Stop Signs on the Web

[Duncan Frissell]

http://www.economist.com/printedition/PrinterFriendly.cfm?Story_ID=471742&CFID=301055&CFTOKEN=47471685

The Economist 11 Jan 2001

The Internet was supposed to be all about freedom. That is why governments 
want to regulate it. It is far from certain whether freedom, or government 
control, will win the day.

.....

"Both filtering and IP-address tracking are far from perfect. Filters 
generally block too much—and too little. And surfers can block IP-address 
tracking by using services such as Zero Knowledge’s Freedom or 
anonymizer.com. In any case, knowing where a user is is only part of the 
solution. In the case of Yahoo!, the firm would still have to work out 
which auctions to block.

But do these shortcomings matter? Jack Goldsmith, a law professor at the 
University of Chicago, argues that the real world is full of imperfect 
filtering and identification techniques: criminals crack safes, 
15-year-olds visit bars with fake IDs, secret information is leaked to the 
press. To Mr Goldsmith, there is little doubt that filtering and 
identification technologies will help to make cyberspace more regulated, 
because they will allow governments to raise the cost of getting certain 
information."

.....

Save that in the real world, I can't write and instantly distribute a 
program which will let anyone easily crack safes or accomplish other tasks 
that government may seek to block.  As we've seen, BTW, I *can* distribute 
fake ID's and fake ID technology easily and swiftly over the Net these days.

Since even the most casual Net surfer is using an incredibly complex suite 
of software and electronic communications protocols, we've established that 
complexity, alone, is not enough to block the use of technology.  Adding a 
new software/protocol layer designed to defeat new government control 
attempts is no more complex than what we are using already.

If motivated by the ability to acquire "free" content or "forbidden" 
content, people have already shown themselves willing to download and 
install software.  They will in the future.

.....

"The holy grail for e-commerce, however, would be a system in which users 
had permanent digital certificates on their computers containing details of 
age, citizenship, sex, professional credentials, and so on. Such technology 
would not only allow websites to aim their services at individuals, but 
would let governments reclaim their authority. These solutions to Internet 
regulation are far off, if they fly at all. But Lawrence Lessig, a law 
professor at Stanford University, warns that e-commerce firms will push for 
such certificates and that governments may one day require them."

.....

Require them, for what?  In the US, licensing of speech and the press is 
specifically prohibited, and anyone on earth can effectively become a US 
person by opening a telecoms account here.

Before the Internet "broke wide", we developed an international 
store-and-forward network (Fidonet) using the Plain Old Telephone Service 
(POTS).  The Internet is not one network but thousands.

If individuals choose to communicate, it is hard to stop them in the modern 
age.  And that is what we have, a choice.

Legally, the Net is a series of Virtual Private Networks (VPN's).  If one 
aspect of the Net becomes too restrictive, it is trivial to deploy a new 
VPN with the liberated character that users may prefer.  That is what the 
various peer-to-peer networks are.

.....

"On the Internet, the struggle between freedom and state control will rage 
for some time. But if recent trends in online regulation prove anything, it 
is that technology is being used by both sides in this battle and that 
freedom is by no means certain to win. The Internet could indeed become the 
most liberating technology since the printing press— but only if 
governments let it."

.....

Johannes Gutenberg (1398-1468) http://www.slip.net/~graphion/guten.html

The printing press was not liberating because governments decided to let it 
be liberating.  They didn't have a choice.  The technology made the 
communication of ideas easier and so it was easier.   The Reformation, the 
Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, etc. followed.

The printing press worked these changes not because it was impossible for 
governments to censor printing or even to jail printers.  It worked these 
changes because the technology let millions of individuals preserve and 
spread their ideas easily and cheaply.  In spite of controls.  It took from 
circa 1455 to 1776 for the changes allowed by printing to come to 
fruition.  It will be a bit faster for the Net.

The Net makes the communication of zeros and ones even easier than 
printing.  In addition, we have developed so many ephemeral goods and 
services since 1455 (money, video, audio, etc.) that in addition to mere 
ideas, the net can transfer actual value.  Trade.  This has obvious 
implications for attempts by states to control the economy.

It turns out that, in the case of communications technology, the ease of 
use and the wideness of its adoption are more important than the control 
desires of censors.  The reason that this is so is obvious.  If millions of 
people can easily do something, it is hard to stop them.  Governments can 
stop a few but that leaves thousands or millions of people still doing the 
forbidden thing.  Sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll proved that long ago.  In 
the case of the Nets, governments are faced with the problem of how to stop 
millions (soon billions) from hitting the Enter<--' key on their 
keyboards.  Big challenge.

Since totalitarianism turns out to be a non-stable state when individuals 
have physical power in the world, things continue to look difficult for the 
authorities.

DCF

----
"They believe that the Government is the problem and that what everyone 
needs is to be told, 'You're on your own; go out there into the tender 
mercies of the global economy; have a great time in cyberspace, and we'll 
get out of your way.'" -- William Jefferson Blythe Clinton in a speech to 
the AFSCME in Chicago June 21, 1996.