From: myboy@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Lewis Murtaugh)
Subject: Re: Why freedom of information must be garenteed!!! [sic]
Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston Illinois.
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 14:56:17 GMT

I'm not correcting this guys spelling mistakes....
In article <1992Aug26.004804.7140@ac.dal.ca> rclarke@ac.dal.ca writes:
>Hello,
>I was discussing politics with my family this summer and I though an agument
>that I thought could sum up why the freedom of information must be garenteed.
>I warn you that I have a large solialist slant and so if you're a right wing
>facist you probable won't agree with me.
>
>Freedom of information must be garenteed as information controls resorces (human,
>natural, etc.) and so if information is alowed to be privitised then resorces
>are being privatised.  If information is not free then large corporations will
>be able to claim all information as there own and so they will be claiming all
>resorces as there own, leaving nothing for the rest of us.  If information is
>free then no one will be able to horde resorces and no one will go hungy (insert
>your favate human unjustice here <--  ) as they will accses(sp?) to the things
>nessary for life.

Information, and the freedom thereof, has little to do with the hoarding of
resources, at least not in the way you think.  Corporations, of one type or
another, have been hoarding information for ages -- its called capitalism. 
What you're describing (the siezing of resources by the corporations) has 
already occurred, and has gone on for years without the help of computers. 
Knowledge won't set you free if someone else has the money and the guns on
their side.

>I belive that cyberpunk is tring to show the would (as well as make a few $$) 
						     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
some socialist you are!		

>what will happen when capitalism gets out of hand and the upper class elite
>will end up ruling (yes, I know, they do all ready).
>
>
>On another note.
>I was talking about hacking (cracking, whatever) this sommer and I have decided.
>That there is a great weak spot in the current ecconmic system that may bring
>the rich to there neas (sp?).  Computers are mostly used by the rich.  In North
>America they are the middle class but on a would scale, even working class
>North Americans are rich comparied to the starving people in Somalia (or any other
>third would country).  In the future computers will probably be networked into
>one large entity (it's nowhere near that stage now) and will be run by the rich.

You know what they say about when you assume....

>But the rich will also be dependant on the computers to maintain there postion
>of power.  The poor will probably be prety much excluded from the net (except
>for a few cyber cowboys).

Wake up!!!!  This is sci-fi you're talking about, not reality!  It takes a lot
of money to be a computer user, and that's money poor people don't have.  If
you took a survbey of Internet users, you'd probably find that their avergage
household income puts them in the top 5% of the population in America, and if
you average in the Somalians, probably in the top 0.5% worldwide.

>  The net will probably not affect the poor very much
>  So if someone were to find a hole in the net then bring it down you would
>knock the support out from under the rich and they would be off balence (though
>I admit that it wouldn't be for long) and the poor might have a chance to fight
>back.  The sutting down of the net would be nessary because if the rich were
>still able to use the net they would be able distroy (sp?) any uprising that
>occured.  

SURE the net won't affect the poor much.  Where do the rich get their money,
in the aggregate sense?  From the poor, of course, from selling them food and
TVs and other goods.  Why would the rich want a global net?  To facilitate
their making money -- i.e to make the selling of goods to the poor more
cost-effective.  So if you crash the net, it will be impossible to sell stuff
to the poor.  Hence, global famine, collapse of governments worldwide, etc. 
Not too many people are going to want a revolution if they can't feed their
families.
>

>Any thing you may want to say back to me can be mailed to:
>Rclarke@AC.DAL.CA
>as long as you don't try to convince me that capitalism is right, I'm set on the
>right path and I very stubborn.
>Or if you want post so people can hear both sides of the issue.
>
>By the way my editor is real junk so I can't fix any errors (It's also 1 am 
>when
>I write this so it may be incorherent)
>
>Rclarke@AC.DAL.CA
>
>Sorry the only cool things I can say are about politics and I think you've had
>enough preaching for one day :-)

--
Charles Murtaugh
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk