[ via Nettime ] Lawrence Lessig was appointed as a special master (think domain expert) during DOJ v. MS. He’s got a new book out about the role of software architecture in the legal construction of cyberspace.
I’m pulling several quotes from an interview with him from Feed. This is definitely a book to read.
“LESSIG: We have an architecture of the web right now that makes it hard to control what data are gathered about you. Cookies are one part of that technology. The architecture is now that you can turn cookies on or turn cookies off. If you turn cookies off, or if you turn them back on when you get to a certain site, then 90 percent of your online life is spent making a decision about this. So most people just turn cookies on and live with it and that’s that.”
“LESSIG: One argument of the book is that we should expect governments to turn to the regulation of code as a way to bring about their regulatory objectives. The government sees that it’s hard to regulate people directly in cyberspace, so if you regulate the code, then it makes it easier for the government to regulate people in cyberspace. But one check on that is open source software. To the extent the government attempts to regulate code, if the code is closed code, then it’s hard for people to notice the regulation, it’s hard for people to resist it, it’s hard for people to substitute in. You basically have to accept the package as it comes. But if it’s open code, then in a sense it reveals its regulation to anybody who can read the code, and it’s relatively easy for people to pull out the part they don’t like and put something else in.”
“FEED: So you’re trying to persuade the libertarian factions that their beloved open source can actually function as a check.”
“LESSIG: Right. It can function as a check in the way constitutionalists want to think of checks.”
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