Say goodbye to Speakeasy

[jc at trillian.mit.edu (John Chambers)]

> On Sun, 7 Aug 2005, Gregory Boyce wrote:
>
>> Well, it looks like the FCC has reclassified DSL as an Information
>> Service, meaning that the phone company no longer is required to share the
>> lines with other providers.
>>
>> http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/media_law_prof_blog/2005/08/fcc_reclassifie.html
>
> Any reason we can't get DSL the ol' fashioned way - a second phone line -
> before the days of line sharing?   I think SE was doing pretty well before
> the line sharing days.  No reason they can't continue success, unless
> there is soemthing further to the FCC ruling that I am missing...???

One thing I notice in the FCC's release:

(2) consumers are entitled to run applications and services of  their
choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement; ...

This sounds like it's saying that the phone/cable  companies  can  no
longer do port blocking, and can't kick you off for running a server.

The main reason I like speakeasy is that they promise  to  not  block
ports,  and  they encourage you to run servers.  Most ISPs, including
almost all phone/cable companies, make it illegal  to  run  your  own
servers, and block at least ports 25 and 80.  You have to relay email
through their servers, and you can't legally run web servers at all.

It'll be interesting to see if this is enforced.  Of course,  if  say
Verizon  or  Comcast  terminated  your  access  because you run a web
server, they could still just say "Yeah, it may be  illegal.   You're
welcome  to  take us to court.  In 5 or ten years, if you win, you'll
get your access back."

I also wonder what that "needs of law enforcement" means?  Do we  all
have  to provide a standard backdoor to our system, accessible to any
law enforcement agency (or anyone who knows the access protocol)?