But when it comes time for their recommendations, I feel like a country bumpkin. Recent Leo and Steve Gibson were talking about the new Sony Reader and Leo said that it only costs $349. Only $349? That’s half my weekly salary!

I think that a lot of the folks out in Silicon Valley and, to a lesser extent, New York City have a distorted perspective as to what is affordable. In a place where a house like mine can cost five times what I paid for it, the idea that $349 for a version 1.0 eBook reader is a good deal is probably correct. If you’re paying $2500 a month or more for your mortgage, that probably is a good deal. (And if you’re making, as you should be, four times your mortgage payment every month, it’s definitely a good deal.) And judging by what the folks on MacBreak Weekly or TWiT are saying, they’ve got tons of money to throw around, buying Quad Core Mac Pros with dual 30″ monitors and $600 BluRay players and $400 gaming systems to go with their $2,000 HDTVs. (And if it sounds like I’m jealous, you’re right. You wouldn’t like to be able to afford things like that?)

But for most of the rest of the country, where the cost of living is significantly lower, $349 is a pretty big chunk of change. I’d have to spend a few months saving to be able to afford a Sony eBook reader, so I don’t want to buy one until it’s compelling enough to make it worth it. And before that, there’s a bunch of other things I’d rather buy. I still haven’t picked up a 250GB hard drive to do backups, and my Powerbook is starting to feel its age. (And it also doesn’t stay closed.) So I don’t think I’ll ever have an eBook reader, at least not Sony’s.

So to any tech columnist who might read this; I understand that you’ve got tons of money because you’re a super duper tech writer. But realize that not everybody is a super duper tech writer or a Web 2.0 millionaire. Some of us are still poor schlubs pounding keyboards and paying mortgages.

(Hey, maybe there’s a niche out there for a “Penniless Geek” column. I’m not going to say that would make a good domain name, because I want to avoid the quantum domain name effect.)

What do I use port 80 for? WebDAV to share my iCals and files. I also keep an eye on my headless Mac Mini using a PHP script and a cronjob that takes a screenshot. I also SSH in to test connectivity from a different IP address, as well as to fix issues on my wife’s iBook (when she’s home) and run software updates. Sound valid? I think so.

Verizon lost a customer because they think I’m not a good enough person to manage my own computer. Because they’re too lazy or stupid to monitor machines connected to their network for proper service. And because they think their customers are children, dutifully consuming information and contributing nothing back. “Why would a residential customer need their inbound ports?” they ask. They don’t think that someone could be using the ‘inter’ part of the Internet.

If this isn’t a good argument for nationalization (or at least demonopolization) of the Internet, I don’t know what is. I pay them to give me an IP address and bandwidth. Period. What I do with the bandwidth is none of their damn business. (Unless it’s illegal. In which case, it is their business, because it’s the governments business. But only if they get a warrant.)
At the very least, why don’t they offer a la carte services. Pick the bandwidth you use, pick the ports you need opened, and pay based on that. Heck, they could even offer static IPs as a monthly fee. That way, people could get very, very low end service (no open ports, 1GB/month bandwidth) for $10/month. Want a port open? $0.99/month. Five ports for $3.99. All ports for $20/month. Need more bandwidth? $1 per GB per month. Symmetrical speeds? $20/month. Static IP? $10/month. And make it configurable over the Internet, so I don’t have to deal with your tech support troglodytes to do manage my connection. I know that these things aren’t expensive to set up, and any company who offered them would make a lot of profit on them.
So if anyone can find me a decent DSL provider that doesn’t cost more than $55/month and doesn’t treat me like a child, please post it in the comments. DSL Reports says the only other option is Earthlink, who blocks port 25 because of idiots are unkowingly running spambots.