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regulate.tech Posts

5 – simple, clear, logical, as can be

Summary :- the rules and tools for logically routing traffic across the internet are largely run outside of direct government control. Public funding helped support the development of the internet protocols with the work being done by academics and industry. The relationship between the administration of the Domain Name System (DNS) and governments is interesting and has been controversial at times.

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4 – let’s get physical

Summary :- the physical infrastructure that supports networked services is highly regulated. It uses technical standards which are set by a variety of non-governmental bodies. But the deployment of equipment and offering of access services at scale usually depends on securing licenses from governments. The conditions attached to those licenses are core to what it means to regulate Physical layer. There has been particular interest in the concept of ‘net neutrality’ in the internet community.

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3 – island life

Summary :- I use an analogy comparing online spaces with islands to structure a discussion of jurisdictional questions. I describe the key considerations for both entities running internet spaces and governments when thinking about jurisdiction.

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2 – de legibus

Summary :- There are some important qualities inherent in the tech landscape that make it different from most other sectors and present policy makers with novel challenges. I describe these as scope, scale and speed. There are ways to regulate the sector if we work with the challenges rather than wishing them away. This requires national regulation to be cognisant of what is happening in other countries, for it to be realistic for large numbers of entities of very different sizes and with vast user communities, and for it to be capable of update more quickly than the cycle of traditional primary legislation.

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1 – de rerum natura

Summary :- The ‘tech’ I have in mind for this project includes telecommunications networks, the nodes that connect with each other using those networks, and the people who control those nodes from individual users through to mega corporations. I think of ‘regulation’ as all possible sets of rules that may be applied to the sector. I propose a model to help analyse the different areas for potential regulation that has six layers – Physical, Logical, Functional, Data, Content and Commerce.

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