Chapter 2: Regulating and Governing the Internet
A Brief History of the Internet
The Internet was developed in
several stages:
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In the 1950's and 1960's Baran and Davies develop Packet
Switching as a robust, surviveable, network architecture.
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In the 1960's ARPANET is funded by U.S. Defense Department to encourage
resource sharing among researchers at major universities.
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In the 1970's electronic mail begins to dominate network traffic.
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In the 1980's NSFNET replaces ARPANET and encompasses other lower level
networks. This is the beginning of the Internet.
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In the 1990's the NSF no longer subsidies the Internet which has become
largely commercial.
The Internet and the World Wide Web Today
The Internet is build
from several layers:
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The physical infrastructure is comprised of several privately owned and
operated networks called Network Service Providers (NSP).
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Each NSP connects to three network access points where packets can be
transferred between NSPs.
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Network traffic is managed using Internet Protocol (IP) and Transmission
Control Protocol (TCP).
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Hypertext documents are represented in Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)
which allows documents to be linked to each other across the net.
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The (virtual) network of connections between HTML documents is the World
Wide Web (WWW).
Communications on the internet has several
characteristics:
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Openness: It can support new modes of communication.
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Asynchronous: Users do not need to coordinate with each other.
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Many-to-Many: Individuals or groups can communicate with each
other.
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Distributed: There is no central control or clearinghouse.
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Scalable: It can grow without affecting performance.
Electronic Commerce
Online companies enjoy some important
advantages:
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People can browse and shop at any time.
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Reduced overhead since physical stores are not required.
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Allows customized sales and advertising.
Online companies can be
categorized:
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Business-to-Consumer (B2C), such as Amazon.com.
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Consumer-to-Business (C2B), such as Priceline or Expedia.
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Business-to-Business (B2B), such as IBM.
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Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C), such as eBay.
Social Costs
Social costs of using the internet include:
Regulating the Net
Following Lessig's categorization, there are
four ways we might regulate the net:
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Market forces (consumer choice, boycott, etc.) can force companies to act
ethically.
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The government can impose laws and regulations on individuals or ISPs.
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Individuals can use code to filter and block undesirable communications.
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We can rely on people to act ethically.
Clearly, we will need a combination of methods.
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