I don't know where you were last week. But I can tell you where United States Secretary of Commerce William Daley, Esther Dyson of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, Steve Case of America Online (AOL,) and Gerald Levin of Time-Warner were spending their time. They were in Paris, France, at the Louvre, schmoozing with government officials from all over the planet.

No, they were not at the Louvre to appreciate the art.

They were there for a meeting of an organization you probably have never heard of before. It was formed in January of this year and called the Global Business Dialogue on Electronic Commerce (GBDe.)

I'll explain to you, Netizen, why you were not invited to this gathering...

You were not invited because you are *not* part of what Secretary of Commerce Daley calls t he "Chamber of Global E-Commerce." You are probably too small. Unless you are the CEO of Time-Warner, or AOL, or Germany's Bertelsmann AG --- well, I guess you don't matter much.

Welcome to The Future of the WWW.

The most interesting report I found on the meeting appeared at Tornado-Insider.com, "The Digital Nervous System for High Growth Europe." In Senior Editor Kristi Essick's article is the implied question: Here are Time-Warner, America Online (AOL), and Bertelsmann AG, but where are the *real* Internet entrepreneurs. Answer: Not invited. (ASIDE: If you haven't checked Tornado-Insider.com do. It's a wonderful publication. Add it to your bookmarks/favorites.)

The notable thing about all this is that Germany's Bertelsmann AG chaired the organization from January until now. For the next year, the chair will be shared by Time-Warner's Mr. Levin and AOL's Mr. Case. In other words, hundreds of government officials were in Paris sipping their champagne and schmoozing to the tune of the 800-pound gorillas who want to take over the shape of the Internet. It was not about innovation, it was about turning this medium into another cash cow for already-giant multinationals.

Inside the replica shack at Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts is a page from "Civil Disobedience." I've often wondered if anybody but I had read that page... and if they had, had they really understood it?

Unjust laws exist: shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?... They [men and women] think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform? Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults, and do better than it would have them? Why does it always crucify Christ, and excommunicate Copernicus and Luther, and pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?

During this 150th anniversary of "Civil Disobedience," I protested in front of Gandhi's grandson who was delivering a speech for the Thoreau Society outside the First Parish church in Concord. My sign, THOREAU WAS A DISSIDENT, NOT A SOCIETY OR SHOP, was either read in disgust or simply ignored by Society members (see Northwoods Journal, Fall 1999 issue).

A month later, I was incarcerated for doing something different.

I had been going to Walden Pond nearly every day for the past year. During the summer, I often swam there. On the second of September I pulled into the park, waited behind the car in front of me.... and waited and waited and waited as the attendant gabbed, indifferent to my waiting. So I drove around the car, pointing to my seasonal sticker and parked. The attendant had hollered: "SIR, SIR!" But I had kept driving.

I swam 45 minutes. Walked back up the hill, got into my car, drove out of the lot, pulled over to the control station, and asked the attendant what was wrong. He said that I hadn't followed the rules. And I replied: "What fucking rules?" I pointed to my seasonal sticker and said I'd paid my dues. An argument ensued about the rules. I remained in my car. But I had sinned. I had used the F word.