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Could the Web Not be Invented Today?

Posted by Zonk on from the no dept.

An anonymous reader writes " Corante's Copyfight has a piece up about this new column in the Financial Times by James Boyle celebrating (a few days on the early side) the 15th anniversary of Berners-Lee's first draft of a web page . The hook is this question: What would happen if the Web were invented today? From the article: 'What would a web designed by the World Intellectual Property Organisation or the Disney Corporation have looked like? It would have looked more like pay-television, or Minitel, the French computer network. Beforehand, the logic of control always makes sense. Allow anyone to connect to the network? Anyone to decide what content to put up? That is a recipe for piracy and pornography. And of course it is. But it is also much, much more...The lawyers have learnt their lesson now...When the next disruptive communications technology - the next worldwide web - is thought up, the lawyers and the logic of control will be much more evident. That is not a happy thought.'"

3 of 267 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Disruptive technologies can't be controlled. by JWSmythe · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I had BBS's, and FidoNet (along with a few more obscure ones).

        We had fairly established, while unregulated networks. I won't say communication was fast, but it was there. I don't really need to review the wonderful capabilities of BBS's. Probably 25% of the folks who read here were users when BBS's were big.

        Could the internet be reinvented? Sure. But, like any large platform, it started small. The next Intranet is being built by a half dozen teenage kids in their darkend bedrooms around the world. It isn't anything now, but will be the biggest thing the world has seen.

    --
    Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
  2. Re:First thing we must do... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Nay, that I mean to do. Is not this a lamentable thing, that of the skin of an innocent lamb should be made parchment? That parchment, being scribbl'd o'er, should undo a man? Some say the bee stings; but I say 'tis the bee's wax; for I did but seal once to a thing, and I was never mine own man since.

  3. Re:First thing we must do... by anthropomorphized · · Score: 3, Interesting
    As a lawyer, I find it disturbing (and amusing) how much is blamed on lawyers. Lawyers are hired guns. A lawyer does not and can not patent anything or sue anyone by him/herself. It is usually businesses and the people who run them that make those decisions. It is business people that decide what to lobby. Yes, lawyers counsel those clients and help them with strategy and often shape arguments.

    Admittedly, lawyers always have the option to decline representation for something they find morally reprehensible, however, believe it or not, lawyers are also supposed to follow a code of ethics which often places a certain obligation to represent people.

    Disclaimer: Of course it's not really this cut and dry, but we do ourselves a disservice by placing all the blame on laywers. In this case, killing the lawyers would just mean the underlying technology of the web would be patented by the inventors themselves (as required by their employment contract) or by patent agents (engineers/scientists that are admitted to the patent bar and are NOT lawyers).