Robbin Murphy's postings about the GIF controversy -- whether
Compuserve and Unisys should be allowed to charge for it -- make me
wonder if some sort of law defining illegal online marketing practices,
similar to or a stretched version of Robinson - Patman, might not be
needed? To offer something for free, and then land established users
with a surprise charge -- after the fact (not clear that it's being
done on purpose in this case, but it would be in others) -- smacks of
"bait and switch" and some of the old "used car salesman" tactics which
were outlawed long ago by price - fixing and Uniform Commercial Code
legislation.
 
There are special "open systems / open platforms" considerations for
the nets, though: what about freeware, shareware, any not - yet -
commercialized code, any "trial balloon" -- it will be some trick to
establish a social policy which will continue to promote these while
forbidding sharp practices in the commercializing which inevitably will
have to pay for them.
 
 
Jack Kessler
 
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