Comments on the definition of the Internet and the importance of ...

Another quote of the day service is defined as a datagram based
application on UDP. A server listens for UDP datagrams on UDP port
17. When a datagram is received, an answering datagram is sent
containing a quote (the data in the received datagram is ignored).
Quote Syntax
There is no specific syntax for the quote. It is recommended that it
be limited to the ASCII printing characters, space, carriage return,
and line feed. The quote may be just one or up to several lines, but
it should be less than 512 characters.
Postel [Page 1]
The Internet Engineering Task Force, or, in this case, perhaps a
predecessor body, met and agreed that there was good reason to have
such a standard protocol, and so this RFC was adopted. The working
group that dealt with this RFC did not have to negotiate with the
Duopoly a place for this protocol. Nor did the Duopoly have to
consider pricing for delivery of qotd packet streams, nor whether, nor
how, to introduce this new service to its customers, nor what
regulatory bodies would have to approve the introduction of this new
service, nor how this protocol should be dealt with by the Duopoly's
hardware and software, etc.. None of these burdens attended the birth
of the quote of the day protocol. None of these burdens today weigh
down the deployment of the qotd service, none of these burdens weighed
me down when I used the service a few minutes ago, and none of these
burdens bore upon the owner of ota.iambic.com, when the owner started
his qotd daemon running.
We shall not discuss how RFCs are created. Except to remark the
central fact that the Duopoly has no direct business interest in the
writing, nor adoption of any RFC. But if the Main Error were not an
error, but a truth, then of course, the Duopoly would set its own
standards, and create its own services, in the interest of, at least
according to a now popular religious sect, stockholders in the
Duopoly. But, of course, that is not how the Net was built. Rather
the builders of the Net bought delivery of data, no better, signal, at
the best price they could get, and they built the Net on top of the
delivery of signal. There are over 5000 adopted RFCs, all hacked out
without oversight of the Duopoly and without oversight of the FTC, nor
of the FCC. We who think the Net we have is worth keeping, think that
the radical freedom of association, with near zero external imposed
frictions, is worth defending, because this is how we built the Net.
Again, we note at this point that the Duopoly never invented anything
like the Net. But, under the rules of common carriage, and under
contractual obligations to deliver signal, the Net was built, in
freedom, atop the signal carriers' faithful carriage of signal.
Those who are for Network Neutrality are not for regulation of the
Net. We are for freedom of the Net. Without freedom to design, and
freely use, new services and protocols and applications, there is no
Net. This same freedom makes possible the setting of standards, that
is, agreement on RFCs and adoption of RFCs.