Tying up a Series of Tubes, Debating the United States Regulation of the InternetRichardson High School Richardson, Texas

Jason Jordan

Zane SchwarzloseUniversity of Texas Austin, Texas

1. SUMMARY We believe that the 2012-2013 high school CX debate topic should be: Resolved: That the United States Federal Government should increase its regulation of the Internet in one or more of the following areas: cybercrime, e-commerce, net neutrality. Well clarify. 2. INTRODUCTION A lot of Americans use the Internet:A recent count put the number of Internet users in just the United States at over 104 million; most (93 percent) use email and search the Web for information (80 percent). Every day, 50 million Americans go online. Researchers argue that the Internet is now a mainstream medium for nearly every type of human communication,and one that, in the year 2000, achieved critical mass in the United States. [14]

And the duty of regulating the Internet has largely fallen on the United States. However, the United States has abdicated much of this power in favor of self-regulatory regimes:Since the Internet was developed in the United States, and the country has the largest number of Internet users, it is only natural that the American government would be expected to take the lead in regulation. One of the first official indications the world received about Internet regulation at the international level from the United States was a call by President Clinton and Vice-President Gore for selfregulation. While the concept of self-regulation has historically occupied an important place in American mass media policy, it was alien to most of the rest of the world. There are several definitions of the concept of self-regulation. When applied to the Internet, it refers to the role of the Internet communitynamely, engineers, software developers, analysts, network specialists, administrators and usersin determining the standards, protocols, codes of ethics and direction of the Internet, with minimal government participation, input and control. The Clinton-Gore framework was an exhaustive survey of the administration's policies with regard to the Internet or the Global Information Infrastructure (GII). This expression represented a globalization of the nomenclature of the Internet from the term Information Superhighway proposed by Vice-President Gore in 1994, and embodied in the National Information Infrastructure.

The Clinton-Gore framework for global electronic commerce acknowledged that the Internet had transformed the world into a planetary plaza. The two leaders argued that the Internet, this global network of networks, would thrive for the benefit of all people if it were allowed to regulate itself. The framework was a unique, unprecedented document in that, on the one hand, it was a diplomatic message addressed to governments around the world, and, on the other hand, an executive order addressed to a number of departments of the American government. In the framework, President Clinton said in part that the actions of governments can have a profound effect on the growth of electronic commerce. He therefore appealed to governments around the world to act with restraint, knowing when to act and when not to act is important in matters of Internet regulation. Clinton and Gore called on governments to adopt a market-oriented approach to the Internet and appealed to the industry to regulate itself. This self-regulation model soon became the de facto Internet regulation standard at the national and international levels. [15]

But our honeymoon with this free-wheelin Internet has ended: countries are disenchanted with the digital Wild West and are attempting to regulate the Internet. This is the state of the Internet:But then the tide reversed. Then came libel originating in distant countries, stock manipulation from afar, worldwide domain name cybersquatting, sales tax circumvention by citizens purchasing faraway goods, hate speech websites located in countries protecting this kind of expression, online casinos based within the territory of states encouraging this business as it would almost exclusively affect foreign people in foreign countries while generating tax revenues, and worse. The dark side of the Web manifested itself, and it triggered a movement for cultural and nationalistic withdrawal. People started to say that they did not want outlandish foreigners to do the equivalent of standing in the garden in front of their house doing things that are regarded with outright repugnance in their community. The French were anxious at the thought of there being, just around the corner, deant Americans believing it is their fundamental right to say whatever they want to say, even if it involves an apology for Nazism. In the United States, people were incensed about lax foreign governments not cracking down on online casinos, which were intruding into American homes and ofces, computers, and mobile phones, to fuel compulsive gambling. Many countries became concerned about incitements to terrorism and appeals to fund terrorist organizations owing into their country simply by dint of being globally accessible. Some governments began to consider blocking by technical means local residents access to foreign Internet sources that glorify terrorism. Other governments grew increasingly apprehensive about the West spreading its culture and values throughout the world by a mere information transfer into territories which were previously exposed mainly to local information. Suddenly, the free and global character of the Internet started to be considered an evil. The global Internet community started to think that, after all, it did not want to be a single community, but several, and that each community should be allowed to live according to its internal fundamental values, according to its own choices of public policy (in the sense of ordre public), which partake of the expression of each nations Volksgeist . The Internet should be free, most agreed, but only insofar as this freedom stopped short of violating the fundamental principles underlying the operation of each states legal system. The ancient principles governing law and politics within nations were being challenged. [3]

3. HOW THE INTERNET IS REGULATED Many readers of this paper will be surprised to learn that the Internet is regulated. It is. 3.1 Lessigs Framework Lawrence Lessig, a professor at the Harvard Law School, once proposed a framework that posited four ways to regulate the Internet. These four forces would be the affirmative plan mechanisms under this topic:Lessigs framework identifies four forces that regulate or constrain an object (e.g. the Internet). They are: the law, markets, norms, and architecture. Each of these regulators has the following unique properties: 1. Law constrains by defining a command that, if broken, threatens punishment. Law is imposed by a state. 2. Markets regulate through price. The market regulator is immediate it is characterized by a direct monetary exchange. 3. A social norm regulates through a stigma that a community (not a state) imposes. Deviation from a norm makes you socially abnormal, which can have negative affects, such as alienation from a community. 4. Architecture (or code) regulates through the physical burden it imposes. It is imposed immediately and automatically by its very design. [6]

3.2 ICANN Another more specific plan enforcement mechanism can be found in the United States relationship with The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN. ICANN was created by the United States in 1998:The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) coordinates the Internets technical function, essentially serving as its manager. The non-prot corporation was created in 1998, under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Commerce, to assume control of the Internet domain name system (DNS). The DNS is a global, distributed database that translates easy - to - remember mnemonic addresses, like www.digitalmedialaw.us , into numerical identier, like 213.86.83.116, that computers can use to locate websites and deliver e - mail. Each numerical identier called an Internet Protocol address leads to one computer, the way a telephone number points to one phone. ICANN ensures that domain names and their corresponding IP addresses are globally unique, so the same address always leads to the same location. ICANN is also responsible for the delegation of top - level domain (TLD) names, like .com, .net, and .org, and country codes, like .us or .uk. It accredits both the registries assigned to manage particular top - level domains (like Verisign, which is responsible for housing all of the domains ending in .com, .net, and .tv in its databases) and the companies that register individual domain names. The Commerce Department has consistently maintained that its eventual goal was to release ICANN from government supervision as soon as it is ready to stand on its own. The original target date for independence was 2000. In Sept. 30, 2009, the U.S. government signed a new agreement with ICANN giving up unilateral control of the organization. [8]

Even though the United States has ceded its control over the ICANN, American could still seize control of the ICANN. However, such a move would be politically unpopular:There is a difference, though, between ICANN and a truly international body. Currently, the federal government retains formal oversight over ICANN through the contractual relationship between the Department of Commerce and ICANN as spelled out in the Memorandum of Understanding. Congress could, if it desired, reassert regulatory control over naming and numbering, either by mandating that ICANN adhere to certain specific policies or by taking the power over naming and numbering away from ICANN altogether. Reasserting national control would be much more difficult once naming and numbering had been delegated to an international body. It would require that the United States break or leave an international regime. To be sure, such a move is not without precedent in recent history, but it comes at a cost. In relative terms and from the vantage point of the U.S. government, it is therefore preferable to avoid formal delegation in the first place. This argument is somewhat flawed, as even under the current regime, any attempt by the U.S. government to influence policy-making at ICANN causes significant negative international public opinion and fuels those voices that call for a complete internationalization of Internet governance. Thus, even if the United States may prefer to retain formal control over ICANN, in practice, it may find itself in the role of Swifts Gulliver powerful in theory, but bound in practice. [13]

3.3 The Commerce Clause The legitimacy of affirmatives state action will stem from the Commerce Clause of the Constitution:The United States is a case in point. The regulation of commerce is part of the American constitutional and economic schemes. The Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution gives Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce, that is, all commerce that includes more than one state. Congressional oversight extends to the channels (instrumentalities) or infrastructure of interstate commerce. Other constitutional provisions concerning foreign trade reinforce the national interest in commerce. The American constitutional plan of international affairs seems to reflect the framers' intent to create a national common market and free-trade zone to buttress the country's capitalist free-market economy. Although Congress may have the power to exclude goods or activities that have been determined to be detrimental to public health, safety, welfare or morality, the Constitution seems designed to stimulate aggressive commerce. Since the Internet represents the convergence of various types of communication media, its regulation falls squarely within the rights of Congress. This is the constitutional foundation of American neo-merchantilist Internet regulation. [15]

3.4 The Limit of the United States Jurisdiction Even though the United States has a constitutional foundation for domestic regulation of the Internet, any legitimate international jurisdiction that America has over the Internet is hamstringed by its ability to enforce such regulations:In reality the problem is less severe than this general view suggests. This is so because, as Jack Goldsmith observes, enforcement jurisdiction is not affected by this

overlapping of a large number of laws. Enforcement jurisdiction, one may recall, is the authority actually to enforce the law by inducing or compelling compliance with it. It is what gives regulation its teeth and makes it effective. This form of jurisdiction has a strictly territorial basis, which means that in the absence of extradition, which is unlikely to be granted with respect to the vast majority of Internet matters, a state can enforce its laws only against in-state actors, against entities with a presence on the territory of the state or with assets there. The distinction between prescriptive and adjudicative jurisdiction, on the one hand, and enforcement jurisdiction, on the other, is what allowed Joseph Story, almost 200 years ago, to maintain that whatever force and obligation the laws of one country have in another, depends solely upon [the latters] own express or tacit consent . It means that providers of Internet content need to worry mainly about the regulations of the states in which they have a presence or assets. Enforcement jurisdiction acts as a limiting factor, reducing the overlapping of directly effective regulations to the various states where Internet actors have a presence or assets, which falls somewhere short of all the nations of the entire world. The submission of Internet actors to a worldwide range of paper rules may be true, but their submission to effective rules is far more limited. [3]

3.5 International Modeling The United States might not have direct control over the Internet, but affirmatives will be able to make international advantage claims stemming from the United States role as de facto guardian of the Internet:The phenomenal growth, extreme decentralization and diffusion of the stateless Internet from its center of origin in the United States to the peripheral areas of the globe have virtually eliminated geographical boundaries and put question marks over sacrosanct traditional international legal concepts such as national sovereignty and jurisdiction. The regulatory frameworks engendered around the world by the Internet are redefining the concept of sovereignty, not usually to the liking of most states. Billions of bytes of data are sent across national borders countless times every day without the authorization of the countries concerned, raising issues of sovereignty, jurisdiction and territorial integrity. In addition, since the largest proportion of Internet activity takes place in the United States, Congress and the Supreme Court are increasingly being seen as the de facto regulators of the Internet for the rest of the world. [4]

4. AFFIRMATIVE CASE AREAS Reasons for increasing the United States regulation of the Internet are numerous:There are three distinct domains in which the Internet may need governancethat is, intentional and legitimate ordering. Each serves distinct purposes and requires different kinds of processes and methods, so it is vital to distinguish between them in order to develop high-level rules and procedures. The first is technical standardization. This involves reaching agreement about networking protocols and data formats and documenting these agreements. Because standards structure the behavior of machines and people, it is useful to consider them as part of an intentional ordering process. The second is resource allocation and assignment. In the case of the Internet, this means virtual resourcesInternet identifiers such as domain names and IP addresses, as well as protocol port numbers. These identifiers require exclusive use, because they must be unique and exclusive to function

properly as an address. Resources may also be scarce and require rationing. Allocation and assignment processes coordinate the distribution of Internet resources to users, to maintain uniqueness and/or to ration consumption. The third area of governance is human conduct, which is governed by defining and enforcing regulations, laws, and policies. Whereas the first two governance functions are concerned with the specification or coordination of the technical system, the governance of human conduct orders the actions of people. It includes global public policy for such areas as spam, cybercrime, copyright and trademark disputes, consumer protection issues, and public and private security. [23]

We believe affirmatives will tarry in the third area of regulation. 4.1 Net Neutrality Net Neutrality is a principle which states Internet Service Providers (ISPs) shouldnt restrict the quality or quantity of the content that their users access. The arguments for and against net neutrality can be summarized thusly:Over the past years, the merits of network neutrality regulation have become a hot topic in telecommunications policy debates. Repeatedly, proponents of network neutrality regulation have asked the Federal Communications Commission to impose rules on the operators of broadband access networks that forbid network operators to discriminate against third-party applications, content or portals (independent applications) and to exclude them from their network. These proposals are based on the concern that in the absence of such regulation, network operators may discriminate against these products and that this behavior may reduce innovation by providers of these products to the detriment of society. Opponents of regulation deny the need for network neutrality regulation. They argue that regulation is not necessary because network operators do not have an incentive to discriminate against independent applications anyway, or, alternatively, that regulation is harmful because it would reduce network operators incentive to upgrade their networks in the future. [25]

However, detractors of net neutrality say that regulation could stop innovation:Net neutrality regulation is also likely to reduce innovation in both the development network infrastructure and the provision of Internet-based content. Proponents of net neutrality regulation have tried to co-opt the innovation argument by contending that small content-providers at the fringe of the network will be less innovative as a result of contracting for Quality of Service (with positive prices). Taken to its logical conclusion, however, this argument implies that Internet access should be provided free of charge to all content providers to maximize fringe innovation. But this argument assumes that the network infrastructure of the Internet is simply a commodity product that can be supplied by a number of fungible BSPs (Basic Service Providers). It ignores the fact that both the initial establishment of the network and its ongoing management require significant investment. Because innovation occurs at both the content level and the network level, the following economic considerations must be taken into account in contemplating the outcome of a broad discrimination standard. [2]

The following describes a sample regulation that affirmatives could place on Internet providers:A government agency could, for instance, set a minimum price for IPTransit. Following the Bertrand argument, this minimum price would quickly turn out to be the new equilibrium market price. Of course, calculating the right price would be a huge challenge, but the FCC has already gained some experience in such calculations while regulating retail prices both for telephone and Internet lines. As infrastructure investments exhibit positive externalities, the FCC would have to provide top-level networks with appropriate incentives for investing. One way would be to set up a Capacity Fundsimilar in structure to the Universal Service Fund described in Laont & Tirole (2000) according to which the FCC would tax the premiums mentioned above to endow the fund with nancial resources. This money would be redistributed to the Tier 1 networks, but not on a pro rata basis but based on the outcome of a tournament. The main criterion of the tournament would be the interconnection qualities of the participating networks, i.e. a technical, comparably objective measurement which can be obtained accurately with relative ease. Using this criterion, while optimizing additional costs for infrastructure on an individual basis, network operators would internalize a part of the externality they create, if only because higher infrastructure investments would increase the likelihood of gaining a larger share of the fund. [4]

4.2 Gambling Gambling is big business for the Internet:While at least 50 countries consider gambling on the Internet to be a legal activity, the United States does not. In the past decade, the industry has grown considerably. There are now approximately 2,000 online gambling sites, operating oversees, particularly in Europe, the Caribbean, and the Asian/Pacic rim. Ironically, their customer base is largely drawn from the United States. In 2005, online gaming generated $12 billion in revenue, half of which came from U.S. customers, according to a report conducted by Peter D. Hart Research Associates for the American Gaming Association (AGA). That gure is projected to double by 2010. Although federal law does not directly prohibit U.S. citizens from gambling online, Congress has attempted to curtail the practice by passing legislation that prohibits businesses from taking bets online and banks from accepting payments from online gambling operations. State law generally determines whether a states residents can legally engage in gambling activities. A person who lives in a state that makes gambling illegal would be violating the law by betting online even if the online casino is located outside the state. At least six states specically address Internet gambling (Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington). Other states simply apply existing gambling laws to the Internet. But because most gambling crosses state and foreign borders, federal laws are more applicable. In 2006, Congress passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, which applied to Internet wagers on sporting events as well as bets through online casinos. The statute prohibits gambling businesses from accepting credit cards, electronic fund transfers, checks, or drafts from Internet customers. It also directs the Federal Reserve, in consultation with the Attorney General, to prescribe regulations to require banks to identify and block nancial transactions associated with Internet gambling. [8]

Affirmatives could use a variety of tactics to stop this illegal activity.

However, the regulation of Internet gambling also gives a good example of how affirmative cases could lead to trade disputes:International economic law, however, may impose limits on the use of an electronic border for enforcement purposes. The Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization sets out substantive obligations for signatory states to allow crossborder services and information flows. Antiguas recent case against the United States, though, suggests that the WTO constraints will affect the legitimacy of the underlying rules rather than the choice of enforcement mechanisms themselves. Antigua was a haven for Internet gambling operations that faced a substantial loss of business in the United States as a result of U.S. legislation outlawing non-U.S.-licensed operations. Antigua filed a complaint with the WTO against the United States alleging that U.S. laws restricting Internet gambling were in violation of U.S. trade obligations relating to the cross-border supply of services. The case is interesting because it addresses the legitimacy of the gambling laws themselves and whether the WTO rules bar the substantive provisions of U.S. law. If the final ruling in the case determines that U.S. substantive law contravenes the WTO obligations that the United States accepted, then any enforcement by the United States of the Internet gambling laws would not be a legitimate exercise of state power. International economic law, thus, constrains the states underlying decisions on rules and policies rather than the choice of enforcement instruments if the decisions and policies are legitimate. [19]

4.3 Child Pornography The Internet is uniquely situated to aid child sex offenders.Digital information contained within the Internet is not located or stored at one single point and is not administered by any one person or group, and so by its nature is uncontrollable by a single regulatory body. As such, the Internet has a number of uses and potential, and very real, misuses. Durkin (1997) proposes three ways in which the Internet can be utilized by sex offenders: (1) to disseminate images for personal and/or commercial reasons; (2) to establish and engage in social networks with other individuals who have a sexual interest in children; and (3) to engage in inappropriate sexual communication with children and/or to locate children to abuse. In addition, Lanning (2001) suggests that abusive images downloaded from the Internet may be used to desensitize and/or lower inhibitions in an offender or victim prior to or during an offense. It is worth noting that the Internet might also serve as a method for covertly breaking probation restrictions regarding access to children for those individuals who already have convictions for child molestation. [22]

Affirmatives will be able to institute regulations to stop these practices. 4.4 Cybercrime Cybercrime will be a large case area. Readers will probably most familiar with the use of viruses and worms to cause economic damage:In 2008, the Computer Security Institute found that almost half of the 522 respondents to its annual Computer Crime and Security Survey experienced a computer crime in the previous year. Most frequently, organizations were the victims of malware software maliciously designed to harm other computers. The most common forms of malware

are worms and viruses. A computer virus is a parasitic program that attaches itself to another application. When it is activated, it self-replicates and spreads throughout a computer system and then, via shared les, to other computers. Some viruses are simply pranks that spread strange messages or pictures. Others do serious damage by erasing data and corrupting hard drives. Computer worms engage in the same malicious behavior, but do so independently. The essential difference between them is that worms do not need a host application. Viruses and worms are most commonly spread through e - mail attachments, links to infected websites, P2P le sharing, and free software downloads from the Internet. [8]

And, one virus can cause billions of dollars of damage:In May 2000, Onel de Guzman, a 23-year-old student at the Amabel Mendoza Aquiluz Computer College in the slums of Manila, the Philippines, created an e-mail borne virus named ILOVE YOU, and unleashed it on an unsuspecting world through the Internet. The self-replicating virus or worm spread rapidly, infecting computers and destroying data in computer systems and networks around the globe. The disruption and damage caused by the ILOVE YOU virus amounted to billions of dollars. Governments around the world were alarmed. The United States Congress held a number of hearings and some countries, which had had no laws against making and disseminating computer viruses and computer hacking prior to the attack, passed legislation to address the problem. Onel de Guzman was arrested a few weeks later by Philippines authorities, under pressure from the American government, but officials had no choice but to release him because there was no law against the creation of computer viruses and computer hacking in the Philippines. The ILOVE YOU computer virus brought the age of instantaneous global electronic communication crashing into the lives and businesses of millions of people around the world. Oriel de Guzman's infamous love letter from the slums of Manila was a vivid, but very expensive demonstration of the new interconnectedness of communications infrastructure and networks around the globe. [15]

5. NEGATIVE POSITIONS This topic offers a variety of on-case and off-case negative positions. 5.1 On-Case Arguments First, negative teams could argue that substantial regulations are already addressing the problem:Computer fraud is prohibited by 18 U.S.C. 1030. The statute makes it a felony offense to hack into a protected computer, transmit a virus, or trafc in computer passwords. A protected computer is one used in interstate or foreign commerce, located in or outside the United States, or one used by the U.S. government or a nancial institution. Specically, the statute prohibits intentionally accessing a computer without authorization or exceeding authorized access to obtain information from any protected computer if the conduct involves an interstate or foreign communication. The Act also criminalizes knowingly causing the transmission of a program, information, code, or command that intentionally causes damage to a protected computer or trafcking in any password or similar information through which a computer may be accessed without authorization. The punishment for unauthorized access is normally a ne or up to one year in

prison. It increases to ve years if the unauthorized access is for commercial advantage, furthers another tortious act, or the value of the information obtained exceeds $5,000. The statue also entitles those who suffer damage or loss due to behavior prohibited by the Act to le a civil suit against the violator. [8]

Another solvency argument could be that unwanted activity will merely move to another country:But even if we do not need perfect enforcement, the opponents argue back, we will still require sufficient enforcement to discourage the few among us who will not adhere to a rule on their own; and even sufficient enforcement is unlikely in global cyberspace. Whenever, for example, an information provider is threatened by a regulation in one state, it just needs to relocate the potentially violating information to another jurisdiction with a more favorable regulation. Given the market forces in a global network, over time certain states will turn their liberal regulatory regimes into a competitive advantage, in essence offering to providers of questionable content flags of convenience in the sea of information called the Internet. As Frances Cairncross put it, cyberspace causes the death of distance. It ridicules traditional national borders and boundaries. [18]

Furthermore, programmers could use code to evade regulations:The Web as a social space is not subject to physical constraints. The affordances of its users are created and constrained by the Webs architecture, which is engrained in software code. The architecture is the result of many loosely coordinated and at times controversial decisions taken by the designers of the Internet and the creators of its many applications. This fundamental difference between the regulation of physical space and the regulation of the Internet poses a challenge for traditional regulators: The regulated subjects can avoid regulation by coding around it. This phenomenon can be nicely seen in the development of file-sharing applications and protocols: the coders of these tools were fast to implement the court orders by adjusting the design of their tools to escape liability. The global nature of the Web makes avoiding regulation by changing the jurisdiction for web sites is as easy as a few clicks, a popular ploy among the senders of spam, and phishing emails. [7]

5.2 Disadvantages The traditional disadvantages for a domestic topic will apply to this one. But, negatives would also be able to link increased content restrictions for America to more stringent requirements for those abroad:Internet filtering occurs in different ways in different parts of the world. Some states implement a software application developed by one of a small handful of United States-based technology providers. Burma, in the first incarnation of its filtering regime, used an open source product for filtering, called DansGuardian. Others rely less heavily on technology solutions and more extensively on soft controls. Sometimes the filtering regime is supported explicitly by the states legal code; in other cases, the filtering regime is carried out through a national security

authority. In yet other instances, the regulation is simply presumed to be permissible. The content blocked spans a wide range of social, religious, and political information. Our studies have combined a review of whether individual citizens could access sites in a global basket of bellwether sites to test in every jurisdiction across a variety of sensitive areas akin to a stock index sorted by sectoras well as a list of Web sites likely to be sensitive only in some countries. [10]

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5.3 Counterplans Other actors could implement affirmatives plans. For example, many scholars are unconvinced that national action is the answer to the Internets woes:Traditionalists begin by stating that the preeminent existing governance agency, the state, is the appropriate regulator of cyberspace. After all, the state has the democratic legitimization, the procedural setup, and the institutional enforcement to make regulations, including ones pertaining to cyberspace, work. The opponents of national laws regulating cyberspace contest this assumption that the state is the best agency to regulate cyberspace. They point out that any national law applied to cyberspace will lack the necessary democratic legitimacy on a global network. Why, they ask, should anyone operating in cyberspace be subject to a cyber-regulation in whose enactment she did not partake even in the most indirect way? Isnt democratic legitimization all about taking part in the political process? Further, if each and every national law on the face of the earth is applied to conduct in cyberspace, then people interacting on the Net would potentially have to obey hundreds of different, potentially even contradictory regulations at the same time. In the words of The Economist , reporting on an American online service providers decision to bar its customers from accessing parts of the Internet because of a Bavarian prosecution alleging a violation of German law, when Bavaria wrinkles its nose, must the whole world catch a cold? [18]

Instead, some authors propose that control of the Internet is best left to private actors:But there is a second flavor of cyber-separatism, quite apart from Barlows extreme approach. Its proponents do not argue for the formal regulatory void of the cyberanarchists. Instead they aim for self-regulation of cyberspace. They point out that any free society must be governed only by its own rules. In their arguments, they recall the plight of the Founding Fathers and their fight for independence and self-rule. They reason that subjecting people in cyberspace to rules conceived outside of it necessarily involves the enforcement of rules devised by one society against members of another, thus contradicting the fundamental principle of selfgovernment. Cyberspace, it is argued, needs to be governed, but not by some distant, unaffected national legislature (again evoking powerful historical metaphors of American suffering under the British Crown); rather, it should be governed by the people who are actually affected, the people interacting in cyberspace: the netizens

themselves. Self-regulation, they argue, is the single best way to ensure the legitimacy of governance. [18]

6.

CRITICAL ISSUES

6.1 Specific Negative Strategies and Selected Responses While the proposed topic will allow negative teams to critique many of the same pre-fiat and post-fiat implications of affirmative plans (threat construction, statism, spectatorship, general lines of Nietzschean critique, etc.) several topic-unique trajectories of critique will be elucidated and discussed below. 6.1.1 Freedoms and Rights Negative teams will be able to claim that efforts to regulate the Internet constitute an undermining of basic rights:The United States has weathered one major federal attack on the Internet in the form of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which was declared unconstitutional. The U.S. is in the enviable position of being the only country that has a constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech. [26]

Furthermore, negative teams will be able to indict the undermining of basic rights of speech as motivated by drives of fear and protection:Overall, one can say that the instinct to censor is quite universal, and that the stated aim is protection -- of children, of cultural values, of government stability, and so on. The objective is to maintain control. But why is there this need to be protective, to be in control? Perhaps underlying this instinct is the more basic one of fear. As Godwin puts it in his discussion of why the "Communications Decency Act" was passed by the United States Congress, Its that the theocratic right is driven by an irrational fear -- a fear that the citizens and Congress cant be trusted to do the right thing if theyre presented with unvarnished, unmanufactured facts (Godwin, 1998, p. 301). Across the world, similar fears seem to drive the censors, suggesting a mistrust of free speech and peoples ability to deal with it rationally, and perhaps an unacknowledged lack of confidence on the part of the censor in his her own infallibility. [26]

Such theoretical linkages will allow debaters to develop critical implications predicated upon the works of James Der Derian (1998) as well as Gerorgio Agamben (1998, 2000). Conversely, affirmative teams will be able to access impact turns pertaining to hate-speech and international perception:Both public/market pressure and parent-controlled filters represent opposite ends of the Internet regulation spectrum. At one end, network hosts are pushed to restrict online hate by public/market pressure, and at the other end, the network users vulnerable to such content are shielded from such content through parentcontrolled filtering systems. Although neither of these are permanent solutions to the problem of online hate speech, both are effective and practical ways of dealing

with it until international consensus on regulation can be achieved. The United States should not bury its head in the sand and continue to disregard the concerns of the international community. If nothing else, it must consider the implications of becoming a safe haven for hate mongers around the world. The Oklahoma City bombing and the Columbine shooting serve as horrific testaments to the deadly consequences linked to Internet hate, and they lend credence to the international communitys concern regarding such speech online. According to current Supreme Court doctrine, hate speech cannot be regulated based on its content unless it falls into one of the unprotected categories of speech. This leaves the United States in a seemingly intractable situation, both domestically and internationally: either accept the likely violent and otherwise injurious ramifications associated with protecting hate speech or agree to some type of international regulation of such speech and chip away at the most basic First Amendment protection of expression. In response to this dilemma, it is clear that, in order to minimize the likelihood of future acts of hate-related violence, the United States must engage the world and actively attempt to find a reasonable solution to Internet hate speech. An international regime of ratings and filters may be the most effective way of combating online hate, as such a system responds to the differing parameters of each nation. Unfortunately, the creation of such a regime is unlikely to occur soon, and the spread of hate is occurring now. Although interim solutions, such as public/market pressure and parent-controlled filtering systems, can limit the reach of hate temporarily, it is apparent that long-term international solutions are the only way to stem the rising tide of hate. [1]

6.1.2 Borders Negative teams will be able to argue that regulation of the Internet creates new borders within a previously open space:Thus, the Internet will inevitably transform from a relatively borderless dimension into a medium that takes account of geo-graphical and legal borders. Such a development seem particularly unavoidable when considering how geo-location technologies (as part of architecture/code) affects, and is affected by, the three other forms of regulation. Furthermore, in light of such a development, current "effect-focused" conflict of laws rules may make sense. In other words, from the perspective of Internet regulation, geo-location technologies may, to a large extent, eliminate the regulatory difficulties associated with the Internets "borderlessness. [11]

Such notions of bordered thought and action suggest various trajectories of critical engagement including the work of Michael Shapiro (1997) and Gloria Anzaldua (1987). 6.1.3 Foucauldian Critiques The proposed topic lends itself to critical argumentation from a variety of trajectories informed by the corpus of work produced and/or inspired by Michel Foucault. Negative teams seeking to critique affirmative plans from a Foucaldian perspective will be able to cite good links to Foucaults critique of power: Negative teams will also be able to link affirmative cases to notions of Surveillance and Control:

Foucaults critique of the Panopticon has been widely adapted to the context of the Internet. Mark Poster has, for example, labelled the Internet a Superpanopticon and Oscar Gandy has coined the phrase Panoptic Sort to describe the way that the Internet can locate and sort personal information. This section will outline these arguments that the Internet is a modern Panopticon. Robins and Webster argue that the Internet enforces social discipline in the manner of the Panopticon by the force of the information revolution having deemed that social and cultural enfranchisement requires households to own a wide variety of communication technology such as the Internet, and that this expectation disciplines individuals into spending leisure time acquiring material goods and spending money in order to feed the capitalist economy. An alternative critique is that the Internet disciplines by the way in which users are aware of a capacity for their activities to be monitored- either by their emails or web-browsing history being monitored at their workplace, ISPs examining viewing history, or by states enforcing laws to punish those who access certain content. The result of this ever-present threat of surveillance, or dataveillance it is proposed, is that it inhibits individual decision-making and creates self-censorship. Notably, it is the target of surveillance who initiates this cycle, not only by signing onto database services or becoming a member of a site, but simply by entering cyberspace. The notion of the Internets capacity to observe derives from the concept of the Panoptic sort which is empowered by the convergence of bureaucratic and commercial databases. Statements such as that from the CEO of Sun Microsystems that you have zero privacy- get over it, gives credence to Internet user scepticism about the way that their information is being used. Gandy argues that this Panoptic sort identifies, classifies and assesses personal information. The reality of this scenario is made clear by cases of consumer profile databases being sold to companies and marketers or by states enforcing laws to punish those who access certain content. [20]

The implications of such critical engagement with Internet regulation presuppose implications deriving from both Foucaults extensive writings on power/knowledge and also the seminal work Discipline and Punish. Finally, as with many other elements of the proposed topic, teams will be able to cite good empirics of the critical implications of Internet regulation:The disciplinary power of panopticism is often productive as opposed to being experienced as repressive. To appease those who feel uneasy under surveillance, its proponents often state the benefits, such as upholding social norms by regulating pornography or providing a sense of security. Especially after 9-11, people in the U.S. are willing to trade certain rights and liberties for safety and a sense of security. An oft-quoted proverb used to justify surveillance is that, if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear. In a similar manner, the indignation China feels with regard to its role in the world has significant implications for the way Internet regulation is justified. It is not uncommon to hear calls for regulation of the Internet, seen by some as the latest proponent of Western imperialism. Chat programs and videogames are likened to electronic opium, to justify regulation and surveillance practices. Social norms enhance the span of the Panopticon, making the gaze absolute and reaching out to the most remote sections of society. (p. 72)

(Author continues, pg. 76-77)

The Internet was initially designed with an open, decentralized, and libertarian spirit in mind. Lessig argues that this is changing fast, due to the market, which increasingly seeks to regulate and determine the development of the Internet. The four modalities of control exemplify how panopticism is the imperative modus for Internet regulation in China. As explained by Michel Foucault, panopticism illustrates how normalization of behavior is achieved by surveillance practices, where the subjects are at the same time implicated as both the bearers and the effects of disciplinary power. In his own words: power is employed and exercised through a net-like organization. And not only do individuals circulate between its threads; they are always in the position of simultaneously undergoing and exercising power ... The individual ... is not the vis-a-vis of power; it is I believe, one of its prime effects. 58 Panopticism thus leads to a high degree of self-censorship and self-regulation, further enforced by the law, which stipulates that everybody is responsible for what s/he publishes online. Furthermore, the most crucial regulation is the requirement that users connect through a government-controlled international gateway for foreign traffic, simulating the role of the invisible guard in the Panopticon. Also important are the logging of information and the registration of users, enabling the visibility that is the source of disciplinary power. Productivity of surveillance, such as the regulation of pornography and providing a sense of security, justify the potentially repressive side of it. Further tools at the governments disposal are intimidation, serving as a reminder of constantly being watched and, subtler, disinformation, to sow uncertainty over the authenticity of the services offered to circumvent censorship. These services often lack the continuity to facilitate a large user base and are destined to stay marginalized. Panopticism is a highly effective model for regulating behavior, especially since the government is mostly concerned about normalizing the behavior of the general public. [24]

6.1.4 Representations of Crime The meeting of rhetorics of regulation and the Internet will allow negative teams to critique converging representations of safety and control balanced against dissident desires for anonymity and freedom:While it is common to portray the Internet as a lawless place, some of our actions are in fact much more traceable and easier to monitor online than they are ofine (Grabosky, 2001: 246). Coupled with the never-ending call for tighter regulation and criminalization of behaviour which in its ofine incarnation may be simply treated as deviant or immoral, the distinction between identity play and downright identity fraud is indeed set to become increasingly vague simply because online behaviour may be more extensively monitored and policed. Moreover, a greater demand for identication on the Internet, while partly the result of a desire to combat deception, may have the opposite effect of encouraging identity fraud as some users seek to escape an undesirable legal identity (such as an unfavourable credit rating) which bars them from accessing services and information online. Thus Finch (2007) notes: The increasing requirement of identibility that is an ineluctable aspect of modern society forces individuals with spoiled () identities to choose between perpetual disclosure of information they would rather hide from the public gaze or the denial of access that follows from the inability to provide this information. (p. 33) Internet communication may offer enhanced opportunities for identity fraud, but equally signicant is that it also acts as a screen on which deepseated feelings of insecurity can be easily and convincingly projected. [2]

Negative teams will also be able to claim that representations of social netthreats avoid the real issues that precipitate Internet danger:

The effects of harmful web contents are chronically at issue in the Internet regulation debate, leading to frequent calls for intervention and censorship. When placed within the wider context of media effects, one is left wondering whether there may indeed be nothing new under the sun (Sutter, 2000) in respect of new technology (see also Grabosky, 2001). The virtual demon evokes an image all too familiar to media scholars, namely that of audiences being sucked into an impoverished and surrogate reality, causing all manner of social ills. What such discourses tend to neglect is that if there is any harm perpetrated, its causes and effects are often complex and multifarious. The Internet is only a medium: as the pro-ana community is keen to emphasize, you do not catch anorexia from visiting a website. Anorexia is a complex disorder and the pro-ana controversy is the latest instalment in the long-running debate on the link between the consumption of media images and eating disorders. It would not make for a sound public health policy if the attempt to combat anorexia focused exclusively on the media side of the disorder. In that sense, the virtual does not hold the key to solving anorexia (and bulimia) as a problem because it is neither sufcient nor necessary to trigger an eating disorder. [2]

In addition to basic solvency implications, such critiques of net-threat representations will allow debaters to utilize the writings pertaining to criminality produced by The Invisible Committee (2007) as well as Jean Baudrillards writings dealings with symbolic violence/terrorism (1990). 6.1.5 Cyberfeminism Negative teams will be able to critique affirmative plans from the standpoint of cyberfeminism:The Internet represents a potentially powerful platform for women's subversion of gender stereotypes and for development of a virtual public sphere that more strongly reflects the values, priorities, desires, and aspirations of women. This optimistic view of telecommunications innovations is undercut by the interests of global capital, which seek to regulate and control cyberspace. (Page 1.)

Author continues P. 2Cyberfeminism is one of many strands of feminism, such as liberal, socialist, environmental and so on. In common with other feminist ideologies, cyberfeminism emphasises the central role of gender in social relations and the consequent oppression of women. The best-known exponents of cyberfeminism are the VNS (pronounced Venus) Matrix, authors of the "Cyberfeminist Manifesto for the 21st Century" (1991), and Sadie Plant, author of Zeros + Ones (1998). Cyberfeminism asserts an alliance between woman and new telecommunications technologies. Cyberfeminists emphasise the transformative power of cyberspace, or the notion that the virtual world allows women to transcend gender, class, ethnicity, sexuality and other identity categories to generate a more egalitarian reality within the virtual public sphere. Cyberfeminism can be seen as a fresh understanding of the relationship between gender, science and technology; since Victorian and Edwardian 'first-wave' feminism, feminists have debated the nature of this relationship. In the final analysis, this feminism is premised on an optimistic understanding of technology, or the perception of technology as societal saviour rather than destroyer. [27]

In addition to the notable works referenced by Smitley, debaters will be able to research broader implications of technology and feminism, such as Donna Haraways seminal work A Cyborg Manifesto (1991). 6.1.6 Psychoanalysis Finally, negative and affirmative teams alike will be able to critique notions of the Internet from the standpoint of psychoanalysis, via multiple link stories from either a Zizekian or Lacanian perspective:ieks early work on cyberspace emphasizes the loss of virtuality as the gaps in the symbolic are filled. The circulation of contributions in the networks of communicative capitalism suggests a different structure, one characterized by drive. There is no cyberspace that persists as its own domain. Rather, the networks of global communications connect through a variety of devices, technologies, and mediaInternet, mobile phones, television, global positioning systems, game platforms, etc. One of the more interesting features of massive multiplayer online role-playing games is the intersecting of game and non-game worlds: players can buy and trade currencies and characters outside the gamespace. The expansions and intensifications of networked interactions thus point not to a field closed to meaning as all possibilities are explored and filled in but rather back to the non-all Real of human interaction. In his later work, iek supplements the Lacanian account of the Real as that which always returns to its placeas that which remains the same in all possible (symbolic) universes (2006: 26). He adds the notion of a parallax Real, that is, a Real capable of accounting for the multiplicity of appearances of the same underlying Real. Such a parallax Real is a gap or shift between perspectives. It does not embody a substantial point of information or sensory perception (you feel it in your gut; I feel it in my bones). Rather, it is the shift from one perspective to another. The Real, then, does not refer to what is the same but to the hard bone of contention which pulverizes the sameness into the multitude of appearances (2006: 26). It is retroactively posited as the necessary yet impossible cause of this very multiplicity. Thus, there are two aspects to the parallax Real: multiplicity and its impossible core, a purely virtual, actually nonexistent X (2006: 26). Such a notion of a parallax Real is well-suited to communicative capitalism. What appears is multiplicity, pulverization, the constant and repeated assertion of something else, something different. Yet, to the extent that the shifts of perspective appear immediately (without interpretation, meaning, elevation to the status of a universal) they obscure the fact of contention, as if the shifts were among a multitude of singularities each with its own perspective, none of which is more powerful, more structural, or more true than another (an example from the U.S. is the way that conservatives accuse liberals of racism when liberals argue for racial diversity in political appointments). What is obscured is the underlying gap or disavowal, the virtual X of fundamental antagonism. The multiplicity of shifts effaces their embeddedness in capitalism, more specifically, the communicative capitalism that makes their expression possible. If the Real is ultimately impossible, then it names the obstacle we come up against in our supposition and experience of reality. In communicative capitalism, that obstacle is the (missing) efficiency of the symbolic. The Real of the Internet is the circulatory movement of drivethe repeated making, uploading, sampling, the constant pulverization that occurs as movement on the Internet doubles itself, becoming itself and its record or trace effected by symbolic efficiency as loss. The movement from link to link, the forwarding and storing and commenting, the contributing without expectation of response but in hope of further movement (why else count page views?) is

circulation for its own sake. Drives circulation forms a loop. The empty space within it, then, is not the result of the loss of something that was there before and now is missing. The drive of the Internet is not around the missing Master signifier (which is foreclosed rather than missing). Instead, it is the inside of the loop, the space of nothing that the loop makes appear. This endless loop that persists for its own sake is the difference that makes a difference between so-called old and new media. [26]

6.2 Topic Specific Critique Alternatives and Selected Responses While teams will be able to argue the generalized critique alternatives of mere rejection, re-thinking, and revolt via the ballot the unique qualities of the Internet pre-suppose several interesting and unique critique alternatives. Self-Regulation Alternative options for negative teams will include un-ordered selfregulation:6.2.1Donath and Boyd (2004) attribute the growing success of social networking websites (such as Friendster, Facebook and Myspace) to users desire to authenticate themselves by explicitly stating their connections with others who know them (preferable from ofine encounters) and who are therefore able to conrm that they are indeed who they claim to be. In contrast with the anarchical and criminogenic reputation of the Internet, Wall (2001: 167) nds cyberspace remarkably ordered, a quality he believes is in no small part attributable to different layers of governance, including a measure of self-regulation imposed by users themselves. Self-authentication as a means of establishing credibility undoubtedly testies to users wish to contribute to order online. Featherstone (2000) says of virtual reality: As in all types of communication it is to be expected that forms and conventions will emerge which provide the equivalents of everyday face-to-face cueing devices, turn-taking in conversations, body language etc. which are driven by the economizing imperative of being understood. (p. 615) [12]

A similar more policy-oriented alternative might be the creation of forms of pseudo-institutionalized self-regulation:Within the present context, the question concerns more precisely how the different solutions to the self-regulation of the Internet can encounter their own conditions of increase in reflexivity. These conditions have to be met if one wants to mobilise effectively the new reflexive resources which are needed to face unprecedented ethical situations. However, literature on the subject of self-regulation of the Internet already attempts to go beyond the insufficiencies of actual solutions ; hereby holding that self-regulated networks can go beyond individual market behaviour by developing a certain level of collective constraint which is different from the one emanating directly from the government (Black [9]). One can think of forms of self-regulation by delegation as in the case of the privatisation of the root by the creation of the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) (Ogus [43], p. 596 ; Mueller [39], pp. 518-519) or of forms of spontaneous emergence of voluntary constraints within user communities (Poullet [46] ; Ogus [43]). Nevertheless, these solutions are most of the time limited to proposing a purely formal reflexivity of ethical codification or juridical self-rule. To take into account the reflexivity of the actors and the institutional frameworks in addition to

the formal rules, two types of solutions are proposed in literature on the subject. The first solution, which can be described as decentralized regulation (Lemley [29]) or multi-regulation (Vivant [55])7, tries to take innovation (Kling [25], p. 116) or on the question of the real beneficiaries of the increase in productivity in organisations through computerisation (Kling [25], p. 123). These are the terms used in the field of Internet governance. One could prefer the term of polycentric governance, used in the field of community management of common goods studies, which has the advantage of showing that decentralisation does not imply the absence of any coherence between the subsystems. The use of this term, introduced by V. Ostrom, Ch. Thibout and R. Warren, connotes a coherent manner of functioning of the system as a whole through various contractual and cooperative undertakings between the independent into account the reflexivity of the new actors emerging in the field of the Internet. This solution focuses on the increase in reflexivity of the emerging actors through the recurrent interaction between subsystems of normativity, such as the interaction one can observe within the Internet Society between the Internet Societal Task Force (ISTF) on the one hand and the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) and the Internet Engineering Taks Force (IETF) on the other8. The second solution, which we describe as co-regulation in the strong sense, focuses on an institutional framing facilitating the responsibility of the actors in favour of the research of common solutions, such as in the proposition of the French and Australian coregulatory agencies. [9]

Conversely, affirmative teams will be able to claim alternative solvency deficits and impact turns by claiming that such self-regulation reifies problematic social structures:What is important about such practices is that, through them, social hierarchies, inequalities and power relations easily nd a way into cyberspace. (p. 320)

(Author continues p. 327)It is important to stress, however, that rather than taking us into entirely new directions, our cyber selves (Aas, 2007) constitute merely an additional layer to already densely structured social identities. This is becoming ever more pronounced as ofine social rules are routinely relied on to order cyberspace where they mimic familiar hierarchies and cannot be decoupled from existing material inequalities. When considering the case for increased regulation of the Internet, we would do well to bear in mind that social control, often but not exclusively driven by commercial and political governance imperatives, is already deeply enmeshed with cyberculture. [12]

Affirmative teams will also be able to cite good solvency advocates for permutations concerning such critique alternatives:Let me summarise the issues conveyed so far. Pure forms of self-regulation, as in the case of having to abide by codes of conduct are not the norm. Most of the time some form of hierarchical assistance is required in the monitoring and enforcement stage. The value of this point is proved by examples such as the dispute-resolution mechanism introduced by ICANN and the architectural solutions developed for DVDs. [17]

6.2.2 Anonymity A second unique critique alternative at the disposal of negative teams will be the acceptance of anonymity as an identity:Accepting, however, that a strong case can be made for this control vision of the Internet, some have argued for the creation of new rights. It has variously been suggested that the Internet requires the development of new constitutional rights, or the creation of digital rights. Part of the debate about rights relates back to the question of whether these are required because the Internet presents a new space. The position of this paper is that early hacker culture was not altogether nave in thinking that the Internet posed an opportunity for interacting differently to the real world (or creating a new space). This mode of real-time, decentralised and remote communication arguably did present new opportunities to develop alternate personas and non-geographically bounded relationships. The furor which developed about this capacity, specifically the capacity to act deceptively through adopting anonymity as a result of these technical characteristics, led to debates about how to build, responsibility, and accountability between Internet users online. Arguably, this debate has now been largely decided by the process of commercialisation. As Lessig noted, the simplest route to imposing responsibility on individuals in cyberspace is by the way it is done in the real world- through identification. Anonymity and pseudonymity can offer a form of strategic resistance for Internet users against ways that the Internet could be used as a method of social control. [20]

However, affirmative teams will also be able to cite good solvency advocates for their permutations to strict anonymity:However individual stewardship of anonymity is an inadequate method of achieving this goal. For effective utilisation of anonymity, it must be structured into the architecture of the Internet, where the capacity for control and surveillance is decided. Ideas such as those of Goldberg and Clarke who propose implementing centrally held traceable or non-traceable pseudonyms, present two examples of such alternative Internet architecture. Apart from an anonymous architecture being the only way of effectively protecting individual privacy, it might also be the only way a more nuanced approach to privacy might be developed which takes account not only of individuals interests as consumers, but also reflective of privacy as a collective and community concern, and related to the human rights of privacy and freedom of expression. Thinking of anonymity as an architectural concern may also provide a solution to the problem of economic and political vilification not only of individuals who use anonymity software, but of those who operate anonymity structures. As Froomkin notes, In the absence of a compensation mechanism or a jurisdiction capable of offering a safe haven for re-mailers, the cornerstone of Internet anonymity currently relies on the charity of strangers. However, debates about reforming Internet architecture would not only be difficult to be had because of its lack of an overarching authority. [20]

6.3 Critical Advantages and Selected Responses The proposed topic opens up several important/interesting critical options for affirmative teams both with regards to advantage scenarios and impact framing.

6.3.1 Civil Rights Affirmative teams will be able to argue for the need for Internet regulation in order to protect dissenting and/or minority group voices from organized violence:The Internets lack of mediation also facilitates rapid revision of web-site content in a fashion that can assist terrorist organizations. A site that contains specific or personal information about potential targets of terrorist attacks, including buildings, installations, or people, can readily update that site as new information becomes available. While people or groups can alter patterns of behavior to deal with other kinds of public threats, the flexibility and modifiability of Internet communications mean that those behavior alterations can be quickly passed on to persons who might be committed to executing attacks. In addition, the flexibility of the Internet makes it easy to shut down web-sites and set up new ones to avoid detection. (p. 36)

Author continues p. 42To reinvigorate civic engagement, both Brandeis and Arendt looked to outsiders. Both thinkers believed that immigrants strengthened democracy by bringing new ideas and renewed commitments. Each identified the labor movement as a central engine of participation for the hitherto excluded and viewed repression of the movement as a danger to participation-centered ideals. Arendt also praised the role of the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960's in making the government accountable. Although civic republican theorists insist on the need for dissent, they tend to view organized violence against others as undermining engagement. For Arendt, violence reflects a homogenized viewpoint, certain of its conclusions, and focused too often on the mechanics of death and pain [21]

Conversely, negative teams will be able to argue for solvency turns predicated upon the desire of government officials to utilize such regulation regimes as a tool of suppressing dissent:Government, properly understood, needs participation to develop new ideas and challenge old habits. However, government officials often seek ways to domesticate or manage participation, robbing it of the alliance with the unexpected that makes it a central expression of what it means to be human. Seeking to manipulate public opinion, governments frequently alter facts and massage the truth. Governments also seek to stigmatize dissenters, casting them as outsiders of questionable loyalty. [21]

6.3.2 Democracy Perhaps most importantly, the proposed topic will allow the high school debate community to move beyond a mere perfunctory discussion of democracy (this is Diamond, 95) and engage the well nuanced and developed literature base of various democratic theories. Affirmative teams will be able to claim advantages and critical impact turns related to the need of some regulation in order to achieve the ideal polis of deliberative democracy described be Habermasian communication scholars:

The Internet could be an efcient political instrument if it were seen as part of a democracy where free and open discourse within a vital public sphere plays a decisive role. The model of deliberative democracy, as developed by Jrgen Habermas and Seyla Benhabib, serves this concept of democracy best (p. 21)

(Author Continues Pg. 34)In order to preserve the potential for deliberative democracy that the Internet offers, it is necessary to have legal and administrative regulation. This is one of the consequences which follows from the concept of a normative public sphere. In the future, regulation of the Internet will depend more and more upon the limitations imposed by commercial interests, but it remains important that non-prot organizations should exist in addition to commercial providers so that affordable access to the Internet can be maintained. This is especially the case when one considers developing countries and the so-called third world. For these countries and for organizations such as Unesco, this access should be a life-line for the political use of technology. At the same time politicians should keep clearly in view the fact that access to information is part of the fundamental right of citizens to unrestricted communication and interaction; and this is basic and essential to a functioning democracy. The political and legal results of maintaining a critical and deliberative public sphere would be seen in public access to the Internet in places such as public buildings and libraries, as well as free access to on-line archives, databases and commercial data-banks such as Lexis-Nexis and Genios. The recommendation is simple, but in combination with the relevance of a vital public sphere as it is pictured in the model of deliberative democracy it is very important. [5]

Conversely, a spirited impact turn debate is to be predicated upon the work of such radical democratic theorists as Chantal Mouffe (2000) and Ernesto Laclau (1996, 2005) as well as various more moderate social democrats influenced by the various Rawlsian theories of democracy and communication. 6.3.3 Totalitarianism Finally, affirmative teams will be able to claim that moderate Internet regulation in the present safe guards against a full government take over and co-option in the long term a la Putins Russia in the wake of the more laissez faire 90s:Traditionally, authoritarian governments have responded to the IT revolution by censoring sources of free and unbiased information (China, Singapore, Middle East), while democratic governments focused on public concerns such as protection of minors and hate speech (United States, European Union). The game theoretic model introduced to explain the Russian case formally showed that governments have a third choice: to promote Internet access and ICP proliferation, and then use the Internet for direct and indirect propaganda. Realizing this danger even if in the long run the governments ability to overpower independent ICPs The most important part of reforming what Huskey (2001) called centralized state machinery was Putins re-centralization of executive power through dividing the country into seven administrative regions, run by Putins loyal representatives appointed to reign in on the numerous regions governors and presidents. See President Putin May 13, 2000 Presidential Decree establishing the seven regions. The simplicity of the game

theoretic model introduced also allowed us to see that introduction of new technologies such as the Internet may open up possibilities of control that were otherwise unavailable to a post-totalitarian authoritarian regime (one that is forced to allow some freedoms in the public and private space, while leaders maintain power and political control through un-democratic means that exclude blunt propaganda, censorship, and terror). In these cases, what may seem more freedom could mean less freedom in the short run and a danger of yet-to-be- conceived opportunities for control in the long run. Further, when non-democratic governments show signs of learning which control mechanisms work and which ones do not, we should be especially concerned. [24]

7.

WORDING THE RESOLUTION

We believe there will be a spirited discussion about what regulation means. Most sources define the word to mean control by the government over a communitys actions.Regulation is sustained and focused control exercised by a public agency over activities which are valued by a community. The key features of regulation are that it involves a third partythe regulatorin market transactions and interorganisational relationships and that it places responsibility for overseeing performance with a single entitythe regulator. Economists see regulation largely as a remedy for market failure. However, as the definition suggests, regulation is also often used to achieve wider social goalsequity, diversity, or social solidarity and to hold powerful corporate, professional, or social interests to account. [28]

However, there are interpretations of the word that exclude criminal law.It is probably useful to begin by dening regulation. According to Dictionary.com, regulation is a law, rule, or other order prescribed by authority, especially to regulate conduct. Obviously this denition is quite broad. For example, it would seem to include the whole of criminal law, as well as tort law. From this perspective, making the case for regulation is easy. Economists agree that laissez-faire does not generally achieve an efcient outcome in the presence of externalities. A criminal who robs or murders someone is obviously creating a negative externality, as is a driver who runs down a pedestrian, or a rm that creates pollution. It makes sense for the government or the courts to discourage such behavior by imposing prison sentences or nes on the perpetrators or making them liable for the damage they cause. In most discussions, however, regulation is used in a narrower sense. First, it often seems to refer to a situation where quantities rather than prices are used to control behavior. For example, a regulation might specify that a business must have a re extinguisher on its premises, rather than that it will be liable for the damage caused by the absence of a re extinguisher. Second, regulations are often proposed in situations where the relevant parties have a contractual relationship with each other. This is obviously not true of the criminal and his victim, or the driver and the pedestrian. Making the case for regulation when the key parties can contract with each other is much harder. The difculty is that it is not clear why the parties cannot design their own penalties to control bad behavior. To put it another way, the argument for regulation comes up against the argument for freedom of contract. Regulation restricts the feasible set of contracts available to the parties, and under standard assumptions this cannot make them better off. In order to justify regulation, therefore, one has to appeal to

some imperfection in the contracting process. I discuss the main imperfections on which the literature has focused, illustrating each with examples. [29]

Additionally, students will be able to discuss what the Internet actually is.As an umbrella term that includes the associated terms cyberspace and the Web (World Wide Web), the Internet can refer to the actual network and the exchange of data between computers. Many people use the Internet in a seemingly straightforward way: sending and receiving personal email, accessing public information, downloading maps, viewing merchandise and making purchases online, and generally using the technologies for information gathering and transmission. Internet can also refer to social spaces where relationships, communities, and cultures emerge through the exchange of text and images, either in real time or in delayed time sequences. There is a long tradition of social interaction and community development based on the capabilities of the Internet. In short, the Internet can be perceived as a set of technological tools, a complex network of social relations, a language system, a cultural milieu, and so forth. The way one denes and frames the Internet influences how one interacts with Internet-based technologies, as well as how one studies the Internet. [30]

(The authors would like to briefly clarify here the distinction between the Internet and the World Wide Web. The Internet is a series of interconnected computers that communicate using the Internet Protocol Suite. The World Wide Web is a system of hyperlinked documents accessed via the Internet. In other words, the Internet is the framework and the Web is the app.) Regardless of each of these concerns, we are confident that regulation of the Internet is the proper term of art and that adequate evidence could be reached by students searching on those keywords. We are now open for cross-examination.

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