Internexus Americana
By Dale Dougherty
The global Internet is something of an American fantasy. Not that there isn't truth to it, but the idea is colored largely by our desire for how things ought to be. The American dream can center around great ideals of liberty like those expressed in the Bill of Rights, or it can be a nightmare that turns America into a global village mall where citizens are defined by their behavior as consumers.
I'm writing this from a family vacation in Europe, which may remind you of an American movie starring Chevy Chase. This is perhaps my point. We Americans can hardly think of the world without imposing the American experience upon it. While the Internet can be a tool for cultural exchange, most communication appears to flow one way. Americans have a certain arrogance in regarding the Internet as a U.S. product that's exported to the rest of the world, just like our movies and TV programs. While we don't actually believe that the Internet belongs to us, we have the pride of leadership—it's ours to lead.
A month ago at WWW9 in Amsterdam, I listened to an impressive keynote address by Lawrence Lessig, a Harvard Law School professor who is author of Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace. Since then I've read and enjoyed his book. His talk emphasized a theme central to the book: how to preserve and protect the values represented by the Internet.
Lessig believes that we may be taking those values for granted, and that we're growing complacent about defending them. He began his talk by challenging the belief that we really know why the Internet happened.
