Thursday, March 15, 2012

The Anonymous Internet

Choi, Bryan H. "The Anonymous Internet." Maryland Law Review, Forthcoming, February 2, 2012.

From the abstract: "In the post- 'code-is-law' era, all literature about the internet has been overcast by the promise of regulability. Having set aside the fallacy that the internet is unregulable, cyberlaw scholars have hunkered down to reconcile just how this regulation should transpire. One principle that has emerged is that we should safeguard the internet’s 'generativity,' an attribute representing the ability of ordinary users to generate new, unanticipated uses, and thereby mold the character and constitution of the internet. If we want to leave generativity alone, however, we need another point of leverage with which to regulate behavior. Regulating anonymity provides that latitude, and it is also the path of least harm. Not only is it less heavy-handed than regulating generativity, it is entirely consistent with our treatment of offline anonymity." Read more