Enter the conversation

Rayne Today

This is completely jacked up, in my opinion, an argument beating all around the subject. Adam Thierer at Cato Institute kicked the ball off with his analysis of candidate Howard Dean's Principles for an Internet Policy. Dave Weinberger, Lawrence Lessig and Howard Rheingold all take issue with some if not all of Thierer's commentary. Wow. What a surprise; they haven't yet found common ground on this issue.

Perhaps it's because they haven't deconstructed the internet to the lowest common denominator, making for less-than-constructive argument about which is better, apples or oranges. They've simply not gotten to common terms. Yet.

The internet is one big conversation, with everybody agreeing as they talk on how to conduct the conversation. It's the same conversation we had BEFORE the internet -- only the location has changed.

Contracts are merely documentation of that conversation. Party of the first part agreed with Party of the second part -- operative here is "agreed". They discussed, negotiated, settled on mutual terms. A market is merely a collection of like contracts. An aggregate of conversations.

Let's simplify this even further, which the Dean policy attempted to do: conversations are speech.

And as Americans, we fundamentally believe in the human right to free speech. Free, meaning open with the least possible restraint. Not necessarily free, as in no cost, but free, as in the lease possible barriers.

To that end, we should support an internet with the least possible barriers and restraints to ensure continuity of an open conversation. Free speech.

Who's got a problem with that?