Jul 10
1
A Bill Of Digital Rights?
The EFF has a pretty useful reference page in place for anyone who wants to get a quick update on some of the most vexation questions about IP – particularly with respect to media. (Tip of the hat to John Pin for pointing it out).
The reality is that we are moving into a really important period of human endeavor right now in so many areas of technology, culture and history – not to mention law!
As corporate power is concentrated in fewer and fewer companies and as the enabling power of digital communications technologies allows greater flexibility in terms of how information flows, it is inevitable that the large and powerful companies will try to ensure that their stock in trade continues to hold value.
That is reasonable. The problem comes when their tactics involve them stopping access to information. (For the purposes of this brief post I would consider anything that is able to be resolved into zeroes and ones as information).
The reality is that we are living in a transitional period – we are still analogue beings but we exist in a digital ideas marketplace, where communication takes place faster than the blink of an eye. At some point in the future we may all have to become digital beings in order to continue to exist – perhaps embedded in silicon chips in some servers somewhere – rather than as a carbon based life form.
If that is going to be the case, we had better make sure that we do not become digital slaves to some Matrix like digital corporation. The only way we can do that is by ensuring that new laws are created that create a new Bill of Digital Rights. These digital rights should ensure that in the digital realm information that is of critical value to people should be able to be accessed under a 'fair access' provision.
This should mean that any news information, or technical information or research information (and probably a whole lot more besides) should be able to be accessed by everyone at any time, without any charge whatsoever. In fact I believe that this information should be able to be accessed without it impinging on any data charges that are in effect.