Newsletter ArchiveSUBJECTs:Teleconferencing - Internet taxation The Internet 800 Directory - http://www.inter800.com The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter This issue is for Friday, November 16, 2001 Table of Contents 01. Teleconferencing 02. Internet taxation Welcome to The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter. We have discussed Internet taxation in past issues. This week, Dave McClure provides us with some interesting points to consider on this subject. Don't be silent on issues that can affect your life and livelihood. Feel free to pass along your ideas on how our readers might improve their business. Send them to me (Chuck Arning) at chuck@inter800.com *01 Teleconferencing Since the events of Sept. 11th, many Americans have developed an aversion to travel. Still, business is business and a big part of business is meetings. Regardless of people's willingness to travel, meetings must still take place. Let's examine some alternate forms of conducting meetings. Email and chat rooms have become an extremely popular form of communication, but unfortunately, text has no tone. Certain nuances of a conversation can be lost or completely misconstrued due to this lack of inflection. I personally have been involved in dozens of text-only conversations gone awry because one party perceived something that simply wasn't there. People "read into things" from their own perspective. Oftentimes, the writer's meaning is completely lost. Text is fine for exchanging data, but for negotiations, you need more than plain old text can offer. So much can be determined by the WAY a person says something, regardless of what the person actually said. Audio conferencing is a mechanism that allows people in multiple locations to participate in a verbal discussion using the telephone. Audio conferencing enables participants to call from practically any telephone, including hotel phones and public pay phones, from just about anywhere in the world. Conferencing can be toll-free or caller paid. You can arrange the meeting or have an Operator arrange it. If desired, you may have the conference recorded digitally so listeners can hear it later at their leisure or on audiocassette that you can duplicate and distribute as needed. Audio conferences aren't just for special occasions. Audio conferences are an efficient everyday business tool for getting work done. You can expedite decisions, conduct training, hold interviews, optimize productivity and react more quickly to events in your marketplace by using audio conferencing services to conduct your meetings. When you have to go on the road for business, audio conferences can help you coordinate with co-workers just as if you'd never left. Given the higher cost of video conferencing, compared to audio conferencing, it is often asked, "what exactly is gained by the addition of video?" Like text, voice has its limitations. Being able to see people at the other end of the call makes it easier to build and develop relationships with them. The body language available from the video picture gives speakers a great deal of valuable feedback about how well they are being received, which in turn helps them to modify their message. In training situations, video can provide invaluable clues as to whether participants have understood and whether the pace is appropriate. It allows you to see whether people at the other end of a call are listening, who people are addressing, if someone is signaling that he or she wants to speak, or when a person who has been speaking has finished and is expecting an answer. Finally, video conferencing enables you to present your materials in their original format (35mm slides, OHP transparencies, etc.) without having to convert them into digital form. Not coincidentally, this week's newsletter is sponsored by AT&T TeleConference Services. When I decided to write this article, I immediately contacted them about sponsorship and they agreed. If you have any questions about teleconferencing, give them a call. Their contact information is listed below. George Paul (george@gotollfree.com) AT&T TeleConference Services are available 24 x 7 to help you take care of business at a moments notice. It's easy, effective, and affordable. Call now 1-800-232-1234 or visit us at www.att.com/conferencing/index4.html *02. Internet taxation By Dave McClure (dmcclure@usiia.org) A few points to make in the discussion of Internet taxation: 1) One of the key points of the Quill decision was the assertion by North Dakota that sales taxes were the primary funding mechanism for essential government services that include fire and police as well as upkeep to the highways and streets. It was essentially the old "Football" dodge (wherein the school district claims that without an increase in property taxes they will have to eliminate the very popular school football team) -- inferring that without the ability to tax anyone they wished people would die, crime would run rampant and the roads would go to hell. The ploy backfired when the Court then asked why out of state vendors should be forced to pay for services they could and would never use. If the tax was the mechanism with which to fund government services, the Court reasoned, it should be paid for by the people who use and benefit from those services. No service = No tax Hence, nexus. Businesses should be required to pay taxes in any location in which they are provided government services. That is what the law provides for today, and the way it should remain. 2) People and businesses that choose not to pay taxes they are not required to pay are not tax cheats. They are exercising their perfectly legitimate right under US law. The rather bizarre concept that we "owe" an ever-increasing share of our hard-earned revenue to the government simply because that government wants more to spend is nonsense. Companies (and individuals) can and should as a responsible management policy seek to reduce their tax burden by any legal means possible. 3) When governments are forced to levy taxes on the people who vote them in and out of office, a balance is achieved. If government becomes excessive in it spending, the people vote in new representatives to curb spending. Increasingly, governments in this country are seeking ways to increase tax revenues without facing that balance -- through "hidden" taxes and by taxing people who cannot vote them out of office. Lost in the discussion of taxation of remote sales is the fact that it is a de facto case of taxation without representation. 4) The idea that taxing online commerce is "fair" is patently absurd. It could only be fair if every brick and mortar business were required to query every customer who buys from them, then collect and remit local sales taxes for that customer. (John claims he would be happy to do that, but in reality I doubt he would really be able to file tax forms with even the 1,700 primary taxing authorities in the US each month and remain in business.) It is all well and good to claim that some technology or piece of software will quickly and easily collect and remit these taxes, but that software doesn't exist today. So even under the rosiest of scenarios put forth by the states, online businesses will have to collect for and remit nearly 600 tax filings per year. 5) Finally, this is not "lost" tax revenue. The states can't lose what they don't have. Education will not be lost, widows and orphans will not starve, the sky will not fall and the world will not end. Governments may be required to re-assess their priorities, or to raise taxes among the people who receive government services. This may not be popular, but Americans have generally been willing to pay taxes for the services they want and need. Dave McClure (dmcclure@usiia.org) Vegas Vacation has the best rates on Las Vegas Hotel Rooms. Don't make a reservation without calling us first! Call 800-637-6442 or visit our ad in the Internet 800 Directory: http://inter800.com/02281174.htm Banners? Pay-per-click? Why not target your market with links or information placed in relevant content? The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter offers direct access to business people who are interested buyers. Advertising: Information on how to sponsor this publication: Call 800-299-1879 Thanks for taking to time to review our newsletter for this week. If you know of anyone that might benefit from receiving this newsletter, send them to (http://www.inter800.com/news800/ ) where they can subscribe. 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