<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"
http-equiv="Content-Type">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
Thanks for highlighting this.<br>
<br>
It reminds me of the debate in Cambodia, some yeas ago, when the
Cambodian authorities had announced it was illegal to use VoIP
services like Skype or telephone call-back-services, to avoid the
very high charges for international phone calls.<br>
<br>
The official argumentation was that this is a big loss to the
country, calculating the estimated phone time on these special
services, multiplied by the very high official charges (higher than
in most of our neighboring countries), and then claiming that the
sum found in this way is the LOSS of income for the Ministry of Post
and Telecommunications (at that time being simultaneously Regulator
and Operator).<br>
<br>
In actual fact, many people who used VoIP at internet cafes would
never have had the money to make phone calls to their relatives in
the USA, Australia, or France, who had left 20 or 30 years ago as
refugees from the political dangers at home.<br>
<br>
There had also been a report in the papers at that time about a poor
woman from the countryside who sold some chicken and traveled to the
capital city to make an (illegal) call to her relatives from an
internet cafe, once or twice a year - she never would have been able
to pay "normal" phone charges. Economic harm to the Ministry? Maybe
a bit, because also people who cold afford to support the "income
earning activities" of the Ministry of Post used these special
services. <br>
<br>
=<br>
<br>
On 01/15/2012 07:36 AM, Joly MacFie wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:CAM9VJk2wj0Zh56K0JbFaaxuPKktJBmYmpMmH8D9oULHK+Zrocw@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div><br>
</div>
<div>[Well argued piece by Tim O'Reily on the economic aspects]</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://plus.google.com/107033731246200681024/posts/BEDukdz2B1r">https://plus.google.com/107033731246200681024/posts/BEDukdz2B1r</a>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;
line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In
the entire discussion, I've seen no discussion of credible
evidence of this economic harm. There's no question in my mind
that piracy exists, that people around the world are enjoying
creative content without paying for it, and even that some
criminals are profiting by redistributing it. But is there
actual economic harm?</span><br style="font-family:
arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;
background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
<br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;
line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;
line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In
my experience at O'Reilly, the losses due to piracy are far
outweighed by the benefits of the free flow of information,
which makes the world richer, and develops new markets for
legitimate content. Most of the people who are downloading
unauthorized copies of O'Reilly books would never have paid us
for them anyway; meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of others
are buying content from us, many of them in countries that we
were never able to do business with when our products were not
available in digital form.</span><br style="font-family:
arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;
background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
<br style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;
line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
<span style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 13px;
line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">History
shows us, again and again, that frontiers are lawless places,
but that as they get richer and more settled, they join in the
rule of law. American publishing, now the largest publishing
industry in the world, began with piracy. (I have a post
coming on that subject on Monday.)</span>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
-- <br>
---------------------------------------------------------------<br>
Joly MacFie 218 565 9365 Skype:punkcast<br>
WWWhatsup NYC - <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://wwwhatsup.com" target="_blank">http://wwwhatsup.com</a><br>
<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://pinstand.com"
target="_blank">http://pinstand.com</a> - <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://punkcast.com"
target="_blank">http://punkcast.com</a><br>
VP (Admin) - ISOC-NY - <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://isoc-ny.org" target="_blank">http://isoc-ny.org</a><br>
--------------------------------------------------------------<br>
-<br>
</blockquote>
<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
In April 2011, I started a new personal blog:
...thinking it over... after 21 years in Cambodia
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.thinking21.org/">http://www.thinking21.org/</a>
continuing to share reports and comments from Cambodia.
This is my last posting:
On Law Enforcement (8 January 2012)
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.thinking21.org/?p=682">http://www.thinking21.org/?p=682</a>
Norbert Klein
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:nhklein@gmx.net">nhklein@gmx.net</a>
Phnom Penh / Cambodia
</pre>
</body>
</html>