VoIP Ruling Helps Liberate Chile from Telecom Stranglehold - Chileno, Chile Travel Blog, Life in Santiago

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VoIP Ruling in Chilean Courts

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It was an off-day, and I wasn't on the ball. Slow reflexes prevented me from avoiding eye contact, and before I knew it, my scoundrel of a publisher had me writing today's lead story in Santiago Times (republished on Mercopress). I never write for these guys anyway, I just use their free office space, wi-fi, and pretend to be working on something related to the chile information project, but this time I was caught off guard.

It was an offer I couldn't refuse, though, considering that like anybody else I recoil at the sense of powerlessness that these mobster crooks of monopolistic telecommunications make me feel, charging 30 cents a minute for a local cell phone call, conversations dropping left and right amidst perfect reception, etc. More a testament to criminality than stupidity, that monopolies exist in what was supposed to be Pinochet's haven of freemarketness.

And then when the free market works...buses choke out billows of smoke, this salt-oil taste lining my throat with the first gasp of air each day triggering the gag reflex, morning spit is usually black in color, while the screaming cancer buses roam freely about Santiago, untouched. The free market.

It's not so much my impending emphysema which disturbs me, but the idiocy of this "free market." It's shooting itself in the foot. How can you spur tourism and consumer culture via shee shee foo foo downtown shops and cafes when every three minutes a pack of these death star warships tear by, ripping open your eardrum and emptying a pint of blood into that cute little espresso cup that you were enjoying amidst such dashing company on that oh-so Parisian street side patio feel.

That's just stupid. Regulate the bus companies -- destroy the old buses, control smog, and promote tourism and foreign investment in Santiago. Cuz with smog this city is butt ugly and depressing and nobody likes living here.

Exact same thing with countries that ban VoIP in favor of their telecom monopolies, they kill off other economic opportunities. Like call centers, which are the devil, but at least they are an economic opportunity in Chile, which is a country pummeled by poverty, don't be mistaken, even if someone says it's fine cuz they visited one neighborhood that looks like a US suburb. That's the best it gets, and it's hardly representative.

And better yet than call centers are cheap calls. And the ruling pretty much seals the safety of Skype. So this time Chile actually took the first-world route in this landmark free competition decision that regulates the telecom, and allows VoIP to exist, which is nice. So one down, Chile, about a million more to go. Cough, cough.