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Contracts in Cyberspace
phutureboy writes "In his online Journal of Interesting Economics, economist David D. Friedman (son of Nobel laureate Milton Friedman) presents some interesting ideas about the enforcement of contracts in cyberspace. The gist is that he sees a gradual shift away from public enforcement of contracts (i.e. government courts) to private enforcement (e.g. third party arbitration, reputationial enforcement). The rest of his site is interesting as well - he even has an archive of his open-source economics software, which includes a neat trading simulation game called Hansa."
It seems to me that third party contract enforcement is the only way to go. With the internationality of the internet, one single governmental entity isnt going to be able to take care of matters that may arise. Besides the fact that they have more important things to concern themselves with, they would most likely be out of their jurisdiction.
On a seperate note, if this whole third party thing does progress, it may be an interesting buisness in get involved in. Either as an investor, or as a "contract enforcer" if you will. heh
Not so fast there, Skippy. There is one significant difference between private parties and government; government can use force to get what it wants and private industry cannot. What you're promoting is granting a private party the authority to use force to further its interests. Not a good thing. Why? Picture the MPAA or their hired help with the authority to kick down your door and drag you off to interrogation if they suspect you've violated a term of your licensing agreement. Any questions?
Don't just do something, stand there!