Edited Edupage, 4 February 1997

From: IN%"educom@educom.unc.edu" 5-FEB-1997 01:10:14.09 To: IN%"edupage@elanor.oit.unc.edu" "EDUCOM Edupage Mailing List"

************************************************************ Edupage, 4 February 1997. Edupage, a summary of news about information technology, is provided three times a week as a service by Educom, a Washington, D.C.-based consortium of leading colleges and universities seeking to transform education through the use of information technology. ************************************************************

GATES SAYS OLD LAWS ARE GOOD ENOUGH FOR THE NET Microsoft's Bill Gates: "It's always surprising how old concepts carry over into the new medium. It's overly idealistic to act like, Oh, the Internet is the one place where people should be able to do whatever they wish: present child pornography, do scams, libel people, steal copyrighted material. Society's values have not changed fundamentally just because it's an Internet page. Take copyright. Sure, there should be some clarifications about copyright, but the old principles work surprisingly well in the new medium. Anybody who says you have to start over -- I don't agree with that." (George Feb 97)

Looks like he hasn't thought about enforcement problems, which may fortunately prevent the application of unnecessary laws to the 'net.

CULTURE CLASHES ON THE INTERNET At a session of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the issue of censorship on the Internet was debated from East/West perspectives, with the Eastern view represented by such countries as Singapore, Iran, and Egypt. Denmark foreign minister Uffe Ellemann-Jensen said, "Whenever you want to stop the free flow of information, you must ask yourself what is possible. The usual answer from politicians is we need international rules. I say, forget it. It won't happen." Iranian mathematics professor Mohammed Lasijani countered: "In the west, the issue is sometimes how to globalise liberalism: how to export an ideology. I am not a liberal, and I do not believe liberalism is the only way to a decent life." (Financial Times 4 Feb 97)

Well, yes, neither did Adolf Hitler. Sorry, cultural differences won't wash; individual liberties are more important than culture or national sovreignty.

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