ISP Fined for Blocking VoIP Traffic

This relates to something the FCC did for a leading VoIP provider.  In this country, can we expect the same from the NTC when it comes to enforcing its VoIP regulations?

Who knows?

Regulating IP Services?

Susan Crawford blogged about a US congressional hearing where rules for IP-enabled services were discussed.  IP stands for ‘internet protocol’ — that piece of code that everything from blogs to email work. Her account of the hearing left me curious about the US Government’s unique ability to regulate the Internet. 

It’s no secret that the Internet was created with funding from the US Federal Government and one of its essential parts has been contracted to a California non-profit company by the US Department of Commerce.   This means the US government can and has claimed some sort of ownership over the technology underlying the Internet and in this sense, the US Congress has some authority to regulate it.  The US Congress could, for example, pass legislation that ICANN would be bound to comply.  No other foreign government can make such a claim.

The previously-believed “inherent unregulability” of the Internet is largely untrue.  China has shown that Internet users can be corraled not unlike cows.  After all, the average Internet user is not much more intelligent than and is as visible as a large bovine. 

What I’m waiting to see is how the US Congress proposes to regulate IP-enabled services given its unique leverage. 

Of Gays and Government

I was surprised that the First Gentleman’s spokesperson described GMA’s (aka Ginoong Mike Arroyo’s)  detractors as follows:

Santos said, “Only cowards and gays destroy people’s reputations with lies and intrigues.” (emphasis mine; as reported in INQ7)

I guess it sounds better in Tagalog (”Mga bakla at duwag . . . “) but what intrigues me is that it doesn’t seem to be politically incorrect in this country to make a disparaging reference to homosexuals.  I mean, if he said “only cowards and (choose one: Muslims, Igorots, Mangyans, Military Men, Lawyers from UP, etc.), he’d be in deep doo-doo.

This reminded me of a scene in Angels in America where Roy Cohn speaks about homosexuals and political power. He says being gay isn’t about sexual preference but clout — men have it and gays don’t.  So, by his definition, he’s not gay, he’s a man who sleeps around with other men. 

Gays in this country have no political power — or at least, they’ve never tried to establish a political base.  Gays may inhabit the highest levels of government and business but they’re deep within their closets.  For this reason, they cannot affiliate themselves with the “Gay Movement.”

Things may change (or maybe the process has already started) and one day, homosexuals will be defined more than an annual debaucherous parade in Malate.

BTW, don’t get me wrong.  I’m not a homo-phobe.  In fact, I was once a fag hag.

iBlog therefore iAm

As of this morning, there are more than 100 registrants to iBlog, the Philippines’ First Blogging Summit.  So far, we’ve only promoted the event on-line.  Today, we’re going to place 200 posters in different areas around the city to drive more attendance. 

I don’t know whether to be happy or sad.

I’m excited that there’s so much interest in the event (after all, it’s FREE).  I recognize that even though the blogging community is hardly organized, the power of the Internet to connect people has resulted in this convergence of bloggers in one space.   As we suspected, there are lots of bloggers out there.  We’re proud and honored to host this event and we can’t wait to meet this band of bloggers.

On the other hand, our program’s meager resources may not be enough to accomodate everyone as comfortably as we’d like.  The space is big enough to handle 300 people but we may not have enough to feed everyone.  But I’m hopeful.  If you remember the sermon on the mount, Jesus fed thousands from the packed lunch of a child.  There’s another version that says most people brought their own lunch but having seen the child’s generosity, shared their food with others.  Bloggers are a strange bunch but sharing is not alien to them.  Through their blogs, they’ve opened up their lives and most intimate thoughts to us.  It’s that spirit that I’m counting on to help us feed the folks at iBlog. 

Otherwise, please help us get us more sponsors!