From: Duncan Frissell <frissell@panix.com>

The denizens of the DDR had to overcome the Stasi, barbed wire, mines, walls, tank traps, etc to adopt an open systems architecture. Learning to use a few TCP/IP tricks (or building them into applications and using those applications) is much easier than breaching the Berlin Wall.

Knowledge about TCP/IP is alot easier to control than knowledge about the Berlin Wall (ie, how many Chinese will even know of the existence of TCP/IP -- in the US, where this is freely available, how many citizens know of it's existence)?