Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!maytag!looking!brad
From: brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton)
Subject: Re: The Moderator Who Doesn't Give A Shit
Organization: Looking Glass Software Ltd.
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 91 03:10:35 GMT
Message-ID: <1991Feb13.031035.27179@looking.on.ca>
References: <74436@bu.edu.bu.edu> <1991Feb11.185846.20778@lavaca.uh.edu> <1991Feb11.212313.8461@uncecs.edu>

People here (and in the Prodigy discussion) seem to write as though they
assume under it all that private ownership and control of "the press"
(including electronic media and publications) is some sort of threat to
freedom of expression.

Quite the opposite.   The framers of the U.S. constitution knew well that
private ownership and control of the press is a cornerstone of freedom,
not a threat to it.

Why this urge to ask "What are we going to do about it?"

The great new feature of electronic media -- the truly new thing which
inspires the creation of something like the EFF -- is the removal of the
distinction between small press and large press.   Freedom of the press has
always gone only to those who own the press.   But now any person with
a thousand dollars to spare can have an electronic press.   We should revel
in this rather than reviling those who don't operate their's to our taste.
-- 
Brad Templeton, ClariNet Communications Corp. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473