Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!hybrid!scifi!bywater!uunet!bu.edu!telecom-request From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: More on BBSs and Phone Rates Message-ID: <72180@bu.edu.bu.edu> Date: 13 Jan 91 04:11:47 GMT Sender: news@bu.edu.bu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 160 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 32, Message 1 of 7 Mike Godwin responds in issue 30 to my comments in earlier issues: My original comments: >> His reply: > >>[Moderator's Note: Well then, if the development of a virtual >>community is what you find important, it should be okay, and >>encouraged to have all the 900/976 ladies and gentlemen selling >>fantasy sex over the phone switch to residential rates. After all, >>they have the same old callers day after day, as do the non-sexual >>chat lines. Those tend to be virtual communities also. >This is an untenable reach on your part, Pat. BBSs are not like >900/976 chatlines. If you think they are, then you must have been >calling a very different sort of BBS from the ones I've experienced >over the last decade. Perhaps then you are not all that familiar with the range and scope of BBSs in America today ... or the 900/976 chat line scene. There are plenty of nice BBSs around, and more than a few 'naughty' ones as well. In both instances, by voice communication in one and by data communication in the other, people call to relate to one another, to chat by modem or speak with others, alone or in a group, friends (I use that word loosely!) or total strangers. Both the sixteen line TBBS sites with their own version of 'CB Simulator' and the six/seven line Diversi-Dial boards run on Apple ][ computers exclusively for chat purposes have a wide range of devotees. >Apparently, I need to explain the word "community." It does not denote >two people talking out each other's fantasies. Nor does it denote >rape-crisis hotlines, which are also, generally, two-person >interactions. Rape-crisis is probably not a good example here, although my inclination would be to give them a break on their phone costs if possible through the creation of a third, intermediate rate for non-residential/non-business service. You are correct this is one on one. But if two people -- sysop and BBS'er -- can sit in chat and discuss matters of interest at residential rates, why can't two people sit and chat voice discussing 'other things' also get residential rates? Or conversely, why do sysops get residential rates while voice-style information services pay business rates? >Virtual communities give rise to colloquies, not merely dialogs, Pat. >More than two people can talk with each other at once, and the >relationship is not structured the way 976 lines and rape-crisis lines >are, with one person invariably seeking some particular kind of >service or information from the other, and often paying for it. There are lots of 900/976 numbers where several people chat voice at one time in a common 'tank'. Likewise there are plenty of BBSs where only two people can talk at once, i.e. the sysop and the caller. And sometime you should ask a few old veteran sysops how many times per day they are called into chat by a new (and heretofore unknown to them) user who invariably asks "what downloads/games do you have here? How old are you? What kind of computer is this?". So some lonely nerd of a sixth-grade child phreaks his way around the country calling BBSs and pestering one sysop after another ... while another chap sits at home and calls a different 900 number daily looking for some person who will talk to him ... what is really the difference ??? >If 976 lines are what come to your mind when I use the word >"community," then I've learned quite a bit more about how you think >than I knew before, Pat. :-) 900/976 devotees (of the community chat lines) are every bit as much a community as are the devotees of some particular BBS. Admittedly the one-on-one 900 callers tend to stay anonymous, but the community chat lines are indeed, quite frequently the same old voices on the other end. Yes there are newcomers daily -- just like on a BBS. Yes, there are people who have been around for awhile and call daily ... just like on a BBS. What is really the difference ??? One chooses to speak, while the other chooses to type. Both choose to call because the person or organization on the other end **has solicited calls from the public** -- invited the public to share in hospitality with them. But you say one is a virtual community .. the other isn't. Maybe it is a matter of your subjective taste and attitudes in how one person should socialize with others. >Our Moderator asks why Compuserve shouldn't get residential rates >since Compuserve is a virtual community. The answer, of course , is >that Compuserve is a commercial service, Pat. Most BBSs are not. So do you want an auditor from telco to examine your books and see if you made money or not last year? Back in 1979-80 Compuserve was not making money. I know your answer to that is that well, their *intent* was always to make money ... and the BBS sysop does not *intend* to make money. Therefore, virtual community or not, since the sysop is only doing it out of the goodness of his heart and Compuserve is doing it for the money they make, the sysop gets off the hook while CIS pays. But if it is the 'profit motive' which is to be used to decide whether or not a virtual community ought to pay business rates on the phone, then we are back to the dial-prayers and other itinerant information providers who offer voice recordings of one kind or another out of, I might add, the goodness of their heart or their desire to serve the community. You see Mike, sysops do not have a monopoly on goodness of heart or desire to serve the community. A lady in Chicago runs a recorded message each day giving soap opera updates '... for the folks who work all day and cannot watch daytime television as I do ... '. Any number of folks have an extra phone line set up to give inspirational talks, book reviews, their view of current events or whatever. All are little one person operators who, like the sysop, believe in sharing their skills and knowledge with others freely. >I'm not advocating residential rates for all virtual communities. I'd >just like to see them for the very small-scale virtual communities >that arise on hobbyist BBSs. Your passion for seeing that these BBSs >pay residential rates will wipe a great number of them out, Pat. This >is a loss that should be avoided. I think you meant to say 'your passion for seeing them pay *BUSINESS* rates will wipe them out.' I will proceed from here on the assumption that is what you meant. I have no such passion. Did I not early on in this thread say I thought there should be a third rate step, an intermediate rate for phones not used as typical residence phones but certainly not as business phones either? If there are only to be two rates, one business and one personal, the BBSs should be treated no differently than anyone else in the 'business of' providing information, indiscriminate chatting and other services to the public out of goodwill. At present, that means pay business rates. The fact that it is regarded as a 'hobby' rather than a 'business' has no bearing on the matter since a good many dial-prayer, soap-opera review, conspiracy-theory VOICE services are regarded by their proprietors as hobbies also. They pay business rates at present. You want to 'avoid the loss of BBSs'. All well and good. Others want to keep their public-service hobbies alive also. It isn't the virtual community that matters; many of them have their little community of regular participants. It isn't the profitability that counts; none of the folks using the phone as a hobby would claim they get any sizeable amount of contributions sent to their post office boxes. It isn't how few there are around that counts; if anything there are more BBSs in any large city than churches, charities and telephone public service announcement-givers put together. At last count in metro Chicago we had over 400 BBS programs operating, per a recent BBS directory. It isn't that BBS sysops are so special and so different; they aren't. They have chosen a media and a method to express themselves and serve others. None of this would have come to pass had it not been for the multi-line chat systems like Diversi-Dial and TBBS sixteen line boards whose (apparently) wealthy owners unflinchingly spent plenty of money to set up such systems, charged a few dollars to let everyone on, and then went stiff when it was time to pay telco their due for the month. I have no doubt telco would have never touched the *really* little guys who visit electronically with a few friends at night had it not been for the real abusers in the modem world. And now, everyone gets to pay. Tell the Judge you think there should be a special rate step for the hobbyists and non-profits who use the phone in any capacity -- whatever their thing. That should be a compromise almost everyone could live with.