On Wed, 28 Feb 2007 20:30:10 -0800, Jack Unger wrote > Mark, > > I agree completely with your closing sentiment that "Everything we > do should be aimed at providing ourselves protection from being > wiped out due to pressure from Congress or the Big Boys". I don't > however understand your "beef" with this particular FCC action.
It's just about undue influence, Jack. Where's the justice here? What about all the other "pirate" stations that don't happen to get a Senator to write to the FCC to turn the enforcement / fine into an STA? Aren't some of them "valuable to their community" too? Mr. > Moses was and is now again providing a clear and valuable public > service to the community of Goldfield Nevada which (if you've ever > been there) is a near ghost-town that's fighting to continue to > exist as a community. It seems that Mr. Moses's broadcasting is > providing a significant service to the town while harming nobody. > Goldfield is located in the desert three hours north of Las Vegas > and six hours south of Reno. This is a desolate rural area with > little to no local broadcasters so no risk of interference to anyone. Hey, I don't object to the idea of inexpensive ways of building a low-power AM station. Had the Senator gotten a dozen colleagues to say "man, this is a great idea, let's make a way for tiny stations to spring up in small and remote communities and enhance their community. I'd be all for promoting a "better than part 15 .1w" set of regulations to allow 1 or 5 or 10 watt community service stations without delays for application windows and onerous recordkeeping, regulatory burdens, blah, blah. That would be justice. That would find a way to do the good, and make sure EVERYONE benefitted. As it is, one rule breaker gets rewarded, one Senator gets media praise, and everyone else gets... nothing. I'd almost call that "business as usual". > > http://maps.yahoo.com/index.php#q1=goldfield%2C+nv.&trf=0&mvt=m&lon=- > 117.240601&lat=37.714245&mag=11 > > Mr. Moses is harming no one and he is obviously helping his > community. I say (figuratively) "more power to him". As to your > comment that Senator Reid is corrupt... well I'm not even going to > go there. I don't want to start ranting about the very real endemic, > destructive political corruption that has been on display in our > Nation's Capital recently. > > To end on a positive note, I'll just repeat that I agree with your > ending sentiment that we (WISPs) need to do everything to protect > ourselves from being wiped out by the "Big Boys". Mr. Moses isn't > trying to wipe us out, AT&T IS trying and has been doing a very good > job of that. Let's keep our eyes on the right ball. > > Respectfully, > jack Jack, I guess I sorta dropped the ball here. I just assumed you'd read the same thing between the lines I did. The "sway-ability" of the FCC with just ONE letter from ONE Senator is very disconcerting. It did not prompt them to adjust rules and create benefit for all. It just ignored the rules and let someone slide because someone thought it would "look good". But what if that letter were something harmful to us, but the reason given was "good"? Frankly, I trust Congress... the feds in general... about... well... ABSOLUTELY NOT ONE IOTA. Government by nature is adversarial to the welfare of the individual. That's why we had (past tense) such an unusual nation, where a government was forced to get OUT of our business turned the people free and they then built the best danged nation to ever exist. I guess that makes me a radical around here. The people from WISPA who travel to DC and lobby for us... well, they come around promoting " we have to be nice to them, so they'll be nice to us". The rest of us out here in the hinterland, the hoi polloi, so to speak, just don't find any sense in trusting our future to the whims in DC. Come on, AT LEAST VOICE OBJECTIONS TO INTRUSIONS. This is our business, people. For many of us, it's our life, our retirement, our bread and butter. And we can't muster the guts to tell some over- reaching regulators they're out of line? Why not? What the bloody heck is "political" about defending what I've worked for for years now? This is my last chance at a retirement. I'm 44 and haven't got $5 to retire on, I used it to start this business. I'd call objecting to ANY potential threat... "Enlightened self interest" and I don't understand why WISPA and Part-15, etc, are so danged afraid to even admit there's a threat, much less speak up and defend us at least a tiny bit.... Even now, the representation they've appeared to have made is that we're totally compliant, unquestioning, and welcoming regulatory mandates. One can hardly wonder why I feel so danged betrayed. I gave WISPA plenty of good money when I hadn't had so much as a single paycheck (I still haven't, but there's light at the end of the tunnel), and couldn't raise money to expand my business, and they did exactly the OPPOSITE of what I consider vital to my survival. I wanted to be defended, not fed like a fly to the spider. -------------------------------------------- Mark Koskenmaki <> Neofast, Inc Broadband for the Walla Walla Valley and Blue Mountains 541-969-8200 -- WISPA Wireless List: [email protected] Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
