If any proof were needed that we live in an oligarchy, where sometimes the rest of us are thrown a bone, consider the “Mobile Informational Call Act of 2011“, which would amend federal law to allow corporations to pester cell phone users with robocalls. I first learned about it in a fundraising email from the Democrats. This is, we at least can hope, an example of a situation where the Democrats might actually, but probably ineffectually, play their assigned role as the party that sometimes thinks people have rights, but, we’ll see. Other than fundraising off it, they may do little to stop it.
If this were a truly representative democracy, this bill would go nowhere. How many people do you know who are clamoring to be annoyed day and night with unwanted cell phone calls? In addition, unlike with landlines, many people will have to pay to receive these calls. This basically amounts to a tax imposed by the callers, a tax that will fall heaviest on the poor, who often buy their cell phone plans by the minute. Only in a country in which corporations totally called the tune would this bill go anywhere. Even the Tea Party hasn’t managed to get its puppets to demand stuff like this.
At the same time, another bill of similar ilk has already passed the House. As the Times reports this morning, the House has passed a bill at the behest of Netflix that would make each person with a Facebook account and a Netflix account a source of free Netflix advertising. Under current law, a person’s video watching habits are protected. Oddly enough, in a round about way, we have Robert Bork to thank for that fact. Netflix wants to “allow” consumers to give a one time consent to “share” every movie they watch. No doubt this would be done by a take-it-or-leave-it change to their terms of service. Every Itunes subscriber knows the drill. Periodically we have to agree to a change in service, and we can actually try to figure out what the changes are, providing we are interested in wading through 40 or 50 pages of legalese. Netflix’s spokesman’s defense of the bill is the kind of laughable pile of BS only the American media could report with a straight face:
“It really is meant to empower the consumer to be able to share with their friends,” says David Hyman, the general counsel of Netflix. He says the bill simply updates an outmoded law so that it matches the way we live now. “It really kind of levels the playing field in social media.”
Isn’t their concern for our welfare touching? If you don’t believe him, then take it from the Future of Privacy Forum, a group which, judging by its name, is obviously devoted to protecting privacy:
People prefer frictionless sharing, a convenience hindered by the current law, says Christopher Wolf, a lawyer who is co-chairman of the Future of Privacy Forum, a Washington research group that receives financing from Google, Facebook and other digital media companies.
Did I say protecting? Sorry, that would be destroying. Again, only in an oligarchy could such a bill be considered, never mind passed by one House.
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