How Should Humanity Run the Internet?
- Thread starter HellsingerAngel
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I think if humanity could find a way to clean up the snuff films and child porn it would a pretty could place. You after a quick cleaning, just leave it as is, is how the internet evolves it self.
Though my opinion is pretty worthless I don't even understand how any of it works.
Though my opinion is pretty worthless I don't even understand how any of it works.
But given the vast quantity of material that can be put on the web in a very short time, tracking it all seems unlikely. Also, given the fact that people can use proxies (and, in some instances, bot-nets), catching the perpetrators of even a relatively low amount of internet crimes would require a near-infeasible amount of effort. Unless every individual were to be forced to utilise one account for accessing the internet (which still wouldn't prevent claims of hacks, or issues with bot-nets), tracing anything back to its source would be tricky. That would also be an unworkable system, as it would require every human being on the planet to be registered online to prevent fake account creation. Such a structure would be impossible to implement without various world governments essentially providing internet access, which is unaffordable.HellsingerAngel said:
Also, the social impossibility still stands. The fact that it would be difficult to find enough people willing to do the job (or indeed enough people not guilty of some kind of piracy) notwithstanding, the number required to effectively police the internet would result in a lot of workers being lost from other professions, just to watch virtual space. Additionally, given that pretty much every country in the world has outrageously over-stretched legal systems, where is the money for this venture going to come from? And where would those convicted serve out their sentences?
That's not what I meant to imply. As I stated, given the anonymity of the internet, minors who want to access adult content are very hard to stop. It is in no way OK for websites to profit from those not legally allowed to access their material, but without draconian privacy-infringing measures such as the one I suggested above, determining who is accessing such material is nigh-impossible.HellsingerAngel said:
A genuine rational argument? This could be fun!
Let me clarify what I meant. (I was trying to be all poetic and shit, so I didn't explain myself very well)HellsingerAngel said:
I don't think that we, as a race, should govern the internet as a whole. However, I do think that institutions should be installed by individual governments to regulate any concerns of Child porn, violence, or illegal activities.
So besides regulating all the illegal shit, I don't think there should be much restraint on what the internet can be used for simply for the reason of it being one of the last untamed places in the western world and having such an untamed place, in my eyes, can create new boundaries to the human experience.
EDIT: In a nutshell, I don't think we should really run the internet as much as we should sweep away all of the illegal crap to make way for more productive/awesome things.
I don't mean to, but when you get a crowd full of people that go "No, it stays the same", most likely without thinking baout it or even putting some form of "why" or even entertaining the thought of putting why it wouldn't work any other way, it seems good to try and get people with the ability to discuss to get discussing.Kortney said:
That is true. However, saying "I think it's good how it is" without explaining why is half-hearted, in my opinion. Even then, why not extrapolate and try to spur some discussion, y'know?Kortney said:Maybe that's why I post in the thread. Your original question however wasn't "where is the internet going" it was "how should we run the internet" and I answered that. So, don't act like I'm only now complying with the thread.
Very thoughtout. I like. The problem is when you get places like Canada who's governing enforcement is not local or provincial, but rather federal to begin with. The majority of Canada has the RCMP rather than a local policing force, and then CSIS for intelligence (akin to the FBI). While this leaves us very readily prepared for following criminals across provinces, there's no real capability to devote a part of our crimes division to lurking the internet. We comparitavely very small to the U.S. and we have problems with outside influences when it comes to illegal things.Kortney said:
That I completely understand and is certainly a point where the "who should come up with these rules" comes in. However, could you not say there are, fundamentally, certain laws that are universal or near universal? I hate to beat a dead horse, but things like child pornography, sexual harassment, slander, gambling and pornography 18+, and the like. I understand not everyone agrees, but not everyone agrees with a lot of things. Here's some food for thought:Kortney said:
Country X makes child pornography legal. Because sites are regulated by the governing bodies in which their servers are based in, child pornography sites are legal to view on the internet. Where does this leave places like the United States in dealing with people are are citizens and viewing these sites? They aren't in violation of anything until they download something onto their hard drives, but at the same time everything is happening on American soil. Just something to think about when federal juristiction is concerned.
Agreed with the rest of your post.
My best guess as to how it will end up is countries working hand in hand with each other and enforcing their own laws for their own citizens. If the FBI find a child pornography webiste operating out of South America, and isn't involving any US citizens then I guess it's down to that South American country to do something. An international system of moderating the internet will never fly.
Lots of people in Western society agrees with this. Many countries exist where what a Western person would call child pornography is completely accepted.HellsingerAngel said:
And that's the problem of the internet. You can be accessing a website that is illegal to engage in in your country, however the website is based out of a country where it is legal. The only way to combat this is to just make it a country based decision. The Australian Government for example, makes it illegal to engage in activity no matter where you are. If it's illegal in Australia, then you can't do it anywhere. For example, if you are an Australian and you go to Thailand and have sex with a 15 year old girl - something that is completely legal in Thailand, then you better not go back to Australia because you have just committed a crime and will be tried for it, and in some cases not granted permission to enter the country again. It's a sort of strange concept, but I think it is a great idea and thinking like that is the only way this whole issue will be resolved.HellsingerAngel said:
My best guess as to how it will end up is countries working hand in hand with each other and enforcing their own laws for their own citizens. If the FBI find a child pornography webiste operating out of South America, and isn't involving any US citizens then I guess it's down to that South American country to do something. An international system of moderating the internet will never fly.
Like I said, hypothetical thought experiement. You can put whatever you want and justify it within. So let's go!J03bot said:
People who buy an internet plan are subject to an "Internet Police Tax" of X amount, according to the trade index of their current country's monetary unit of measurement. Upon gaining access to the internet, you are given a user identification number for every person who can potentially use the internet within your household. Heck, you could probably even cut it down to a singular household. Now, whenever you do something online, our friendly neighbourhood Internet Police are roaming about the internet. This number is posted online in an imprint into a cache when you visit somewhere. If an officer suspects you of doing something bad, the Internet Police can boot up a program that tracks where your ID has been on the internet, because they would have that issued to them by every ISP.
Now, because this is international, there would need to be some sort of agreement between the governing bodies of the world for this to be set up. The advantage that gives is that these people are not limited by the red tape currently holding down cross country investigations, but this also gives the program a vast amount of people to be apart of it. With today's technology, we're seeing jobs that never existed, but we're also seeing past ones vanish very quickly. Because we can get one person to do two to three times as much due to technological advancement, there are plenty of people looking for jobs that could really do something good with a job like this. Heck, you could even get a handful of people from each federal bureau and have them do it with a few people who didn't get the promotion to "shiney FBI agent" that chance.
Now, with that all set up, let's say Joe from Dallas, Texas decides to torrent thirty games. Someone from this Internet Police Department from China finds out. He can quickly and efficiently check up on this guy's records from the U.S. database, credit card records, bank statements, etc etc, and investigate the matter, in a similar fashion to your own government right now. He could also get an American to assist, as they'll need to be briefed about this before going and making the arrest. They can physically check if this guy owns all thirty games and have the American agent walk on down to get Joe to produce them. If he doesn't, well then, off to jail for 6 months, or whatever. As for where to detain them? Well, the U.S., of course, as they would have agreed to having this Internet Police Force as well as every other country to help keep the law abiding citizens free to do positive things like informed discussion, create blogs about their life, or post internet comics. Basically, the criminal is busted in short order because of several detering factors being eliminated by having a dedicated, international task force.
Very fundamentally changing? Yes. Very possible so long as you can change those fundamental beliefs? Also a yes.
The internet should not be regulated in any way, shape, or form, and access to it where possible should be elevated to a basic human right. It should be every government's duty to make internet access available for all of its citizens. Finally, the ability for private or public entities to monitor the internet should be severely restricted in all cases but those related to the most heinous of crimes.HellsingerAngel said:
No entity, public or private, has any business regulating the internet. If you want complete anonymity on the internet, you can have that. But you can also have strictly members-only sites, and sites connected directly to your person. The only thing about the internet that needs fixing is the removal of the censorships which certain nations impose upon it. Otherwise, it is not broken, and therefore should not be fixed. There are no possible benefits worth the cost of ceding the last zone of near-complete free speech to inept governments and their satellites.
Edit: To answer the thread title directly: It shouldn't!
An interesting idea, and one that would, in principle, work.HellsingerAngel said:
There are, however, a number of issues that hold back such measures:
For starters, this would result in the internet being better policed than real life, indicating that someone's priorities are severely twisted.
Secondly, (and I know I've already said this) whilst the number of people to do the job exist, the number of people willing, or morally capable (i.e. not pirates themselves) of doing the job almost certainly do not. The likelihood of finding enough tech-literate people without a history of at least minor piracy is next to none.
Additionally, think through the idea of everyone having an account that is tracked wherever you go online. That's like being followed everywhere, all the time, with someone checking what you're doing in great detail. If it were to happen in real life, not a single rights group anywhere would stand for it. The same is true of an online log of your location.
Finally, in order to create such a system, the entire structure of the internet would have to change. Such changes could take between days and months to complete, with the result that the entire internet would be withdrawn for that period. The world has got somewhat used to online life, and withdrawing it in its entirety, even briefly, would be disastrous.
I don't think you can run the internet. It's a vast Hydra that is already more powerful than anyone that would like to keep a reign on it.
You can't censor it, you can't stop it. Just let it run and fly and create both the inspiring and the terrifying.
You can't censor it, you can't stop it. Just let it run and fly and create both the inspiring and the terrifying.
Well, honestly, I wouldn't mind the government helping out the little guy by trying to negate the internet strip mall effect, but that's more an economic matter.Mortagog said:
Really, though, I don't think the government shouldn't exert control over the internet, but rather try to promote civility and respecting the power of anonymity. (Without scare tactics, hopefully)
I mean, imagine how pleasant the internet as a whole would be if 4chan only produced the good things it does, like lolcats and catching criminals and stuff.
Really, though, I don't think we're doing too bad with the internet- as a presence sculpted purely by the hedonism of the wealthiest of humanity, its not that bad.
Of course, I've never gone to the red light district, so I'm going to ignore that like I ignore sex in actual humanity.
The cooperation required between governments would have to be very large, and we'd probably need a global government first. And then they'd get rid of subversive elements first.
I think the governments of the world are more concerned with Wikileaks than piracy or child porn right now. If you're going to regulate the internet - and good luck with that - you can't have our governments doing it.
I think the governments of the world are more concerned with Wikileaks than piracy or child porn right now. If you're going to regulate the internet - and good luck with that - you can't have our governments doing it.
The internet should be run by computers because computers are the only ones that understand the internet.