This past March, I started getting dozens of e-mails from upset but resigned AT&T Broadband customers. All said more or less the same thing: their e-mail addresses were about to stop working. I had to update my address book to change the letters after the @ sign from "mediaone.net" to "attbi.com."

More than 630,000 AT&T customers were forced to make this change. They could have used the occasion to simply and inexpensively assert their electronic individuality and independence. Instead, the majority behaved like good sheep and did what they were told: moved from one mega-corporate address that they didn't own to another. Baa-a-a-a! Baa-a-a-a!