As the
anniversary of my full 8th year actively in the
wireless internet business is here, I decided to make some
comments. My
interest in wireless internet, and actual efforts to
actually start doing it
are now 14 years old. Yes,
really, it was that long ago.
And I’m feeling much older these days.
My first
internet venture failed quite spectacularly. I think I made every
mistake one could make, and didn’t learn every lesson there
was to learn, either. But
it did help, as I did not repeat a bunch of things that were
fatal. The most
important one was to not start with vastly larger bills than
your revenue. Growth
doesn’t always come in rapid fashion. And there’s a cost to
all growth. Know before you make that leap, what the
consequences will be.
Over the
last few years, I’ve been known to get what some people call
“political”. Perhaps
it is, I say it isn’t. It’s
just common sense business principles. It was one of my first
lessons – learn how to preserve your future flexibility,
because THINGS CHANGE. That,
too, was one of my first mistakes. I had no alternatives, really, to
travelling down the road I started on, which was a seriously
bad mistake. That
ability to be flexible, to violate the “rules” of internet
by wire, is what created the WISP business in the first
place, and yet, it’s one of the things that’s been done the
most damage to, and faces the largest threats in the future.
This post is
probably my last, as it concerns things WISPA. I have given up on
WISPA completely. Mostly
for the reasons above. While
WISPA was being formed, I had the self-generated illusion
that fellow WISPS’s
would be all about getting, expanding, and maintaining the
freedom to be in business.
We’re notorious for being rogues, cowboys,
unconventional, and extremely individualistic. It would have never
occurred to me that one or more founders of WISPA would go
to the FCC and tell them that they should create reporting
mandates and then encourage regulation of our industry. My shock when I
learned that was a kind of “rock your world” kind of thing. And anger. Serious anger. How dare people
undertake to put us under the thumb of the utterly
incompetent idiots in Washington DC? If you want to live
that way, go live some place like that, don’t undertake to
force it upon me. That’s
the essence of the American attitude, history, and the very
thing that built this country.
Over the
years, I’ve come to realize that unlike me, few of our
industry have any such lesson learned. The idea of getting
free money or loans or other favors in the form of money
from government or government actions has lured them into
becoming just another faction of the crony capitalism that
has all but destroyed our nation’s economy, currency, and
threatens to finish the job, rapid-fire. WISPA certainly
doesn’t seem to have any interest in telling Washington DC
to go pound sand, and do what is the morally, economically,
and Constitutionally right
and proper thing… Leave us the HELL ALONE! Stop pretending that
DC is the source of goodness, and stop pretending that they
have even an IOTA of the answers for what ails the country
and how to supply our needs.
They do not.
I won’t
waste your time with explanations of what I want, after all,
either you’re in agreement, or else your only interest is in
creating false portrayals to attack me personally, calling
me an “anti-government nut” or any of 100 other senseless
phrases. Some of you I’ve gotten to know a bit over the
years, and I have no idea if any of you are on this list
anymore. Maybe
someone will post this where everyone can read it if they
want. Why we can’t
advocate for economic and business operation freedom anymore
is completely beyond my comprehension. Especially since we’re
supposed be about business, a business which exists solely
because of that
amazing concept of economic and personal liberty otherwise
known as capitalism – or free enterprise – take your pick. It offends too many,
and those who it doesn’t are too too timid to stand for what
they think in the presence of the socialist bullies.
It’s my wish
and my prayer as well, that all of you have a good life, a
prosperous future, health, and happiness. But I hold out little
hope, long term. Unless
things change, we’re all going away, our plans and
enterprises massacred by the attitude that all our needs are
merely a utilitarian function of government. Still, I hope the best
for all – and always have and always will.
Mark
