In Search of Jefferson's Moose: Notes on the State of Cyberspace

In Search of Jefferson's Moose: Notes on the State of Cyberspace

David G. Post

Language: English

Pages: 244

ISBN: 0195342895

Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub


In 1787, Thomas Jefferson, then the American Minister to France, had the "complete skeleton, skin & horns" of an American moose shipped to him in Paris and mounted in the lobby of his residence as a symbol of the vast possibilities contained in the strange and largely unexplored New World. Taking a cue from Jefferson's efforts, David Post, one of the nation's leading Internet scholars, here presents a pithy, colorful exploration of the still mostly undiscovered territory of cyberspace--what it is, how it works, and how it should be governed.

What law should the Internet have, and who should make it? What are we to do, and how are we to think, about online filesharing and copyright law, about Internet pornography and free speech, about controlling spam, and online gambling, and cyberterrorism, and the use of anonymous remailers, or the practice of telemedicine, or the online collection and dissemination of personal information? How can they be controlled? Should they be controlled? And by whom? Post presents the Jeffersonian ideal--small self-governing units, loosely linked together as peers in groups of larger and larger size--as a model for the Internet and for cyberspace community self-governance. Deftly drawing on Jefferson's writings on the New World in Notes on the State of Virginia, Post draws out the many similarities (and differences) between the two terrains, vividly describing how the Internet actually functions from a technological, legal, and social perspective as he uniquely applies Jefferson's views on natural history, law, and governance in the New World to illuminate the complexities of cyberspace.

In Search of Jefferson's Moose is a lively, accessible, and remarkably original overview of the Internet and what it holds for the future.

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prime meridian anywhere near Philadelphia, and that there really wasn’t any “common usage” at all in the 1780s regarding the proper location for the prime meridian—different maps put it in different places (depending, usually, on the nationality of the cartographer). Placement of the prime meridian was something of a political and scientific football in the nineteenth century; in 1816, the United States actually passed a law declaring it to be the line of longitude running through the White House

thinking on his part. The canal was never built; the portage between the Ohio and the Potomac—forty miles of very mountainous road—remained almost impassable, the falls along the Potomac (fifteen connecting the Mediterranean and Atlantic watersheds. As was his wont, he kept copious notes of all he saw; as the historian George Shackleford has written, he was more interested in the machinery for opening and closing the locks than in its traffic. . . . He estimated that the system of operating the

themselves, and struggles over the shape of the place begin in earnest. B OX I . 2 J E FFERS O N O N CYBE RS PAC E Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. TJ TO E DWA R D C A R R I N G O N , J A N U A R Y 1 6 , 1 7 8 7 And like the West of 1787, cyberspace poses some hard questions, and could use some new ideas, about governance, and law, and order, and scale. The

international treaties and conventions managed and coordinated by the World Intellectual Property Association (WIPO), the UN’s Committee on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), and the World Trade Organization (WTO). GOV E RNI NG CY B E RS PAC E I I I 1 7 1 sovereign nation-states are projected, and in which the laws of each of those nationstates are applied within those boundaries—while hardly perfect, remains the best, and perhaps the only, hope for accomplishing that goal: What we once

interact with other players, in whatever manner the game/world designers allow and with whatever tools the game/world designers provide. You might not think that people would be much interested in these no-game games, but you’d be wrong. Second Life—at the moment, the most interesting, and the most popular, of these new no-game game worlds—is, as I write this, reportedly adding a million new subscribers each month. What draws people there? What do they do there, if there’s no “game” to play? They

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