John, On Fri, 30 Sep 2005 11:36:44 -0400, John J. McDonough wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Gerhard Fiedler" > Subject: Re: [OT] Who controls the internet > > > difficult for US Americans --, or we may see two incompatible systems at > > some point in the future... The US versus the rest of the world :) > > And how many of the European nanny-state economies could withstand loosing a > large chunk of the U.S. market? Do you really believe the Asian countries > would pass up an opportnity to increase their U.S. market share? Share of what market? I'm in New York at the moment, and the only thing European I've seen here is BMWs (oh, and jars of Marmite at four times what they cost in England! :-) Pretty much anything that isn't US made seems to come from China as far as I can see. > It might be realistic if Germany and France were in a little better shape. > But their budgets have even bigger problems than the U.S. Well France doesn't seem to care about exports much - as long as they can live on the Agricultural subsidy, they seem to be happy. Germany is still reeling a bit from taking over responsibility for the former East Germany, but things seem (viewed from the other side of the North Sea) to be improving. Wouter's countrymen seem to be doing pretty well - I'm surprised we haven't heard of them doing consulting work (at least) on the sea defences around New Orleans. > Of course, many European leaders seem to have a death wish, so it could happen. I think it's more that the beaureaucrats have spotted another niche to create a new "body" to oversee something, thus creating more useless and unwanted jobs. We had a narrow escape with software patents, so perhaps they were looking around for another target and saw the Internet. We already suffer from too much government, IMHO, and joining Europe has made things worse - that's why I voted against it! > In the end, it would be a very good thing for the U.S. In what way? > Whether U.S. leaders have enough vision to recognize that is another question. Well Homeland Security don't seem to have been involved yet - if they haven't got enough to do, perhaps they could be tasked with protecting the Internet? :-) Cheers, Howard Winter St.Albans, England -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist