Who Controls the Internet?: Illusions of a Borderless World | 
 enlarge | Authors: Jack Goldsmith, Tim Wu
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Category: Book
List Price: $28.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  10 reviews
Sales Rank: 355408
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 238
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 0195152662
Dewey Decimal Number: 303.4833
EAN: 9780195152661
ASIN: 0195152662
Publication Date: March 17, 2006
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Product Description
Is the Internet erasing national borders? Will the future of the Net be set by Internet engineers, rogue programmers, the United Nations, or powerful countries? Who's really in control of what's happening on the Net?
In this provocative new book, Jack Goldsmith and Tim Wu tell the fascinating story of the Internet's challenge to governmental rule in the 1990s, and the ensuing battles with governments around the world. It's a book about the fate of one idea--that the Internet might liberate us forever from government, borders, and even our physical selves. We learn of Google's struggles with the French government and Yahoo's capitulation to the Chinese regime; of how the European Union sets privacy standards on the Net for the entire world; and of eBay's struggles with fraud and how it slowly learned to trust the FBI. In a decade of events the original vision is uprooted, as governments time and time again assert their power to direct the future of the Internet. The destiny of the Internet over the next decades, argue Goldsmith and Wu, will reflect the interests of powerful nations and the conflicts within and between them.
While acknowledging the many attractions of the earliest visions of the Internet, the authors describe the new order, and speaking to both its surprising virtues and unavoidable vices. Far from destroying the Internet, the experience of the last decade has lead to a quiet rediscovery of some of the oldest functions and justifications for territorial government. While territorial governments have unavoidable problems, it has proven hard to replace what legitimacy governments have, and harder yet to replace the system of rule of law that controls the unchecked evils of anarchy. While the Net will change some of the ways that territorial states govern, it will not diminish the oldest and most fundamental roles of government and challenges of governance.
Well written and filled with fascinating examples, including colorful portraits of many key players in Internet history, this is a work that is bound to stir heated debate in the cyberspace community.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 5 more reviews...
 outdated - already! December 21, 2007
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
When keeping up to date with news and stories about the internet you'll just find a compact, but not to detailed summary of it all.
 Who Controls the Internet September 7, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Despite what most people assume and many more wish the Internet has become regulated. The Internet is controled within a countries borders resulting in many conflicting laws. That's a problem for Internet companies who have assets across many borders. Can they get away with just following their countries laws? Time and time again the authors evince the answer being no. Companies like yahoo, google, mircrosoft, ebay, the Dow Jones, obsequiously follow foreign laws but not necessarily sacrifice their own.
Some of these companies have no qualms either assisting the Chinese filter pro-democracy websites, in short because they feel they have to. As I right this Yahoo is being sued by the World Organization for Human Rights for giving the Chinese government I.P. addresses of Chinese citizens who will then jailed and tortured for subversion. Yahoo asserts they were simply following the law.
And that is the problem facing these companies especially with China. They really have no other choice to or get out.
The book was well writen, fair and balanced.
Understand the complexity of the Internet January 15, 2007
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Jack and Tim made one thing dramatically clear: The Internet is no lawless enclave in our world. Their journey from the very beginning to the modern Internet is full of clear examples and anecdotes describing the "rude awakening" of idealists and patient people who participated in the development of the globe-consuming web.
When I read that the authors come from the dry plains of law science I was sceptical if the book would be worth to read. I imagined that their approach would be as dry as the 1000 ft law books in the libraries.
But, when I opened it and started reading I first put it down after page 186, the very last page of the remarkable work. Their writing is so gripping, so light to read, that even a none-English person like me could easily understand and enjoy it.
After working with the Internet since the beginnings of the 80's I thought I knew a lot about it and how it is screwed together, but I got surprised. Their view from a complete different angle, threw light on hidden aspects I honestly never thought about. In a modern world full of economical interests and its enforcement all makes absolute sense and even dramatic events like the Napster case fall into their logical place in this big puzzle.
Every part of the book is filled with cross-references and hints to further readings. All cases and examples are deep researched and very neutral presented.
Buy it, read it and give it to a dear one.
Will the internet change China or will China change the internet? December 2, 2006
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
The title about China and other pointed questions in this excellent book are addressed with a perception rarely achieved. The thought processes that go into policy decisions effecting governments and individuals, a collectivism vs. individualism. The reader is easily made to understand complex technologies and issues, not only at their core but as they expand outward into the real world. From the internets architecture, bandwith, internet borders, copyright laws, crime and criminal law, domain names, eBay, economy and commerce on the internet,filesharing, globalization, and much more. Or questions such as, "How can it be harder to notice that information has become more difficult to find? It is hard, in other words, to know what you don't know." CENSORSHIP. Pick up this book. When you finally put it down, you be the one of the ones hitting their fast/curve balls out of the park.
A great recounting of the history of the Internet and the future of its legal ramifications. November 3, 2006
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This book was required reading for a law school course on the Internet's legal issues. Aside from being one of the least expensive books I've ever been required to read, it is a great book that accurately addresses many of the relevant legal theories. One should note that while the authors do not claim to present a de facto statement of what the law is, there are significant factions of legal scholars who disagree with many of this book's conclusions, of whom my professor is one.
All in all, this is an excellent book for anyone wishing to better understand the way the Internet affects (or does not affect) legal rights without wading through 15 years of case law. Furthermore, the authors have written this book in a manner that makes easy to read and enjoy for the technically adept and the technically challenged (i.e. lawyers) alike.
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