The online site of the American journal Legal Affairs has a thoughtful piece on how cyberspace, once widely considered a lawless frontier where norms might prevail but laws had no application, is rapidly submitting to the rule of law. The more important digital information becomes, the more it becomes clear that is is going to submit to the rule of law. Bad when Chinese law means censoring the net. Good when rights can be enforced.

The story by Jack Goldsmith and Timothy Wu is available at :
http://www.legalaffairs.org/issues/January-February-2006/feature_goldsmith_janfeb06.msp

Another straw in the wind. The Globe & Mail reported on Jan 6 how large telcos are “laying the groundwork” for making Google and other large internet content providers pay for their use of telecommunications networks. “The phone companies envisage a system whereby Internet companies would pay a fee for their content to receive priority treatment.” Hey, if we are paying for the transmission, we can pay the rightsholders, no.

Just to confirm the fading of the freedom of the net: you cannot even read the Globe’s story now unless you are a paid online subscriber.