ethan non sequitur

Do you buy books online, use Google, or download to an Ipod? These activities will be hurt if Congress passes a radical law that gives giant corporations more control over the Internet.

[tag]Internet providers[/tag] like AT&T and Verizon are lobbying Congress hard to gut [tag]Network Neutrality[/tag], the Internet’s First Amendment. Net Neutrality prevents AT&T from choosing which websites open most easily for you based on which site pays AT&T more. Amazon.com doesn’t have to outbid Barnes & Noble for the right to work more properly on your computer. This is the equivalent of a [tag]protection racket[/tag] of money paid so that [tag]organized crime[/tag] leaves your business alone.

Politicians don’t think we are paying attention to this issue. Many of them take campaign checks from big telecom companies and are on the verge of selling out to people like AT&T’s CEO, who openly says, “The internet can’t be free.”

How will you be affected?

• [tag]Nonprofits[/tag]–A charity’s website could open at snail-speed, and online contributions could grind to a halt, if nonprofits can’t pay dominant Internet providers for access to "the fast lane" of Internet service.
• [tag]Google[/tag] users–Another search engine could pay dominant Internet providers like AT&T to guarantee the competing search engine opens faster than Google on your computer. 
• Innovators with the "next big idea"–[tag]Startups[/tag] and [tag]entrepreneurs[/tag] will be muscled out of the marketplace by big corporations that pay Internet providers for dominant placing on the Web. The little guy will be left in the "slow lane" with inferior Internet service, unable to compete.
• [tag]Ipod[/tag] listeners–A company like Comcast could slow access to [tag]iTunes[/tag], steering you to a higher-priced music service that it owned. 
• Online purchasers–Companies could pay Internet providers to guarantee their online sales process faster than competitors with lower prices–distorting your choice as a consumer.
• Small businesses and tele-commuters–When Internet companies like AT&T favor their own services, you won’t be able to choose more affordable providers for online video, teleconferencing, Internet phone calls, and software that connects your home computer to your office.
• Parents and retirees–Your choices as a consumer could be controlled by your Internet provider, steering you to their preferred services for online banking, health care information, sending photos, planning vacations, etc.
• [tag]Bloggers[/tag]–Costs will skyrocket to post and share video and audio clips–silencing citizen journalists and putting more power in the hands of a few corporate-owned media outlets.
• Advocacy groups like MoveOn–Political organizing could be slowed by a handful of dominant Internet providers who ask advocacy groups to pay "protection money" for their websites and online features to work correctly.

The free and open [tag]Internet[/tag] is under seige–can you sign this petition letting your member of [tag]Congress[/tag] know you support preserving Network Neutrality? Act Now to Save The Internet

[tags]Racketeering[/tags]

Whether it is [tag]tourism[/tag], [tag]language learning[/tag], cooking classes or business, I am amazed at how many [tag]Americans[/tag] and [tag]English-Speaking[/tag] people I meet in [tag]Montpellier[/tag], [tag]France[/tag]. I have, however, found zero quality networking tools or gathering locations for us all. The American Library at l’Université Paul-Valéry is a great resource (as is Françoise, the über-librarian) and I have met a few people there on and off, but it is not a social environment and I would like to encourage something bigger, something more.

Are you planning on visiting Montpellier? Do you live or work in Montpellier? If so, leave me a comment or email me at ethan [at] ethannonsequitur [dot] com. I would love to see some [tag]social networking[/tag] and [tag]business networking[/tag] and for us all to share our French Experience™.

A senior at [tag]Georgia Tech[/tag] is suing the University for the right to be intolerant. I’m always amazed at how much effort certain [tag]Christians[/tag] can expend condemning others and defining new ways to form divisions between people. The excuse most often cited is ‘Holiness’ and the Greater Morality™. My concern is that I rarely meet someone of the “I’m standing up for what’s right” crowd that embodies much Grace.

Most believers I’ve met who came to faith through great loss and even greater brokenness are usually so consumed by [tag]Grace[/tag] that there is not much room left inside for Condemnation. If we are truly focusing on God’s calls to “Love our neighbor as ourself” and “Love God with our heart, soul, mind and strength” I believe there would be scant time left for moral posturing. I wonder what would happen if the world saw the Church actively loving the broken, the weak and the different instead of aggressively distancing itself. This kind of [tag]separatism[/tag] isn’t about [tag]morality[/tag] or holiness, it is about [tag]fear[/tag] and insecurity and [tag]doubt[/tag]. After all, if you’re looking for the true spirit of God and [tag]Christianity[/tag] do you look to Mother Teresa or to Jerry Falwell?

So Ruth, after you finish suing Georgia Tech and push the Church even farther out of reach of those in need, I hope that your happy little club is proud of you. I’m fairly sure God won’t be. The God of Scripture and history and my life wlll undoubtedly be just one more bit heartbroken.
[tags]Intolerance[/tags]

After reflecting on the [tag]genocide[/tag] in [tag]Rwanda[/tag], the late Senator Paul Simon said: “If every member of the House and Senate had received 100 letters from people back home saying we have to do something about Rwanda, when the crisis was first developing, then I think the response would have been different.”

During his first year in the White House, [tag]President Bush[/tag] wrote in the margins of a report on the Rwandan genocide, “Not on my watch.”

Since the beginning of the conflict in [tag]Darfur[/tag], an estimated 400,000 people have been killed and more than 2 million people have been displaced. Send President Bush a [tag]Save Darfur[/tag] postcard and remind him of his earlier sentiments to act now to stop the [tag]genocide in Darfur[/tag].