FWD: URGENT: Defend Polish Internet

[Jan Schmidt]

Dobry den,

zachytil jsem SOS nasich polskych kolegu. Nez jsem zpravu postoupil
do net, zeptal jsem se na nektere podrobnosti odesilatele pana Zenona Kulpy.
Jsou pripojeny na konci a podle meho nazoru dovoluji udelat si alespon
pribliznou predstavu, jak to vypada u sousedu. Moje omluva za delku prispevku.

---------------- FWD message ------------------
X-Organisation: Faculty of Mathematics, Computer Science, Physics & Astronomy
    University of Amsterdam Kruislaan 403 NL-1098 SJ Amsterdam The Netherlands
X-Phone:        +31 20 525 7463
X-Fax:          +31 20 525 7490
Organization: Institute of Fundamental Technological Research
Address: Swietokrzyska 21, 00-049 Warszawa, POLAND
Date: Thu, 30 Nov 95 20:29:02 +0100
From: zkulpa at zmit1.ippt.gov.pl (Zenon Kulpa)
Message-ID: <9511301929.AA16670 at zmit1.ippt.gov.pl>
To: lunar at sunsite.unc.edu, tps at genie.geis.com, dmbricke at artsci.wustl.edu,
    oceania at oceania.org, dkrieger at netcom.com, merkle at parc.xerox.com,
    lphq at digex.net, postmaster at lp.org, jjh at aberystwyth.ac.uk,
    qphysics at cs.washington.edu, diagrams at Csli.Stanford.EDU,
    InfoDesign-Cafe at fwi.uva.nl
Subject: InfoD-Cafe: URGENT: Defend Polish Internet
CC: zkulpa at zmit1.ippt.gov.pl
Sender: owner-InfoDesign-Cafe at fwi.uva.nl
X-MX-Warning: VMS Mail To: line does not include all To: addresses

The monopolistic Polish state-owned enterprise NASK,
the owner and sole general Internet provider in Poland
is going to implement a new, per-traffic payment scheme,
[for both in- and out-going traffic!]
effectively killing Internet acces for small institutional
or private users, and also being a sort of informational
"iron curtain", as the international traffic is planned
to be charged four times more than the traffic within Poland.

Anyone willing to stop this outrageous attempt to kill
free exchange of information through Internet
in Poland and between Poland and the rest of the world
is asked to visit the WWW page given below
for more information and directions of how to do it.

  http://www.pol.pl/pol._e/protesty.htm
  Defend Polish Internet!

[note - there should be no 'l' at the end of the URL above]

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE THIS MESSAGE THROUGHOUT THE INTERNET!
-------------------------------------------------------

--------------------- FWD messasge --------------
> please tell me
>
> - what is the present cost and present cost scheme
>
Presently, the charge is constant, according to the bandwith
of the link (and some other technical factors).
It is considerably larger than, say, in the USA,
but bearable.

> - what it will be in the future, in terms of, say, average salary
>
Much larger:
mostly because in addition to the previous charge,
there will be new charge for actual traffic,
BOTH ingoing and outgoing,
approx. $0.60 per 1MB for traffic with abroad,
$0.15 for 1MB for traffic within Poland.
(average salary: approx. $240/month).
It will especially hit private users, as
Universites and similar state institutions
will get unpaid limit of traffic
(approx. around the level of current traffic - so, anyway,
any increase over current traffic will be charged...).
It is estimated that for some users the new tariff
will mean 30 (thirty) times increase over current charges.


> - what prevents other providers from entering the market:
> 	- law / state policy
>
Current law & state policy: NASK is a state monopoly,
similar to TP S.A. (Telecom of Poland).
NASK leases links to other commercial providers,
charging as above (minus approx. 15% for their profit margin),
but nobody can be connected to Internet omitting NASK network.

You may find the full new price list at:

  http://www.cto.us.edu.pl/cennik.nask/cennik.nask.html

(unfortunately - currently in Polish only).

See also the opinion of the Internet Society of Poland
(in English) at:

  http://www.pol.pl/pol._e/psi.htm

[note that there is no 'l' at the end of the URL above]


Thank you very much for your interest!

Best wishes,

-- Zenon Kulpa

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Jan Schmidt