dmarx's Journal: A Parable

I've been thinking-I've been on the Internet since about 1994, and I've noticed a distressing trend-people have been abusing the resources. I mean, people will, for example, join a message board, then proceed to post messages on everything but the topic! This has led to a trend towards decreased access to these resources. I've created a little parable about this situation.
A rich man owned a large pasture. He let all the farmers in the area let their cows graze there for free. Usually, no one brought more than three cows. But then a new farmer moved into the area. He decided to let all 20 of his cows graze in the rich man's pasture. Some other farmers got the same idea. "If he can do it, so can we", they reasoned. The pasture started to become overgrazed. To curtail this, the rich man decided to charge a fee of $100 per cow. This worked for awhile. People started to respect the three cow limit, because that's all they could afford. However, a few farmers hit the lottery. They brought all of their cows to the pasture. Overgrazing was becoming a problem again. So the rich man decided to set a one cow per farmer limit. Everyone was pretty upset at this new regulation, but most understood that 1) it was necessary, and 2)It was the rich man's pasture, and he could do what he wanted with it. However, some people did not accept this. They started sneaking cows in when the rich man's guards weren't looking. The pasture was again being overgrazed. So the rich man said, "I've had it. The pasture is no longer open to the public under any circumstances. Only me and my friends can use it". The rich man erected a barbed wire fence around his pasture. And a great resource was lost.
The moral of the story? DO NOT ABUSE INTERNET RESOURCES!!!