Mexico's Lucky to Have Just One Man Blocking Internet Equality - US Has Got a Bunch Susan Crawford - Wired
go to original May 13, 2013

Carlos Slim Helu (itupictures/flickr)

Usually people keep quiet in libraries. But not last Thursday night, when the richest man in the world, Carlos Slim Helú, spoke in a grand, softly lit public room at the New York Public Library. Slim had been invited because of his stunning philanthropy: NYPL President Tony Marx reminded the audience that Carlos Slim had committed $10 billion to charitable giving. Earlier this year, Slim promised to pay for the translation of Khan Academy videos into Spanish, and Salman Khan sat next to him at last week’s event.

I happened to be there because I was interested in Slim’s role in Mexican telecommunications. His companies control 80% of the landlines and 70% of the wireless market in Mexico, and the OECD said last year that uncompetitive telecom services were costing the Mexican economy $25 billion a year.

Loud laughter greeted Slim’s early remarks, and within a few minutes a major nonviolent protest erupted: kazoo-playing audience members trooped around the giant hall and left the building after flinging multicolored pieces of monopoly money into the air.

What was printed on that money? It bore the legend “$73 Billion Net Worth By Price Gouging & Overcharging.” And that’s when I realized that this moment represented a turning point: Monopoly communications industry behavior may finally become socially interesting in America. There are just a few steps between what’s happened in Mexico and what’s going on here in the United States.

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