SAVE THE PUB's WEBSITE

[Lady Seahawke]

Big Internet operators like AT&T and Verizon want the power to decide

which Web sites open properly on our computers--giving them control over

what we do and where we search online. So far, Congress has caved to their

demands.

But because of intense public pressure, some members of Congress are

starting to switch from AT&T's side to ours! In just a week, Congress saw

over 250,000 of us sign a petition demanding the Internet stay

free. Joining this call are tech pioneers like Google and Microsoft,

diverse groups ranging from MoveOn to Gun Owners of America, and even some

celebrities.

If enough of us stand up now, there's still time for the House of

Representatives to do the right thing next week when it votes on whether

to protect or destroy Network Neutrality--the Internet's First Amendment

and the key to Internet freedom.

Can you join our petition asking Congress to protect the free and

open Internet?

http://civic.moveon.org/save_the_internet?...6O0AuPxcYAHXRFQ

This petition will be delivered to your members of Congress, and everyone

who signs will be kept informed of the next steps we can take to keep the

pressure on Congress this week.

Companies like AT&T are spending millions lobbying Congress to gut Net

Neutrality. A House committee voted to go along with AT&T's scheme last

week, but we are fighting back hard before next week's full House vote. We

want to raise public awareness of this issue and hand Congress 350,000

signatures.

To reach this goal, we're launching a contest: Ask your friends to sign

the petition and you can win one of 10 iPod Nanos or one of 40

BarnesandNoble.com gift certificates. Start by signing the petition

yourself, and you'll receive instructions to enter the contest.

Snopes.com, which monitors various causes that circulate on the Internet,

recently explained this issue:

Simply put, network neutrality means that no web site's traffic has

precedence over any other's...Whether a user searches for recipes using

Google, reads an article on snopes.com, or looks at a friend's MySpace

profile, all of that data is treated equally and delivered from the

originating web site to the user's web browser with the same priority.

In recent months, however, some of the telephone and cable companies

that control the telecommunications networks over which Internet data

flows have floated the idea of creating the electronic equivalent of a

paid carpool lane.

If companies like AT&T have their way, Web sites ranging from Google

to eBay to MoveOn either pay the equivalent of protection money to get

into the "fast lane" or risk opening slowly on your computer. We can't

allow the Internet--this incredible medium which has been such a

revolutionary force for democratic participation, economic innovation, and

free speech--to become captive to large corporations.

Join our petition asking Congress to protect Internet freedom by clicking

here:

http://civic.moveon.org/save_the_internet?...6O0AuPxcYAHXRFQ

[Captain Bob]

At first, I thought this was just a mutation of an email warning about how the phone companies were going to charge extra for phone lines used for digital information. That one's been circling the web (in one form or another) since 1987. However, upon checking with the Urban Legends Reference Pages, I found this article. Well, whuddaya know? They're at it again.

While I agree with moveon.org's intent, most lawmakers ignore email petitions. It's too easy for spammers to "manufacture" constituents in an attempt to influence pending legislation. A more effective tactic is to buy paper, stamps & envelopes and write to your congressman and both your senators. Legislators pay much more attention to snail mail from constituents. It takes almost no effort to send an email, but if you're willing to expend time and money to send a letter, you must be really 'het up about something'. A few letters about the same topic gets their attention, and a lot of letters about the same topic lets them know their job is in jeopardy if they get it wrong.

~~Captain Bob

[Lady Seahawke]

Me I have signed the online petition, am writing a snail mail letter, and plan on using the phone too. I like my interenet the way it is...I don't think AT&T or any of the others should have the right to decide who gets faster service, whereby try to influence what I can have access too.

[Charity]

I signed for you all and anyone out there!

I gringe at the thought of us being told where to go and what to see..i told them i'm Dutch too and what i thought.

It get's done in China too..doesn't that say enough?

Good luck mates!

[Black Hearted Pearl]

Folks, this isn't about Internet Nuetrality. It's about bankruptcy and digital rights management. AT&T owns the infastructure that the Net is built upon. If Google/Microsoft and all that can charge for video's over the internet and NOT pay a fee to to AT&T and Verizon for that service, AT&T and Verizon will go bankrupt and the net will be jeopardy.

Signing a petition and writing a letter that says "Don't Change" isn't going to save the net. The ride is just beginning again.

[Lady Seahawke]

AT&T is gobbling up every thing right and left...they are bit by bit regaining their Monopoly that they had when I was a kid. Yes, I remember when Ma Bell was broken up because it had gotten so big that they own just about everything in the communications ie. phone services. Now they are not only going after the phones but the cable and internet services too. So saying they will go bankrupt doesn't cut it with me. They have the money to purchase the other corporations...they are making MAJOR profits...so fear of them going bankrupt??? NAW no way.

Second...If they can't handle the service then they shouldn't be buying up the various computer services. And no one isn't saying they can't charge a fee, we are saying you can't demand a fee to gain better access to a computer.

Saying they want to charge an extra fee so they have can open on our computers faster then someone else...that is against the Neutrality.

Ok, yes, I know my writings are little on the hodge podge side...I am trying to do this while doing other things at the same time..so please excuse.

[Black Hearted Pearl]

AT&T isn't gobbling everyone up. They just avoided bankruptcy by being bought by SBC. SBC then took the AT&T name because no one knows who SBC is. That's Southwestern Bell Corporation, ie one of the baby bells that was part of the original break-up.

They aren't buying up the various computer services. It's about Digital Rights Management and not just over the net, over the airwaves as well. I told you the ride was just beginning.

Burst Video takes alot of bandwidth. Just ask Bloody and his crew. Why do you think the board was loading so slow for a while. It's because the bandwidth was reaching its maximum on the server. Bandwidth is being gobbled up nanosecond by nanosecond. You want the net to grind to stop, go ahead and not face the reality of changing technology.

This is not about net neutrality aka not changing the web. Its about the evolution of burst video, the bandwidth it sucks up and the internet infrastructure that is over 20 years old.

[Lady Seahawke]

Can I ask if you work for SBC/AT&T? Because that is the way it is coming across here.

Second SBC/AT&T has acquired...Yahoo, Cingular, and various other corps...I know because I am a customer and now have all of it on by SBC/AT&T bill and know the crap I have to put up with....If I HAD another option I would jump at it. But, they have an monopoly and I DON'T have another choice. If they succeed in getting what they want...I expect that it will be even worse. . IT is becoming an monopoly again. I also know that they are buying up things across the country, because my friends on the east coast are asking me about SBC/AT&T/Yahoo/Cingular/Bell South etc. because of the stuff that is happening there.

A rose is a rose by any other name. Using the name AT&T/SBC. blah blah ..is all the same...SBC has acquired the AT&T and using the name...THE NEW AT&T and this has been going on for some time....THE NEW AT&T is the one trying to pressure Congress to change the laws regarding the internet. THEREFORE, we are then talking about the ENTIRE corp.. If a corp has acquired it...and they are joined at the hip...then they are one and the same. You can use the secondary names in order to throw off the pressure by saying "We aren't...such and such...." But, then under a different guise they say we a subsidiary etc. that is playing shell games. If they are under the same umbella (THE NEW AT&T...the Conglomerate) they are under the same operations..

OH from their own website: AT&T pressroom...San Antonio, TX Feb 28, 2006....Fortune Magazine named AT&T (SBC/AT&T/Cingular/etc.) as the World's most Admired Telecommunications Company. Being #1 on the World's and US lists. Part of the criteria used for this list is FINANCIAL Soundness...read the entire article from their own website...at.

http://att.sbc.com/gen/press-room?pid=5097...articleid=22118

I was going to put the article here but, did not want to infringe on any copywrite, so you will have to go to the SBC/AT&T/Cingular/etc. weebsite to see it.

[Lady Seahawke]

Oh let's not forget that SBC bought out Ameritech in 1999, which incorporated...

Illinois Bell, Indiana Bell, Michigan Bell, Ohio Bell and Wisconsin Bell – prevailed until April 1993, when parent Ameritech imposed its single brand. SBC bought Ameritech in 1999.

Thank you Pearl for encouraging me to look things up... it is opening my eyes even further then before. Therefore, might I encourage others to do the same...because...The rate of mergers and acquistions is staggering and very hard to keep up with again... Start your own search and see what you come up with...

[Black Hearted Pearl]

The net is going to crash

No, I don't work for AT&T or SBC. And no, no one in my family works for AT&T or SBC. My family works in researching emerging technologies and I am a part-time student majoring in Computer Mediated Communiations.

Raise your hands those of you who have digital cable along with your broadband that have seen a significant decline in the quality?

Big hand raise here. My broadband got so bad from all the neighbors coming on board, I had no siginal at all. I had to change from broadband just to get back on the internet.

Remember when AOL first offered Internet for $19.99 and then couldn't provide service because too many people joined? Guess what! It's happening again only this time with broadband and digital. Vonage is sucking up bandwidth with VoIP (voice over internet protocol) and the networks/studios with video on demand over the Internet.

The internet is going to crash unless we, the world, come up with a way to rebuild the infrastructure to handle the ever increasing traffic or we could just go back in history when there was no internet.

~Been surfing for over 17 years.

[Rumba Rue]

So we go back to the telephone- gasp! What is the world coming to?

[Arthur Richards from Kent]

ok ok the world is coming to a place where all there is is almost too much and yet we still have new songs new lyrics and new notes being tied together into the fabric of a wonderful way that expresses once again a poignant place in our lives where we wish to go and be a part of.... We just dont see it happening here or for that matter anywhere that is if the eye in the sky takes over huh? So atleast if we caqnt do some things maybe by taking away those very dear things to us they will make room for other things to occur ??? Hmmmmmm? Like issuing 1 number for every one your telephone number and your cell phone and your drivers liscense and the liscense on your car! one number all the same! so when the rat bastard lane moniter is doing forty five in a sixty five zone in the car in front of you, you can call him on the phone and tell him to GET THE "F" OVER!

[Captain Bob]

... so when the rat bastard lane moniter is doing forty five in a sixty five zone in the car in front of you, you can call him on the phone and tell him to GET THE "F" OVER!

Yeah, but wouldn't ya know it? The dumb S.O.B. is already yammering away on his cell and you'll just have to leave a message -- which he won't get around to checking until sometime late tomorrow afternoon.

I wonder if his caller ID will say "It's the apoplectic guy in the car behind you"? Hey, electronic devices are getting smarter all the time. I'm just sayin'.

_________________

"My mind wanders, but don't worry. It's weak and can't get very far."

--Steve Allen

[Black Hearted Pearl]

Yeah, but wouldn't ya know it? The dumb S.O.B. is already yammering away on his cell and you'll just have to leave a message -- which he won't get around to checking until sometime late tomorrow afternoon.

I wonder if his caller ID will say "It's the apoplectic guy in the car behind you"? Hey, electronic devices are getting smarter all the time. I'm just sayin'.

Nay, I say text message the bugger with "Pull over, you bugger, or your tires will be run through."

[Patrick Hand]

OR.......

Caution..... cannon in trunk....