Ma AT&T Says Shut-Up And Sing

Not only will they not lay us fiber optic (least Ma Southern Bell never did), AT&T has a kindamaybesorta policy to censor “political” speech during live webcasting. So they tested every possible free speech boundary during a Pearl Jam concert this past weekend. From SaveTheInternet.com:

AT&T’s culture of control has taken a frightening new turn. Some may remember when the company’s black rotary phone was the only device allowed on its telephone network.Today, the communications giant is banking that a world without Net Neutrality will allow them to exert similar control over another network — the free flowing Internet. Look no further than AT&T’s recent censorship of a Pearl Jam concert webcast, just as lead singer Eddie Vedder launched into a critique of President Bush.

AT&T’s slippery response to the resulting outcry is instructive. The moment the Pearl Jam news hit the Web, AT&T’s public relations division scrambled their spokespeople and shills. In a frenzy of damage control, they fired off a series of statements. One called the move “totally against our policy — of never, ever censoring political speech.” Another declared the Pearl Jam censorship “an isolated incident” — an “unfortunate” mistake by a rogue subcontractor.

Full story here. Wait ’til AT&T discovers what folks say on the blogs! Jeez. What a bunch of corrupted creeps they are. They’d sell-out their mommas for the ability to monopolize the way we pick our own noses over our own webcams.

That said, I gotta say I live-webcasted a big ‘ole rally for a bunch of Georgia Dems once, over what was surely AT&T owned and operated Internets “air.” No one batted an eyelash. Then again, we had about, oh say, 2 million or so fewer folks tuning-in for that one. No rock stars bothered to show to rock the North Georgia Dem vote, sad to say.

And maybe that’s a good thing, because if there’s one thing that annoys the crap outta me is perfectly great music interrupted by some ego-crazed musician with a brain the size of a pea wanting to shove his/her juvenile political pontifications down our throats when all we wanted to do was hear good music and get wasted. I want a political argument, I come to Peach Pundit! (Actually, PR shills and hacks for giant telco beasts annoy me even more, but that’s another post.)

Shut-up and sing, eh?

About Time

Earthlink is Wi-Fi-ing Atlanta! Hell yeah. 'Bout time since they are the home team. Then again, as most of us have had to, at some point in time, hoe that same long, grueling City of Atlanta-business-dealings row, I can feel their pain through the line. (Payback is hell.)

So fuck you, AT&T... just wish I could have had a chance to say "fuck you" to Bellsouth a little louder. Saying it to AT&T just doesn't have the same umph. Still, I'll be canceling my now-AT&T DSL line-in as soon as I see a Wi-Fi cell go up near me! Praise Jesus, and a big strong fem Purse Slam to AT&T.

Now if we could just dig-up all that cruddy-ass DSL and get Earthlink to lay us down some good strong fiber optic instead. Sure! When Bellsouth/AT&T just recalls all their lobbyista and hands over the Legislature/Congress back to us, the people, on the silver platter we shareholder (Bellsouth) idiots gave them in the first place. More on that scam here.

I say renew our efforts in Iraq in a big way -- send all lobbyistas and their corporate-plantation masters over there instead of soldiers. We need the soldiers here to protect us from the Psycho Christian Right anyways.

Greatness Makes Our Happy Meals Possible

First Stephen Colbert sticks a red hot poker in the eye of the media elite at the '06 White House Correspondent's dinner. (Some say Colbert should have been Person of The Year. Ain't that the truthiness.) Now Bill Moyers is preaching from the Church of Social Media to kick-start '07.

Wonder if they're listening out there in La-La Land? Rest assured, the liars and charlatans like Edelman, the networks, Madison Avenue and certain music industry types aren't ever gonna get it. They'll just keep charging, flailing up to the front of the parade they think they're gonna lead, the parade they never even knew existed until it about turned the corner for Main Street. They'll be overrun by the circus freaks and clowns and geeks and monkeys from the back - again.

This Moyers speech is so important I hope you will take the time to read it all. This excerpt is from Craig Aaron of FreePress. net, covering the National Conference for Media Reform, taking place this weekend in Memphis. (And yeah, I'd have sold my momma, again, to have been there, but some of us are busy committing original content in our own backyards; others are simply conference addicts.)

Journalist and author Bill Moyers denounced Big Media corporations Friday in a fiery speech that opened the National Conference for Media Reform in Memphis.

Moyers told a packed house of more than 3,000 activists and organizers that the independent press is under sustained attack, with a few corporations conspiring with political leaders to create an Orwellian world "in which language conceals reality, and the pursuit of personal gain and partisan power are wrapped in rhetoric that turns truth to lies and lies to truth."

Full video and audio of Moyers' Speech is available at http://www.freepress.net/conference

Evoking the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Moyers compared big media corporations to plantation owners and American media consumers to their slaves.

“What happened to radio, happened to television, and then it happened to cable. If we are not diligent, then it will happen to the Internet, [creating] a media plantation for the 21st century dominated by the same corporate and ideological forces that have controlled the media for the last 50 years.”

“Something is wrong with this system,” Moyers added. “This is the moment freedom begins, the moment you realize someone else has been writing your story, and it’s time you took the pen from his hand and started writing it yourself.”

Moyers honed in on the issue of Net Neutrality, which he dubbed the “Equal Access Provision of the Internet,” and praised SavetheInternet.com’s grassroots and online organizing efforts, saying that Washington hadn’t reckoned with this movement “that once again reminded the powers that be that people want the media to foster democracy, not to quench it.”

Moyers called the SavetheInternet.com campaign critical, as soon virtually all media will be delivered to homes via a single high speed broadband connection. “We now have it in our means to tell a different story than Big Media,” Moyers said. “This is the great gift of the digital revolution, and you must never let them take it away from you.”

All coverage from Memphis is here.

The Magna Carta of Web 2.0

As delightful as it is to find pure villany in the Bells, since the fate of net neutrality lies in the hands of their lobbyists and their silos of cash, the telco lobbyists did change the face of Internet copyright law, for the better one might argue. Fascinating stuff. From Tim Wu writing for Slate.

Under the copyright code, YouTube is in much better legal shape than anyone seems to want to accept. The site enjoys a strong legal "safe harbor," a law largely respected by the television and film industries for the choices it gives them.

But the most interesting thing is where all this legal armor protecting YouTube—and most of the Web 2.0 (user-generated content) industry—comes from. It's the product of the Bell lobby—Google's bitter opponent in the ongoing Net Neutrality debates.

So, while YouTube may be the creative child of Silicon Valley, it is also, as much, the offspring of Bell lobbying power.

This is one of those legalese pieces I will have to read at least 3X to wrap my pea-brain around, but trust me, I will. And I still feel that we the people, or at least our legislators whom we send to Capitol Hill, should be the ones writing legislation, not corporate America. But that's soooo spittin' into the hurricane winds of our current political norms/corruption.

UPDATE: Uh, just in case.

Technorati tags: BellSouth, net neutrality, copyright, telcos

Wade Through This

I wrote my U.S. Representative, John Lewis (D), a letter (ok... I took the time at least to send an original email) asking that he support net neutrality regulation and/or net neutrality legislation. Or maybe he could write-up some good kind himself. Heck, at the very least, just please not be led into temptation by hometown lobbyists from massive Atlanta-based telcos. I can't really make heads or tails out of this politico-speak response. Can anyone please offer me your interpretation? Thank you.

Dear Ms. Daughters (Hey, they pasted in the correct name!):

Thank you very much for taking the time to write me with your concerns about the future of information flow on the Internet. I appreciate hearing from you and having the benefit of your views.

As you may know, some Internet service providers (ISP's) have made public comments about plans to develop a tiered system that would give a larger bandwidth to preferred websites. There have also been reports that some ISP's have restricted access to certain websites to prevent their customers from accessing and using these websites. To pre-empt these plans, a coalition of software and high-technology firms such as Amazon,com, Yahoo, Disney, and Microsoft, sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) urging it to "assure that consumers and other Internet users continue to enjoy the unfettered ability to reach lawful content and services." This issue will become a key factor as the debate over the rewriting of the
telecommunications law proceeds.

A major Internet service provider in Georgia recently informed my staff of its plans as it increases its bandwidth. They told my staff that they "will not block or interfere with customers' access to lawful content or applications over the Internet" and have "no intention of unilaterally imposing fees on any Internet company."

(Tricky part is bolded by me, SG.) It does have plans to offer tiered service that will provide additional bandwidth to guarantee some services to customers and offer greater speeds to paying Internet companies. The provider says that a tiered service will reduce costs to consumers by offering greater service variations. (NOTE FROM SG: I assume the "major Internet service provider" mentioned is BellSouth?)

As Congress continues its debate over how to write the new telecommunications law, I will work to ensure that the Internet remains free of predatory efforts to restrict access to the tools that consumers have come to expect. The FCC has declared that Americans are entitled to: access Internet content of their choice, run online applications and services of their choice, connect their choice of devices, and have fair competition among network, application, service and content providers. While these principles will guide FCC policymaking, they do not carry any enforcement power. I believe that the new law should reflect and encourage these principles. (This is a good thing, right? Then again, we are talking about giving mo' power to the FCC - always a scary thought. This is where things get really tricky.)

Thank you again for sharing your views with me about this important issue. I hope that you will continue to contact me with issues that are important to you. Also, please visit my web site at http://www.house.gov/johnlewis for more information on legislation that interests you.

Sincerely,
John Lewis
Member of Congress