen to give the government all my purchase information.
How is that a corporatist position?
“Lawmakers are pursuing new taxes, and creating the distinction because catalogs, frankly, were never that successful. People, until very recently, preferred a trip to the store. Now that they don’t, government is trying to rework the rules so they can keep fleecing the people.”
They are not “new taxes,” they are “sales taxes.” Many states rely heavily on sales taxes. Republicans and corporate interests are ideologically opposed to taxes, but love their special breaks same as everyone else. This site exists to shill for them, and calling an age-old sales tax something different is only the latest facet of a very old game.
Do I love sales taxes? Nope. Do I like taxes in general? Nope. But it was a true conservative who long ago said that taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society. You can argue about what the right taxation level is, but calling “sales taxes” something like “Internet taxes” or “use taxes” is sophistry, driven by ideology.
It’s not exactly new to see people shill for those who sign their checks, but it’s sad nonetheless. We are Americans, and one thing we’re usually pretty good at is calling things by their real names.
No matter how many times you call them sales taxes, they aren’t. They are “use taxes“. I’ve provided a link so you can educate yourself about them. It’s not like I made up the name.
I erred in calling them “new” taxes because they aren’t new at all. They are already on the books in most states, but not enforced. The states are trying to find “new” revenue by enforcing their collection.
Further, @Reactor, to say that a discussion of these taxes is “pro-corporate” displays a staggering lack of understanding to begin with.
Giant corporations like Amazon, eBay and countless others are opposed to the taxes, while still other giant corporations like Best Buy and Target are pushing for the passage of them.
So which corporations do you think we represent, exactly?
Like most things, this is a matter of titans on either side of the issue using the government to do their dirty work. Big offline retailers don’t like the fact that they have to collect sales taxes while the online retailers are not required to collect the use taxes. They’re actually the ones pushing for the law.
We actually come down on the other side. We’d prefer not to see the tax collection because we’re opposed to the taxes generally. However, we’re not paid by anyone with a dog in the hunt.
Your argument seems completely disjointed. You quote Oliver Wendell Holmes on paying taxes, yet you seem to oppose the collection of use taxes because Internet sales are “just like mail or phone orders” (which don’t collect use taxes either, typically).
So it’s not even clear that you have a coherent argument and instead seem to be here just for the purpose of decrying everything. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got a healthy respect for trolls, but usually prefer to find them in dungeons.
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This blog post reads like wishful thinking. I don’t think even the record industry still believes this crap.
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