Btw, Eduardo Saverin did not sell their shares in the free-market. He sold them prior to the market opening at a price fixed by the company through manipulation. If he had sold in the "Free-Market" (which does not exist in the US), things would have been different. If fact, you all saw how low the shares price got...

regarding the internet:Simply because the government entity DARPA assisted in creating a network of computers in no way means that the government was integral or in anyway necessary for the internet.From wiki Research into packet switching started in the early 1960s and packet switched networks such as ARPANET, Mark I at NPL in the UK,[6] CYCLADES,[7][8] Merit Network,[9] Tymnet, and Telenet, were developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s using a variety of protocols. The ARPANET in particular led to the development of protocols for internetworking, where multiple separate networks could be joined together into a network of networks.The first two nodes of what would become the ARPANET were interconnected between Leonard Kleinrock's Network Measurement Center at the UCLA's School of Engineering and Applied Science and Douglas Engelbart's NLS system at SRI International (SRI) in Menlo Park, California, on 29 October 1969.[10] The third site on the ARPANET was the Culler-Fried Interactive Mathematics center at the University of California at Santa Barbara, and the fourth was the University of Utah Graphics Department. In an early sign of future growth, there were already fifteen sites connected to the young ARPANET by the end of 1971.[11][12] These early years were documented in the 1972 film Computer Networks: The Heralds of Resource Sharing.It was always a mix of universities, private entities and to a small extent, government.But at a fundamental level the internet is about communication - and there is ample historical evidence that private industry (capitalists) has absolutely no problem creating and implementing globe-spanning communications networks without the force of Government.The simple fact that the government has chosen to monopolize certain sectors of the economy in no way means that we need a gun put to our head to improve our own lives.And we would all be better off if they just got the fuck out of our way.

This is outrageous, Claymore.The DARPA? The damned DARPA funded the internet research? Huh? And who funded DARPA?They came to me with guns and robbed me, that's who! I didn't order this research, and never intended to pay for it. They also did that to every PRODUCTIVE "US person". They also did that to everyone who they forced to use the US dollar. The only ones that NEVER PAID for that, were exactly the ones now claiming credit, - the non taxed "poor" and ANYONE who works for the government.In fact, the only reason that the internet still sucks so much, is precisely because it was developed by the people without talent, those who could not make it in the open, those sucking on the government tit.And, no that agency you mention doesn't OWN the internet. They insist on controlling it, but without ANY grounds. And, the dns is not essential to the internet, in case you are new to how it works. (I know, that is what it says in every government textbook).Sometimes you say things that just so Marxist, I don't know if you jocking or not.

Military spending of taxpayers production funded Stanford. Americans paid for the funding therefore it stands to certain reason that creations thus born out of stanfords labs belong to the American taxpaying public. I've used the public net since the late 1970s. Government had little to do with it. As governments grow larger they increase in corruption. The American government is an illegal and unconstitutional corporation practicing corporatism upon the populace. There exists a group of inter generational dynastic families formerly know as the money trust back when they illegally instituted the federal reserve central banking system in 1913. Today they are the same only more powerful and much more corrupt. The anglosphere mercantile banker elite practice mercantilism upon the world. They are the private secret shareholders of blackrock and formerly barclays which they have quite obviously manipulated in order to introduce more capital controls. All self described intellectuals better start doing research. The money power ulitizes the energy of the left even more so than they do the right. Step out of the little plastic box of the 2 party paradigm and realize free markets exist everywhere and they have indeed existed in America. Freedom and individual liberty is the answer. Remove leviathan and see the world thrive. Remove the fractional reserve worthless thieving central bank and see Americans produce again.

Enough urban legends, Claymore. Read the following article.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000087239639044446430457753906300840651...

I am a little disapointed - I agree with this comment:" @AruosI believe that Obama is giving that statement as a freedom opinion. He is stating that every single company has the freedom to profit from using the Internet network. No one can deny that the Internet allowed a massive growth boom in modern services and utilities that function by accessing the Internet.My comment was only about that, since most of this article is incredibly biased, taken out of context and purely sensationalist... In this article, for example, the "super wealthy are defecting" theme is again repeated and brought up to the light but yet, there is no observation or comment (again) about the super wealthy that got their money by manipulation of the stock market, like Eduardo Saverin did, in the days before the premiere of the sale of the shares of Facebook. Nether the theme of own some super-wealthy individuals, striped down other individuals from their wealth by using deceiving and marketing tactics, effectively stealing their possessions... not a single word about this...Pity..."Pity, indeed.

@Chris HorlacherIt's provably wrong too. Without government funding of the sciences we get more science, producing more practical inventions.I could say that This is of course, pure speculation too :) But I just prefer to point facts... Why is that, when the ARPANET was developed, that only almost 2 decades later, the private sector had the "balls" to invest in such project? Science Research is a high risk investment! It has always been and it will always be! If an Entrepreneur is after a quick profit in Science research, than it is looking in the wrong place...Practical inventions you say? What is for you, a practical invention? How do you know what kind of research was done specifically for a practical invention? Did you know that most products nowadays, are in fact, the result of decades of research in nuclear physics? I give you the example of the Micro-wave Oven, which is an application of radar technology, which is also the result of research in micro-waves and nuclear radiation. Just because someone cannot see a direct pact between the research and the final product, it doesn't mean it is not there, it only means that it needs "better eyes" to see it! This is actually where Entrepreneurs enter!

..Wessenberk is wrong..lol..as Capitalism is build on principles of Pillage the most of needed to build/invent something ..Theories are Thoughts "costing` only Time (some claim: "time`s money"..si si according pillagecapitalism)..to Realizy/ Furthering/ Materializing the Theory to whatever Commodity requires the PillageCapitalism to take.. Shape....The Self-Made-Man is Myth..Laundered by Hollywood.. ;-)

@ShaneThe US never had a Free-Market.@KashyapI'm not crediting the Government for inventing the internet. The credit should be given to all the engineers and technicians that accomplish the creation of ARPANET. But without DARPA funding, it would have not been possible or, ti would have appeared much much later. The first "draft" (if we can call it that way) of the modern Internet, was when in the 70's, US Universities where interconnected and also connected to the ARPANET and also, with DARPA development of the e-mail concept. Again, Government funding... where was the private funding at the time? It seems that for me, the US Government took all the risk in funding these research projects.Anyway, from the answers posted here, there seems to be quite a lack of knowledge about how the internet appeared and how it really works... I leave that for your own home-research assignments.Peace!

lol. What an appropriate image for this post on the DV's facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=475693122443123&set=a.33103449690...

What the world needs is a kill switch to shut down all government....YES>

Claymore, Government may have created the technology that runs the internet, but I don't believe it was "SO THAT ALL THE COMPANIES COULD MAKE MONEY OFF THE INTERNET"