David VaileCyberspace Law and Policy Centre, UNSW Law Faculty

d.vaile@unsw.edu.au

http://cyberlawcentre.org/genl2032/02.ppthttp://cyberlawcentre.org/genl2032/02.ppt

• Theories• History of internet• Technical basis• Cyberlibertarianism• ‘Self regulation’• Code as regulation• Net Federalism• Critiques• The empire strikes back• The people strike back?

• What’s new?• News summary – class

participation• Regulation• 3 wings of government• Laws• Disputes, courts• Schemes• Jurisdiction

Laws, disputes, courts, schemes

• Jurisdiction • Popular sovereignty• Litigation funding• Law reform• Lobbying • Online campaigning• Talking to yourself• Self regulation• Industry codes

• 3 wings of government• Laws• Disputes, courts• Schemes• Jurisdiction• Criminal v Civil• Evidence / gosssip /‘facts’• ‘Proof’: onus, standard• Risks and costs

Law and IT, with communications flavour

1. What is the Internet? What is 'cyberspace'?

• Leiner et al A Brief History of the Internet http://www.internetsociety.org/internet/internet-51/history-internet/brief-history-internet

• William Gibson Neuromancer, Ace Books, 1984. text http://lib.ru/GIBSON/neuromancer.txt

• Study Guide for Neuromancer http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/neuromancer_study_guide.html

2. Technical basis - The Internet protocols (TCP/IP) and

Internet applications

• Roger Clarke, Gillian Dempsey, Ooi Chuin Nee and Robert F. O'Connor A Primer on Internet Technology (1998) http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/IPrimer.html

• Clarke also provides a very simple introduction The Internet as a Postal Service: A Fairy Story (1998) http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/InternetPS.html

• Cliff Green An Introduction to Internet Protocols for Newbies (1996) http://codewrangler.home.comcast.net/tech_info/internet_protocols.html

3. Origins and history of the Internet

• The pre-commercial Internet (to 1996)– Vinton Cerf, Computer Networking: Global infrastructure for the

21st Century http://www.cs.washington.edu/homes/lazowska/cra/networks.html

– Howard Rheingold ‘Visionaries and Convergences: The Accidental History of the Net’ Chapter Three of The Virtual Community (1994) http://www.rheingold.com/vc/book/3.html

– Robert Hobbes' Zakon Hobbes' Internet Timeline v5.6 http://www.zakon.org/robert/Internet/timeline/

3.2 The commercial Internet (since 1996) - The 'new economy'

Kevin Kelly's ‘New Rules for the New Economy’ WIRED archive 5.09 (1997)

http://www.wired.com/wired/5.09/newrules.html – The Law of Connection - Embrace dumb power– The Law of Plentitude - More gives more– The Law of Exponential Value - Success is nonlinear– The Law of Tipping Points - Significance precedes momentum– The Law of Increasing Returns - Make virtuous circles– The Law of Inverse Pricing - Anticipate the cheap– The Law of Generosity - Follow the free– The Law of the Allegiance - Feed the web first– The Law of Devolution - Let go at the top– The Law of Displacement - The net wins– The Law of Churn - Seek sustainable disequilibrium– The Law of Inefficiencies - Don't solve problems

3.3 Origins and history of the Internet

• The Internet in Australia– Roger Clarke A Brief History of the Internet in Australia

v3.1 (2001) http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/OzIHist.html

– National Office for the Information Economy (NOIE) Current State Of Play (April 2002) http://www2.dcita.gov.au/ie/framework/benchmarking/csop Chapters 1-23 - statistics on Internet penetration and use.

4. Theories of cyberspace regulation 5. `Virtual communities' and self-regulation:

Digital libertarianism• Johnson and Post - 'Net federalism‘

David R. Johnson and David G. Post ‘Law and Borders--The Rise of Law in Cyberspace’ 48 Stanford Law Review 1367 (1996) http://www.cli.org/X0025_LBFIN.html

Shorter version: Johnson and Post And How Shall the Net be Governed? - A Meditation on the Relative Virtues of Decentralized, Emergent Law (1996) http://www.cli.org/emdraft.html

5.2 Self-regulatory mechanisms – ADR in cyberspace disputes?

• Consumers International study http://www.consumersinternational.org/document_store/Doc35.pdf

• OECD’s Guidelines for Consumer Protection in the Context of Electronic Commerce (1999)

• Online Ombuds Office http://www.ombuds.org/center/ombuds.html

6. Regulatory models for cyberspace 7. Lawrence Lessig – 'Code' as regulation

• Lawrence Lessig, Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, Basic Books 1999 http://code-is-law.org/

• Lawrence Lessig ‘The Law of the Horse: What Cyberlaw Might Teach' 113 Harvard Law Review 501 (1999)http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/works/lessig/finalhls.pdf

• Graham Greenleaf, ‘An Endnote on Regulating Cyberspace: Architecture vs Law?’ (1998) University of New South Wales Law Journal Volume 21, Number 2 (Parts III – V) (http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/unswlj/thematic/1998/vol21no2/greenleaf.html) 'Electronic Commerce: Legal Issues For The Information Age'

Lawrence Lessig – 'Code' as regulation (cont.)

Explanation Example

Law A body of rules regulating society’s behaviour, for which sanctions will be imposed if the rules are breached.

Crimes Act 1900 (NSW)

Markets Economic factors which impact upon the value of a product

Telstra’s near- monopoly

Norms Customs or conventions ‘Netiquette’

Code A set of constraints on how one can behave

Software code, the laws of physics

Lawrence Lessig – 'Code' as regulation (cont)

• Critiques/commentaries on Lessig's arguments

Reviews http://code-is-law.org/reviews.html – Karen Coyle, Information Technology and Libraries, September

2000 http://www.kcoyle.net/lessig.html– Mark S. Nadel "Book Review: Computer Code vs. Legal Code:

Setting the Rules in Cyberspace" Federal Communications Law Journal http://code-is-law.org/nadel_review.pdf

– Charles C. Mann "The Unacknowledged Legislators of the Digital World" Atlantic Unbound, December 15, 1999 http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/digicult/dc991215.htm

Lawrence Lessig – 'Code' as regulation (cont.)

• The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World Random House (2001)http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/future/

Tom Zillner, Information Technology and Libraries http://www.lita.org/ital/2103_books.html summary

• Free Culture http://free-culture.org/freecontent/

Other theoretical approaches to cyberspace regulation

• James Boyle's critique of 'digital libertarianism’:‘Surveillance, Sovereignty, and Hard-Wired Censors’ (1997) http://www.law.duke.edu/boylesite/foucault.htm

• Joel Reidenberg - "Lex Informatica: The Formulation of Information Policy Rules through Technology" (1998) 76 Texas Law Review 553-593 (http://reidenberg.home.sprynet.com/lex_informatica.pdf

• Trotter Hardy's presumption of decentralised control I Trotter Hardy 'The proper legal regime for cyberspace' University of Pittsburg Law Review, 1994, 55:993 http://www.wm.edu/law/facultyadmin/faculty/hardy-16.htm

• Johnson and Post - net federalism

Fast forward...

• The empire strikes back: mega jurisdiction

• The people strike back? Anonymity, social networks