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The British developer of the world wide web says he is worried about the way it could be used to spread misinformation and "undemocratic forces". The web has transformed the way many people work, play and do business.But Sir Tim Berners-Lee told BBC News he feared that, if the way the internet is used is left to develop unchecked, "bad things" could happen.
He wants to set up a web science research project to study the social implications of the web's development.
Web Inventor Fears For The Future [news.bbc.co.uk]
I think the web is already being used for misinformation. As social networking expands into new areas and grows over International borders the opportunities for misinformation in a wider field abound.
Trust is going to become a bigger issue in social networking.
but I dislike restrictions imposed by the "righteous" even more
I have to say that I always smile quietly to myself when I hear views like this. Freedom from restriction is fine where people are willing to behave themselves and to stand up and be counted. It's not restrictions TBL is talking talking about, it's regulation. That's regulation as in government.
Unfortunately the Internet has proved beyond any shadow of a doubt that lack of control brings out the worst in people. Would you like to see a press where people could print what they want anonymously? Would you like to live in a state with no law enforcement?
may your god ... if you believe in such a thing
I don't believe in such a thing and I don't have a religion. What I think I have are moral scruples. It's those who don't that make regulation necessary.
Added: ... and I don't consider all of those who disagree with me to be stupid, paranoid morons.
[edited by: BeeDeeDubbleU at 8:03 am (utc) on Nov. 8, 2006]
lack of control brings out the worst in people.
And the best.
And everything else inbetween.
Given the choice I would much rather opt for peer regulation on the web than top-down regulation.
There's a lot of good stuff in The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations by James Surowiecki which might suggest not only that peer regulation does work but even that it might be superior to top-down regulation.
All I am saying is that people should not be allowed to distribute or publish stuff anonymously whether it be on websites or through email. The only real reason people want to do this is because their activities are illegal and they don't want to be accountable for their actions.
I would not insist that the stuff was censored. Let them publish what they like as long as they are accountable and prepared to face the consequences if they do anything illegal.
I think this is what Tim Berners Lee is expressing his concerns about.
Let's change this around a little. Let's see if anyone can provide good reason(s) for allowing people to remain unaccountable for their actions on the Internet?
The Internet is populated with so many people who are only interested in their own ill gotten gains. How do you regulate them?
You don't need to regulate them. The beauty of the web is that if one blog talks about when Nazi Germany attacked Britain in 1939 (sic), a hundred more blogs will reference the article and point out that it was in fact Britain which attacked Nazi Germany.
There is that much accountability already. People will know in future that the information provided by the original blog may be badly researched.
What more accountability do you want?
And who would make people accountable? The US gov. that is in Irak, the Chinese, google?
What makes you think that the people that will hold others accountable are trustworthy. My grandmother, loved the phrase, its not History, its "his-story". Traditionally there have been a limited number of Histories in the books. But that is not the same as saying THOSE ARE the acurate history; history is writen by the winners. Now that the internet is here, there are many Histories, so people have more choises, some will be way off, but NONE are 100% accurate, which is why it is so great to have this medium the way it is.
Also, even though no-one is accontable, every one is. By that I mean, if someone says the grass is blue, on the internet, you can do a search for "grass is blue" and "grass is green". One will render millions of results, while the other a couple of dozen. It is easy to see the general concensus. Plus, the people that argue the grass is blue can give an explanation to this (maybe their daltonic).
The truth is that the "truth" is in the eye of the beholder.
Stupid people will always get hurt one way or another. Someone will always sue MacDonals for having hot coffee, fortunately on the internet I don't have to say my coffee is hot to not get sued. For the people that need that spelled out for them, well, they should either be taken care of or left to their own fait. I don't believe in setting society behind to help a few cases that will ultimately get wipped out of the gene-pool anyway.
I am not saying that Anti Ciber Crime institutions aren't needed (they already exist), but one thing is persecuting ciber criminal and another policing the internet, and putting yet another dent on freedom of speach and comminication.
Stupid people will always get hurt one way or another.
I suppose that makes it alright then ... oh I forgot, what about the children? They can be pretty stupid at times, can't they?
This is not about free speech. We all get the governments we deserve and mine already allows free speech. I don't have to go anonymously on the Internet to express my opinions. What I do have to do is let people know who I am when I express my opinion and I have no problem with that I am not a crook or a coward in this respect.
Why do you think the press will not publish a letter when the sender does not reveal an address? Why do you think that regulation is required in broadcasting and in the press? The answer is that if people are allowed to do as they like without fear of retribution then they will do as they like and it will not be nice. That has been proved beyond any shadow of a doubt.
In your quest for free speech and communication would you prefer a situation where unregulated TV stations could be set up willy nilly to broadcast whatever poison they liked? Would you prefer an unregulated press that was allowed to carry uncensored adverts for porn and paedophilia? Would you prefer a press that was allowed to have a scammers section in the classified ads? Would you prefer a press that championed the causes of extremist and terrorist organisations.
This is the WWW and as its creator this is TBL's problem.
Haha, how should I know. As you recall, I also use the word "ignoramuses". ;)
"Three bloggers have been arrested and detained this year for speaking out in favour of democratic reform. This is an appeal to the Egyptian government to change its position,"
BBC [news.bbc.co.uk]
Yes, I would prefer that these three were unaccountable, if that is the word, and anonymous if that is the word. But these are just examples, and of course it wasn't the Egyptian law you thought about was it? Now, exactly which law is the right one? Say, an American law, just to name one civilized country? But how if that law suddenly deems something illegal that wasn't illegal the day before? ... that does happen. Or, if somebody needs to leak the next Enron or the next Watergate, or whatever.
I will indeed defend anynymity, and unaccountability. I will also point out that this is how the internet has worked for the past 30 years and that the accumulated net effect of the internet on society as a whole has been tremendously positive.
>> would you prefer (1) (2) (3) (4)
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Where I live we already have most of the things you describe here. There are no paedophilia ads in the papers, but anyone with money can set up a tv station, there are ads for pr0n in some of our largest national newspapers, and anyone can put any kind of ad in classifieds. Still we are a civilized democratic country and in terms of general welfare we are very well off.
As for extremists, well we even have a perfectly legal Nazi party. I strongly oppose their viewpoints, but I maintain that they have every bit as much right to state their absurd views as I have to state mine. And they have every right to champion their viewpoints in the press just as I have a right to champion the opposite viewpoints.
I admit and agree that not everything is good, but I maintain that the benefits outweigh the bad things by an extremely large margin, and I just can't imagine anything good from regulation.
Introduce regulation and who can say what and when and by whom they can be challenged all become issues controlled by a higher power.
And, no, that higher power will not be without its own agenda.
I think there are around 200 people in Chinese jails right now for publishing pro-democracy stuff...
Be careful what you wish for, you might get it.
I will indeed defend anynymity, and unaccountability. I will also point out that this is how the internet has worked for the past 30 years and that the accumulated net effect of the internet on society as a whole has been tremendously positive.
Based on what research?
As for research, pick any of these articles that are positive, or pick any of them that are negative if you prefer that view. Research results, like history, depends to some extent on who writes it:
Google Scholar Search [scholar.google.com]
This is the WWW and as its creator this is TBL's problem
Hmmm... I'm not sure about this. Isn't it Interpol's problem?
It seems that most of this debate centers around the fact that it is a global medium, so if people should be held accountable, to whom are they held accountable - the USA, the UN, someone else?
I guess there probably needs to be an internationally agreed standard of what constitutes 'internet crime' and a strategy for dealing with it. I'm no expert on this kind of thing - perhaps such a thing exists already? Or maybe it's just down to the laws of the country of the perpetrator?
Either way I don't think we can blame the medium, or that we should try to censor it particularly.
As for "the USA, the UN, someone else?": I would suggest the country in which the crime was commited, ie., the same way in which "real-world" responsibility is administered.
For example, if somebody in Austria publishes a blog saying that the KZ in Auschwitz had no gas chambers, this person would violate Austrian laws and therefore, be prosecuted in this country, not in others such as the US or the UK, where there is not law against making such claims.
I do not think that accountability per se (ie legal responsibility) is the issue - legal frameworks for publishers are well-developed in all countries.
The real problem is the identification of individuals.
You can always argue about the restrictive nature of laws (at least in democratic countries). However, the key to this issue are not the laws, but the difficulties finding those who violate them.
Bet all of those AOL users thought they were.
Google just throws data away don't they eh?
Goverments don't have any way of tracking phone, mobile, net data or forcing any individual to hand over data.
None of us save our weblogs.
Tescos/walmart etc just throw customer data away.
and the millions of other things. No dont happen.
If I ruled the world.
I'd give you your "supposed" freedom. Create 1000's new laws, its the war on terror and pedos you know, track your every move and give you just enough rope to hang yourselves.
bugger Tony, George and the others beat me to it.
Yes i am wearing tinfoil underpants as a security measure.
Is it possible that anonymity on the net may be less of a problem than the careless assigning of crediblity to anonymous comments?
Of course, everybody can - as long as statements are factbased, the intentions of the person who makes them are of secondary interest.
And I am sure many people who make good money out of spamming, the sale of illegeal porn or simply enjoy being trolls in forums can actually see very good reasons for promoting personal accountability.
Can one credibly oppose anonymity on the net while commenting anonymously?
Most certainly.
On Webmasterworld all comments made are moderated and swiftly removed if deemed inappropriate. We know who owns the site, Brett's name, address and telephone are clearly listed. He is therefore accountable.
You cannot possibly compare the publication of anonymous comment on sites like this with those who clearly break the law by publishing illegal material.
those who clearly break the law by publishing illegal material.
Whose law? Who decides if the material is illegal?
If website owners were accountable then there would be a record of where they lived and they would clearly be accountable to the laws of that country.
If The People's Republic of Jibrovia decided that child p@rn was legal then the rest of the world could deal with them accordingly. It's a bit of a no-brainer really.
Let's go through the countries where this could happen, shall we?
China, North Korea, Myanmar, Iran, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Zimbabwe, Moldova...
Oh, and by the way it might not just be the government who decides to kidnap you and lock you up. In a weak or a failed state it could be any vigilante group. So let's also include:
Russia, Moldova, Iraq, Sudan...
Is abolition of anonymity still a no-brainer?
Is abolition of anonymity still a no-brainer?
Yes, absolutely!
The www was not designed as tool for political propaganda no matter what side you are on and one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. The fact that it has been used for this is no excuse. Governments the World over (and Google) are willing to trade with many of these countries. The Internet was not designed as a medium for solving the world's political problems.
