On Friday 22. September 2017 15.57.26 Florian Snow wrote: > > Carsten Agger <ag...@modspil.dk> writes: > > * I want to park my car in the city, but it's only possible to pay by > > downloading one of two proprietary apps (real-world situation in > > Copenhagen) on my smartphone. Can I refuse to pay an eventual fine on > > the grounds that I couldn't pay? > > No, you get a fine because you have the choice of parking elsewhere.
If Copenhagen is like other cities, the opportunities for parking elsewhere may be very limited. In Oslo, I either *don't* want to know or I would *really* like to know (depending on how much I feel like looking closely at some potentially corrupt dealings) how the parking situation got to be some kind of cartel where supposedly "managed" parking is outrageously expensive and where many people consequently have to play the automotive equivalent of musical chairs to hunt down the limited number of available, free, on-street spaces that are the only real long-term parking option for many people. > The situation is essentially the same for people without a smartphone. > If there is an alternative solution for them (pay by phone call or text > message), then you could use that as well, but if there isn't both > situations pose the same problem. It is a question of accessibility in a broad sense. If people can interact with the payment mechanisms using public infrastructure then there is no problem. However, "apps" are the modern form of the kind of private networks that various corporations wanted to cultivate before the general Internet became popular. It would be like someone in the 1990s saying that you could only park if you had either a Compuserve account or were an eager early adopter of Apple's eWorld (or whatever it was called). So these parking operators are forcing you to do business with specific companies. This is also why people should not be forced to use proprietary software, especially when interacting with public services. > If it is a private company that uses those apps, then I see no issue at > all. If it is the government, then I would say the government should > generally not force its citicens to use non-free software. One colossal problem is that municipalities outsource services to private companies, some even structuring their *own* operations using a network of companies that take on different forms, potentially to seek exemptions from public obligations. I personally believe that companies should, in any case, be obliged to operate using standards-based, open, public infrastructure. Paul _______________________________________________ Discussion mailing list Discussion@lists.fsfe.org https://lists.fsfe.org/mailman/listinfo/discussion
