Previous Politech message: http://www.politechbot.com/2005/04/13/how-to-regulate/ -------- Original Message -------- Subject: RE: [Politech] How to regulate the Net? Target intermediaries... [econ] Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 19:03:36 -0400 From: Jim Harper <jharper@private> To: Declan McCullagh <declan@private> CC: <seth@private> An article with this general theme, but focused specifically on Internet pathologies, was published in Regulation magazine's Winter 2005 issue. http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv27n4/v27n4-7.pdf My response will be published in the next issue of Regulation. Two main flaws underlie arguments for intermediary liability: First, they are not grounded in a theory of justice. It is simply *wrong* to hold people accountable for acts that they did not plan, commit, or participate in. This rule has served us well for hundreds of years and its recent erosion in limited instances, based on efficiency arguments or any others, is regrettable, exceptional, and generally wrong. Efficiency does not trump justice. Second, they fail to account for the fact that the Internet is an agreement on a protocol, or language, used by computers. The Internet is not a thing or a "series of computers connected through a complex system of cables." Even if you could grab all those computers and all those cables, the Internet would already be gone. As with any other language, government regulation of the Internet is neither "inevitable" nor "realist." Jim Jim Harper Director of Information Policy Studies The Cato Institute _______________________________________________ Politech mailing list Archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ Moderated by Declan McCullagh (http://www.mccullagh.org/)
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Fri Apr 15 2005 - 06:29:14 PDT