[ineedasername]

So long as governments exist you will need to pass your data through government-controlled spaces. You may produce your own electricity, you may create your own wireless mesh WAN spanning a continent even, but that continent might contain the US, and the FCC will come knocking on doors and knocking down you signal towers. You cannot operate on any significant scale without touching on something under the regulatory jurisdiction of nation-states. This is not a problem of imagination, it's the current structure of power. East Germans undoubtedly both imagined and were often aware of Trabant alternatives outside of East Germany. But their dominant power structure did not easy allow for home grown competition.

[jeofken]

We agree. Reread my comment - I said it was “just like” the similie.

Just like East Germans lived under forced government monopoly and regulations in the car market but most could dream of Benzes and BMWs, you and I can dream about a world where voluntary relationships replace government force in areas such as internet, conflict resolution, health insurance (where I live we only have government health care, and like for Trabants, there are long lines...), road management, and all other tasks government bureaucrats so selflessly have relieved us of