The Internet has expanded, seemingly from nowhere, to become an essential part of modern living for people in developed countries over the space of only a decade or so. That’s faster than the telephone system was rolled out, faster than electric power, even faster than mobiles. What has driven this extraordinary growth? I give my ideas below, and as always there are some links at the end.
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posted by colin at 12:04 pm
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Today I talked on Radio New Zealand National about digital copyright, and how Parliament could have decided to make iPods legal but now apparently isn’t going to.
The essential point here is that copyright is a form of monopoly granted by government to boost innovation, almost a property right, and that copyright holders will naturally lobby government to have their interests expanded so the worth of their property right increases. That doesn’t make it right. It’s all the rest of us who pay the price, and the continual expansion of copyright risks our whole culture and technology since everything original we do relies on work done by others.
Below the fold are my speaking notes for the radio, which I nearly stuck to, with as always some interesting links at the bottom.
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posted by colin at 1:11 pm