SSSCA, CBDTPA, and BICCA: Acrimonious Acronyms
All three of these acronyms stand for federal legislative attempts to design digital devices and applications. The first two failed. The third has just been proposed.
So what are these things? The first, the 2001 Security Systems Standards and Certification Act, suggested that any “interactive digital device” (defined as “any machine, device, product, software, or technology, whether or not included with or as part of some other machine, device, product, software, or technology, that is designed, marketed or used for the primary purpose of, and that is capable of, storing, retrieving, processing, performing, transmitting, receiving, or copying information in digital form”) needed to respect digital content restrictions and “certified security” technologies. Because standards for indicating digital content restrictions (and implementing them) didn't exist, industry was supposed to come up with them.
Many people didn't like the SSSCA, and it didn't pass.
Then, in 2002, the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act [pdf] was proposed by Sen. Hollings. It was aimed at protecting digital content and promoting broadband penetration, and it (like the SSSCA) addressed “digital media devices”. The CBDTPA called for creation of security standards and encoding rules, and banned the sale of devices that didn't use “standard security technologies.”
Many people didn't like the CBDTPA, and it didn't pass.
Then, in 2003, the FCC adopted its “broadcast flag” rule, which was aimed at protecting digital content and promoting the digital transition, and (like the SSSCA and CBDTPA) addressed a broad range of digital devices. The broadcast flag rule called for devices to respect encoded “flags” (markers) in digital content and to ensure that the content could not be transmitted over the public internet.
Many people didn't like the flag (including the DC Circuit), and it is not now the law.
Now, in 2005, Sen. Ensign has proposed the Broadband Investment and Consumer Choice Act. Indirectly, it aims to do the same thing that SSSCA, CBDTPA, and the flag tried to do. It says that a broadband service provider is not supposed to “prevent any person from utilizing equipment and devices in connection with lawful content or applications.” Who decides what's lawful? The broadband provider does, apparently.
And BICCA gives broadband providers license to block anything that is unlawful in their view. Blocking content is fine when the provider is trying to prevent unlawful conduct. Making available only customized content and services is fine. Blocking based on whatever the provider's terms of service say is fine.
So here's how the logic runs: if the terms of service of a broadband service provider say “your access device must be authorized by us,” that's fine. The device can be required to run only authorized applications. A device that's capable of running unauthorized applications would not be “lawful” under those terms of service (or those applications would not be “lawful”), and so the language saying “you can't prevent someone from using devices in connection with lawful applications” won't apply.
Attaching an unauthorized device to the network would be unlawful conduct, and so a provider under BICCA could demand that it not be attached (just as providers now demand that users not run mail servers or host web pages).
The whole point of BICCA is that it dismantles any interconnection obligations for broadband providers. These obligations go upwards — so there's no requirement to allow all applications or content to be permitted or carried on the network. And they also go downwards — so there's no requirement to allow all user devices to be attached to the network.
Unauthorized devices (such as untrustworthy PCs) would quickly become very unattractive to users. What's the point of owning something that isn't authorized to connect to any broadband network?
The missing link here is, of course, the incentive of the broadband providers to allow only authorized devices to connect to their networks. Why would they want to frustrate their customers? Well, if the only way they can get access to really great big media content (the kind of thing they think consumers really want) is to make deals with content companies to have “mini-Hollings” terms of service, I bet they'd do it. And law enforcement would like to have a regime of locatable, authorized devices in place as well. Gradually, incrementally, the world of “authorized devices” might narrow.
Our network, our devices.
Telecom draft
Sen. Ensign (R-Nev) has introduced a new telecommunications bill [warning, 72-page pdf]. As far as I can tell, the draft bill has the effect of removing traditional common carriage elements for telephone companies (required interconnection, tariffed rates), but keeping in place other requirements that will apply to everyone (telecommunications providers and applications alike). The bill foreshadows a telecom-mindset internet, in which the default setting is “everything not permitted is prohibited” — rather than the other way around.
The bill covers all internet applications by defining “communications service” to include
any service enabling an end user to transmit, receive, store, forward, retrieve, modify, or obtain voice, data, image, or video communications using any technology….
This covers email, IM, blogging software, and anything else you can think of that's offered to the public.
On p. 23, the Commission is explicitly given authority to make rules for any communications service about several topics, including E911, “the use, sale, and distribution of consumer proprietary network information” (in other words, privacy rules), and access for the disabled (both hearing and speech). On p. 34, service providers that use telephone numbers (in any way) are required to provide number portability.
The Commission's authority under Section 230 (which says that online service providers should not be treated as publishers of information they don't create) remains, but I can't tell what happens to the preemption or immunities that that section creates. The FCC's CALEA authority remains too. But the universal service section of the prior act is skipped, signaling that a universal service framework couldn't be worked out in time for this bill.
The bill says squarely that no government authority can require any “facilities-based communications service provider” (any company that runs its own network, like a telephone company or a cable company) to allow third parties to use its lines. This means that ISPs that are not owned by telephone companies will have a hard time staying in business.
Broadband providers (defined by the bill as anything ISDN-speed or higher) can deny consumer access to anything they want, as long as the service plan they're offering provides a rationale for doing so (which won't be hard). And broadband providers can make available vertically-integrated packages of content and applications. There's a strange section on p.21 that seems to say that if (and only if) a broadband provider offers naked internet access (without vertical customization), then its customers should be able to get to content and services offered by other people.
But there's no requirement that broadband providers make this kind of unconditional access available as an option for consumers. And broadband providers are welcome to block access to anything that is “unlawful.” “Lawful” applications and devices are fine. (Who decides what's “unlawful”?)
On p. 23, there's a strange section saying broadband providers can't prevent customers from using VoIP applications “offered by a competitor.” Is Skype a competitor of a broadband provider? Probably not — they don't operate in the same marketplace. (Who decides what a competitor is?) And what about other services that aren't VoIP — can they be blocked?
Although the draft includes pages of rules about removing local franchise obligations for telephone video services, and provisions about having municipalities run auctions for VoIP services, I'm focused on the breadth and vagueness of the “regulating the internet” provisions, and the potential for deep integration of broadband access with content and services.
Others have already noted (particularly Harold Feld) that the definition of “broadband” in the bill is a joke. If you have more than 64kb/second, you've got broadband. Suddenly, US broadband penetration figures don't look so bad.
Let's hope different bills show up promptly.
NYC
Dave Winer is thinking of coming to New York:
Sorry to say it, but every other city in the US is small potatoes compared to the Big One. And it's starting to get an interesting high tech life. Over the last few months I've spoken with half a dozen high tech investors based in NYC, and I don't know what it is, but they seem more outgoing and business-oriented than the west coast venture guys, who somehow seem to act like they're the show, and you're an employee. In all my years on the west coast I never got one of them to invest in one of my ideas. Not once.
I remember running into someone in 1993 who told me that he was doing transactions for America Online and that Northern Virginia was already a high tech hotspot. I was living in Washington DC at the time, and I was surprised.
But I'm not surprised about NY. As Dave points out, the city not only has airports and museums, but also has the Second Avenue Deli.
Semantics and syntactics
According to Robert Rosen, the study of mathematics took several bad turns more than 600 years ago, when several people failed to appreciate the richness of real numbers (a world in which there are infinite, uncountable points between zero and one). Their mistake was to try to jam everything into syntax (or grammar), when in fact real numbers offer many semantic (language-like) opportunities, full of relational interest. (I am not a mathematician and I only barely understand this, but stay with me for a few more brief paragraphs.)
Rosen suggests that the history of math is filled with examples of people trying to work with bigger and more complex sets of data while using the same puny, simple, and syntactic tools they have always used in the past. His view is that we need a richer mathematics that looks at the connections between things — their semantics. But we don't have the language to do this yet. He points to something called “category theory” that may help. From what I can tell, category theory helps with clumping together kinds of relationships and allows people to work with them in the same kinds of ways we now add and subtract.
Why think about this? Well, the telephony/internet split, which has produced two entirely different mindsets looking at the same set of technologies, provides a simple example of the difference between syntactic and semantic thinking. Syntax, or grammar, says we're looking for hierarchical, traditional operations on the network to provide the outputs we're interested in and used to. This is the telephony view — the same mindset that tells wireless carriers that they don't want to allow phones to connect to their networks that allow users to download music from users' computers. Our network, our music.
The internet mindset, which is much more semantic in nature, says that we want everything to connect because we're not sure what the results will be. Something very lively and organized will unpredictably emerge from dense relational interactions, if we can only let ourselves let this happen. We need better semantic tools to describe what happens when we let these processes run.
Coming To Terms
The Pew Internet & American Life Project is reporting [pdf] that most people in America are dim on what podcasting and phishing are, and what RSS feeds do.
This is not a moment for the technical elite to be snarky. This is a moment for the technical elite to worry. If only spam and cookies and viruses have inserted themselves into the public lexicon, internet policy in America is in trouble. Who cares about protecting the net if all it brings is darkness and despair (read: spam)? Let's lock it down and make it safe. Sure, some kid told me that there are amazing something-casts out there that are fun to listen to, but this is a maturing network and someone needs to be in charge.
The game at this point is shaping consumer expectations. This was the same game played for the broadcast flag. If consumers don't expect to be able to transmit digital files freely, they won't mind having their devices crippled and their favorite songs locked to their kitchen table (metaphorically speaking).
Same thing here. If consumers are used to sending email and taking in information, but aren't used to creating their own stuff in ways that directly challenge existing media sources (podcasts) or shaping their own information filters (RSS), they won't mind when the net ceases to be as freely accessible or as interesting as it used to be. The telcos and the cable guys would like to see the internet become just another proprietary, secure network over which they deliver video and data and approved applications. Heck, law enforcement wouldn't mind this outcome either.
Internet self defense is going to take educating and involving all the people who don't know (and don't yet care) about the amazing things the net can facilitate. Rather than despairing about what the Pew study shows, play a podcast for a friend. And explain phishing.
Geist and Potter
More stories from our licensed future — Michael Geist on the right to read.
The line between thing and thought is getting ever blurrier. Time was when an author could do a lot to control the first sale of the thing — the book — but after that first thing left his/her control the rights to control the thing were considered exhausted. People didn't even think of trying to control the reading of the thing — much less the discussion of the thing. Now that things are joined by electronic versions of authorship, the idea of a “right to read” doesn't sound as outlandish as it used to. But it should.
The Harry Potter story told by Geist also shows the power and potential of trade secret law. If you've made an effort to keep your thoughts secret, and these thoughts are valuable because they've been kept secret, and then someone learns them and starts talking about them–you've got a trade secret claim to bring. Trade secrets can easily fill gaps left in a copyright regime (if there are any). Something can be a trade secret even if it's not copyrightable, it can last forever, and any reasonable efforts at secrecy are enough to protect it.
Do you have a license to sit on that chair?
EFF and Netizenship
I've been busy reading posts about brave things people have done to stand up for their digital rights, or funny memories they have about their online lives. Here's the description of the blog-a-thon.
Add your post! Add several posts! (Don't forget to tag them with the Blog-a-thon tag: EFF15.) Here and here are the aggregators.
A related thought — I've been thinking about netizenship principles, and I think I'll be thinking about them (and working on them) for the next ten years or so. What do netizens care about and believe in?
They believe in leaving control of the net at the edges. Families can filter; countries shouldn't.
They believe that optimism is a fine state of mind. Why not believe the best of people, until you're proved wrong? Cooperation produces breathtaking results.
They believe that innovation is worth supporting at almost any cost, because you never know what might show up.
They believe that people affected by rules or filters should be involved in creating those rules or filters (or should at least be taken into account when those rules or filters are created).
Netizenship is a live-and-let-live view of the world. We'll see the emergence of all kinds of different groups online, and they'll be able to take action in ways we can't imagine right now. Netizens are interested in civic order online, but order that comes from the people involved rather than from a nation-state or a pre-existing entity.
There's more to netizenship — a lot more — and I'm looking forward to reading everyone else's posts.
Feeds are Just the First Step
Jeff Jarvis has a good post today about all the feeds, conversations, aggregations, and other kinds of thingies that make up what he calls Web 2.0. He says, “This is a new architecture. It's a dynamic architecture.”
It's even more than that — it's political. These meta-informational thingies are letting us see our online environment in ways we can't possibly see the offline world. What's important isn't just that these thingies are dynamic (although that's clearly important) but also that they can be (1) visualized and (2) affected by the attention of individuals. When humans can see something and act on it, they are suddenly in charge of their own environment. “Well, of course,” you say. “That's not a big deal. People have been able to see commercial web pages for ten years now.”
It is a big deal, because with all of this meta-informational depth (meta-information piled on meta-information, producing information of great quality — a term Ben Reeve invented, and something he understands better than anyone else) we can find issues and people we want to work on/with and then actually do something about it. That's the big difference. All this high-quality meta-information allows us to see the rules and roles that make up groups online, join those institutions for brief periods of time (because we're just the right person for the job) and change the world. Offline, it's hard to see who's in charge or what's really going on. Online, if enough information is available (and, boy, are we producing a lot of information), we can start to see patterns and form into groups on the fly.
What we'll do together in this new Web 2.0 isn't predictable, because we're joining a complex system that is growing more complex all the time. (In a real sense, online organizations are alive.) But it will be more fulfilling for us. The first step, though, is to realize (as Jeff has for a long time now, and many others) that meta-information is enormously valuable.
The next step is to have the tools that allow us to act on it — easily. That means ways to create groups with a click, show rules and roles and boundaries, include deliberation modules, allow adaptation and evolution and bank accounts, etc. We need all of this now. Groups are always more powerful than individuals acting on their own, and with all of this information we're ready to move on.
What Does Netizenship Look Like?
Alexander Svensson has posted this picture of the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) models suggested in its recent paper [doc].
The paper (and thus the picture!) doesn't seem to acknowledge the possibility that online citizens — netizens — might be able to get along just fine without internet-specific involvement by governments. Of course law should apply to the internet. But that doesn't mean we need specific technical mandates or control of internet resources by governments.
What would the netizenship drawing look like?
The SCO Debacle
Back in 2003, SCO Group (holder of certain IP rights in the Unix operating system) sued IBM for more than $1 billion, claiming that IBM by having a Linux product had misappropriated SCO's Unix.
But SCO has never produced any real evidence that, in fact, its copyrights have been infringed. The litigation has been plowing on and on, and a trial is scheduled for some time in 2007.
Now the estimable Pamela Jones, author of Groklaw, has obtained an August 2002 internal SCO email that makes it clear that SCO commissioned an extensive external audit that revealed ”no evidence of any copyright infringement whatsoever.”
The SCO suit has made many people worry about the future of open source. It was, from the beginning, a business model masquerading as a lawsuit — SCO really has nothing to offer other than litigation threats. Now it's even clearer than it was before (and it was pretty clear before) that the copyright portions of the lawsuit were based on less than nothing.
As Pam Jones put it yesterday, “If this doesn't make your blood boil, see your doctor right away.”