``The Net'' has become a common and generic phrase among Canada's online community. It is often used in reference to the Internet, cyberspace, University campus networks, or computer communication networks and messaging systems generally.During the last two weeks of September 1995, Electronic Frontier Canada compiled a list of occurrences of this phrase, ``The Net'', in popular media to illustrate just how widespread and longstanding this usage has become. If you know know of any example uses of ``The Net'' that should be added to this list, just drop us a line at [email protected].
Electronic Frontier Canada compiled this list as part of its efforts to oppose Bell Canada's application to register a trademark on the phrase, ``The Net'', in relation to computer communications and messaging services, on behalf of its subsidiary WorldLinx Telecommunications. According to section 38 of the Trade-mark Act, anyone can oppose an application to register a trademark by filing the appropriate forms and paying a fee of $250.Electronic Frontier Canada filed its formal opposition with the Registrar of Trade-marks on September 29th, 1995.
Bell Canada notified the Registrar of Trade-marks that it wished to abandon their application to trademark ``The Net'' on October 6, 1995.
It's over. We won.
``I wrote a piece about these events called Crime & Puzzlement. Although I did so at the request of the Whole Earth Review -- it made its first print appearance in the Fall 1990 issue -- I "published" it on the Net in June and was astonished by the response. It was like planting a fence-post and discovering that the "ground" into which you've driven it is actually the back of a giant animal which quivers and heaves at the irritation.''
``Working with Jerry Berman of the ACLU, Mitch and the EFF intend to create an " information consumers communications policy forum" to bring together the Baby Bells, AT&T, other telcos, the FCC, newspaper publishers, online information services, and other stakeholders to discuss how their vision of the future of the Net serves the public interest.''
Electronically amplified, Mitch and I were able to personally conduct much of EFF's business in the first few months of operations. But gradually we had to confront the fact that while the Net is very broad, it is also quite shallow. Without even a sense of their physical location, we have been unable to marshal the hundreds of people who have e-mailed us with their volunteered services.''
`` Glossary -- This glossary is only a tiny subset of all of the various terms and other things that people regularly use on The Net.''
``
Usenet News --
... the network consisted of ... two sites ... and was described at
the January 1980 Usenix conference in Boulder. ...
As The Net grew, the news software was expanded and modified. . . .
Every once in a while, someone says that a celebrity is accessible
through "The Net";
or, even more entertaining, an article is forged to appear
to be coming from that celebrity.''
The Net's technological foundation was built to withstand nuclear attack. The RAND Corporation designed the network to be a thoroughly decentralized command-and-control-and communications system, one that would be less vulnerable to intercontinental missiles than a system commanded by a centralized headquarters.
``
Crime in Cybercity --
`We don't want to stifle communication.
We don't want to shut down the Net.' . . .
No one owns the Net, so no one controls it. . . .
The Net providers say they cannot hope to control what floods over
their networks and trust that they will eventually be considered
common carriers, as the telephone companies are, freed from liability
for what people say and do over the phone.''
`` Reality Check -- `The Internet needs content. It's a medium in desperate need of something to say. In the next 10 years, somebody will figure out how to charge for information over the Net, so you won't get things necessarily for free. -- Clifford Stoll''