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Regulating Code: Good Governance and Better Regulation in the Information Age
The case for a smarter "prosumer law" approach to Internet regulation that would better protect online innovation, public safety, and fundamental democratic rights. Internet use has become ubiquitous in the past two decades, but governments, legislators, and their regulatory agencies have struggled to keep up with the rapidly changing Internet technologies and uses. In this groundbreaking collaboration, regulatory lawyer Christopher Marsden and computer scientist Ian Brown analyze the regulatory shaping of "code"--the technological environment of the Internet--to achieve more economically efficient and socially just regulation. They examine five "hard cases" that illustrate the regulatory crisis: privacy and data protection; copyright and creativity incentives; censorship; social networks and user-generated content; and net neutrality.
The authors describe the increasing "multistakeholderization" of Internet governance, in which user groups argue for representation in the closed business-government dialogue, seeking to bring in both rights-based and technologically expert perspectives. Brown and Marsden draw out lessons for better future regulation from the regulatory and interoperability failures illustrated by the five cases. They conclude that governments, users, and better functioning markets need a smarter "prosumer law" approach. Prosumer law would be designed to enhance the competitive production of public goods, including innovation, public safety, and fundamental democratic rights.
The authors describe the increasing "multistakeholderization" of Internet governance, in which user groups argue for representation in the closed business-government dialogue, seeking to bring in both rights-based and technologically expert perspectives. Brown and Marsden draw out lessons for better future regulation from the regulatory and interoperability failures illustrated by the five cases. They conclude that governments, users, and better functioning markets need a smarter "prosumer law" approach. Prosumer law would be designed to enhance the competitive production of public goods, including innovation, public safety, and fundamental democratic rights.
- GenresTechnology
288 pages, Hardcover
First published February 4, 2005
3 people are currently reading
50 people want to read
About the author
Ian Brown
202 books42 followersA Canadian journalist and author.
He is currently the host of Human Edge and The View from Here on TVOntario, and has hosted programming for CBC Radio One, including Later the Same Day, Talking Books, and Sunday Morning.
He has also worked as a business writer at Maclean's and the Financial Post, a feature reporter for The Globe and Mail, and a freelance journalist for other magazines including Saturday Night.
Brown is also the editor of What I Meant to Say: The Private Lives of Men a 2006 collection of twenty-nine essays by prominent Canadian writers, including Greg Hollingshead, David MacFarlane, Don Gillmor, Bert Archer, and Brown himself, who asked his contributors to write on subjects that they'd like to discuss with women but had never been able to.
Brown has also published three books, Freewheeling (1989) about the Billes family, owners of Canadian Tire, and Man Overboard. He is an occasional contributor to the American public radio program This American Life. The Boy in the Moon, a book-length version of Brown's series of Globe and Mail features dealing with his son Walker's rare genetic disorder, Cardiofaciocutaneous Syndrome (CFC), was published in the fall of 2009.
In January 2010, Ian Brown won British Columbia's National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search for His Disabled Son. The award is Canada's richest non-fiction prize and offers the winner a $40,000 prize. In February, 2010, the book won the Charles Taylor Prize, a $25,000 prize which recognizes excellence in literary non-fiction.
Brown is married to Globe and Mail film critic Johanna Schneller.
He is currently the host of Human Edge and The View from Here on TVOntario, and has hosted programming for CBC Radio One, including Later the Same Day, Talking Books, and Sunday Morning.
He has also worked as a business writer at Maclean's and the Financial Post, a feature reporter for The Globe and Mail, and a freelance journalist for other magazines including Saturday Night.
Brown is also the editor of What I Meant to Say: The Private Lives of Men a 2006 collection of twenty-nine essays by prominent Canadian writers, including Greg Hollingshead, David MacFarlane, Don Gillmor, Bert Archer, and Brown himself, who asked his contributors to write on subjects that they'd like to discuss with women but had never been able to.
Brown has also published three books, Freewheeling (1989) about the Billes family, owners of Canadian Tire, and Man Overboard. He is an occasional contributor to the American public radio program This American Life. The Boy in the Moon, a book-length version of Brown's series of Globe and Mail features dealing with his son Walker's rare genetic disorder, Cardiofaciocutaneous Syndrome (CFC), was published in the fall of 2009.
In January 2010, Ian Brown won British Columbia's National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction for his book The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search for His Disabled Son. The award is Canada's richest non-fiction prize and offers the winner a $40,000 prize. In February, 2010, the book won the Charles Taylor Prize, a $25,000 prize which recognizes excellence in literary non-fiction.
Brown is married to Globe and Mail film critic Johanna Schneller.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 30, 2016
I'm on telecommunications policy overload, so this rating may not be a fair representation of the book.
July 19, 2013
At a time when issues such as the availability of pornography on the internet and the NSA’s access to data collected by corporate platforms are front page news, this is a timely book.
The authors - respectively senior research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute and professor of law at Essex University - address the questions of the effectiveness of regulation of the internet, and what is the role of code itself in regulation.
The first chapter surveys the big issues in internet regulation over the last 20 years, themes which are then examined in greater detail through a series of what the authors describe as ‘hard cases’ - privacy and data protection, copyright, censorship, social networking services and net neutrality.
In each case, the authors examine the commercial, social and technological forces that determine the regulatory environment and set its challenges, and evaluate how successful regulation has been hitherto and what prospects for the future are.
The book is an excellent introduction to the subject for specialists and general readers alike and is very well documented. The bibliography (45 pages long) will be invaluable for researchers in the field. The approach combines an authoritative survey of major case law with a clearly articulated underpinning in the technology issues.
The authors bring to the study a distinctive political perspective. They marshal copious evidence for the systemic inability of governments in most cases to regulate in a sufficiently agile and well-informed way to cope with rapidly changing technological and commercial environments.
At the same time, major corporations cannot be trusted to prioritise user interests in systems that are dependent on self regulation. Worse, regulators are all too prone to be captured by commercial interests through processes of ‘lobbynomics’. There are exceptions - the EU’s data protection regime is described as ‘ a gold standard’.
The authors put their faith in the continuing ability of users, acting as ‘prosumers’ and informed by expert ‘netizens’ operating outside either government or the corporate world, to make informed choices in markets that control the worst of commercial behaviours. Government regulation, whether at a national or multilateral level, still has a role to play, for example in requiring interoperability from service providers and in promoting multi-stakeholders. Let’s hope there are indeed grounds for such optimism.
Jeremy Crump FBCS, Director, Cisco Consulting Services
The authors - respectively senior research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute and professor of law at Essex University - address the questions of the effectiveness of regulation of the internet, and what is the role of code itself in regulation.
The first chapter surveys the big issues in internet regulation over the last 20 years, themes which are then examined in greater detail through a series of what the authors describe as ‘hard cases’ - privacy and data protection, copyright, censorship, social networking services and net neutrality.
In each case, the authors examine the commercial, social and technological forces that determine the regulatory environment and set its challenges, and evaluate how successful regulation has been hitherto and what prospects for the future are.
The book is an excellent introduction to the subject for specialists and general readers alike and is very well documented. The bibliography (45 pages long) will be invaluable for researchers in the field. The approach combines an authoritative survey of major case law with a clearly articulated underpinning in the technology issues.
The authors bring to the study a distinctive political perspective. They marshal copious evidence for the systemic inability of governments in most cases to regulate in a sufficiently agile and well-informed way to cope with rapidly changing technological and commercial environments.
At the same time, major corporations cannot be trusted to prioritise user interests in systems that are dependent on self regulation. Worse, regulators are all too prone to be captured by commercial interests through processes of ‘lobbynomics’. There are exceptions - the EU’s data protection regime is described as ‘ a gold standard’.
The authors put their faith in the continuing ability of users, acting as ‘prosumers’ and informed by expert ‘netizens’ operating outside either government or the corporate world, to make informed choices in markets that control the worst of commercial behaviours. Government regulation, whether at a national or multilateral level, still has a role to play, for example in requiring interoperability from service providers and in promoting multi-stakeholders. Let’s hope there are indeed grounds for such optimism.
Jeremy Crump FBCS, Director, Cisco Consulting Services
January 16, 2016
Good book. The writing is clear, although quite jargon heavy. The consistent structure of the analysis of each case study is very helpful. Very enjoyable assigned reading.
A wider point: he talks a lot about multi stakeholder-ism and how we, as citizens, are being excluded from setting standards for various online issues like censorship, privacy, copyright etc. Yet I feel we have a part to play ourselves; we need some awareness of the issues being discussed and an awareness of the outcomes of those discussions. Otherwise it is hard to blame governments and corporations for not involving us; a participatory process does need some will to participation.
A wider point: he talks a lot about multi stakeholder-ism and how we, as citizens, are being excluded from setting standards for various online issues like censorship, privacy, copyright etc. Yet I feel we have a part to play ourselves; we need some awareness of the issues being discussed and an awareness of the outcomes of those discussions. Otherwise it is hard to blame governments and corporations for not involving us; a participatory process does need some will to participation.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews