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Galileo to get go ahead
Alex Terrell wrote:
(Michael Kent) wrote in message ... The payback would be in charging a fee to access Galileo signals. This begs the question as to why anyone would pay good money to get something he can already get for free. Thus, at one time the ESA/EU were going to require all receivers operating inside European borders to use Galileo signals. I don't know if this proposal made it into the final plan. I believe that idea of coercion got dropped. I guess some people might be prepared to pay for security, and slightly improved accuracy, but not enough to provide the payback. I guess the EU could always go the WTO and to force GPS to charge, as currently it could be seen as unfair subsidy. That wouldn't make the EU popular, except with the US Treasury. GPS is a passive system to the end user. There is no way to know who is receiving the signals, so there is no way to charge them for it. Any such WTO ruling would be impossible to carry out. But it would set a very interesting precendent. If providing a service via government that competes with a for-profit service anywhere else in the world is in violation of WTO rules, then other government services such as health care would also be in violation. Logically speaking, the WTO could then rule that Canada's national health care system is an unfair subsidy, depriving cross-border American hospitals their due customers. Imagine the possibilities! Mike ----- Michael Kent Apple II Forever!! St. Peters, MO |
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