Articles by Adam Thierer 
Senior Fellow in Technology & Innovation at the R Street Institute in Washington, DC. Formerly a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, President of the Progress & Freedom Foundation, Director of Telecommunications Studies at the Cato Institute, and a Fellow in Economic Policy at the Heritage Foundation.
A few weeks ago, I was discussing “Campaign Finance Laws in the You Tube Age” and was wondering aloud whether current campaign finance regulations were sustainable in an age of user-generated content and viral videos. The Washington Post ponders that same question today in highlighting the impact of clever mock campaign ad mash-ups like this one about “Big Sister” Hillary Clinton, which already has roughly 1.5 million hits:
http://www.youtube.com/v/6h3G-lMZxjo
The
Post story notes that “this ad’s reach really blows up any notion that candidates and mainstream media outlets can control the campaign dialogue. Especially online.” That’s exactly right, but they don’t go on to ask the next logical question about how Congress and the FEC are going to deal with the growing flood of online campaign ads and commentary during coming election cycles. Remember, stuff like this can be regulated when aired on traditional television and radio outlets in the days leading up to an election. I just don’t see how current campaign finance regs and the Internet can co-exist in the long run. There’s just no way regulators are going to be able to keep pace with all the activity out there.
Yesterday I noted that I have a new study out entitled “Social Networking and Age Verification: Many Hard Questions; No Easy Solutions.” In yesterday’s post, I highlighted the general conclusions of my paper. Today I want to discuss how much of the push for age verification of social networking sites is being driven by unfounded fears and irrational myths about the nature of social networking and the severity of online child abuse.
Indeed, although I set out to write my entire paper about age verification, I ended up spending the first third of the paper just debunking myths about social networking websites and online predation. That’s because I found that this debate is being driven almost entirely by myths and irrational fears.
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In anticipation of the Capitol Hill event I am hosting this Friday (“Age Verification for Social Networking Sites: Is It Possible? And Desirable?”), PFF has just released my new 35-page report on this issue: “Social Networking and Age Verification: Many Hard Questions; No Easy Solutions.”
In my paper, I note that many state attorneys general (AGs) are threatening legal action against social networking sites unless those sites verify the age of all their users. Already, age verification proposals have been introduced in Connecticut, Georgia and North Carolina. More proposals are likely on the way. AGs and other policy makers argue that age verification is necessary to protect kids from cyber-predators and other online dangers.
This week I will be discussing various aspects of my report in a series of blog entries. Today I will just highlight the major conclusions of my study. Tomorrow I will discuss some of the major myths surrounding social networking and online child abuse. And later this week I will outline some of my reservations about leading age verification schemes.
The general conclusions of my paper are as follows:
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The Boston Globe reports that some broadband customers are confused by their provider’s acceptable use policies, which sometimes place ambiguous limits on customers who are aggressive Net users. The problem that some cable operators are trying to deal with is that a very small handful of users who are heavy downloaders can sometimes impose significant delays on other network users because of the way cable high-speed networks work. According to the story, Comcast estimates that only .01 percent of its 11.5 million users fall into this category, but I’ve heard other estimates. Mike Lajoie, chief technology officer of Time Warner (TW), told the Wall Street Journal a year ago that fewer than 10 percent of TW subscribers consume more than 75 percent of the network bandwidth. And I’ve actually heard even more extreme numbers reported by other broadband providers (BSPs), with the ratio being more along the line of 5-10 percent of users eating up closer to 90 percent of bandwidth. To mitigate the problem, some network operators are apparently sending letters to those heavy users requesting that they scale back their downloading activities or else face the possibility of being kicked off the network for violating the firm’s acceptable use policies.
Regardless of what the exact number is, it is clear that a small handful customers really do impose more of a burden on the system and potentially degrade the broadband experience for other users. The question then becomes: How should BSP deal with these bandwidth hogs? As I wondered aloud in this old essay on network pricing issues, I think a metered pricing scheme might help solve this problem by fairly allocating costs to customers who use the most bandwidth. And yet, at least so far as I can tell, no BSP seems interested in taking that path. Why is that?
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TLF readers, I need your help. As most of you know, many federal and state lawmakers are suggesting that “social networking websites” need to be regulated in the name of keeping minors safe online. So far, regulatory proposals have come in two varieties: (1) an outright ban on such sites in publicly funded schools and libraries, or (2) mandatory age verification of users before they are allowed on the sites.
Setting aside the many potential pitfalls associated with either form of regulation, proponents of these mandates seem to be ignoring a very challenging threshold question:
What exactly constitutes a “social networking website”? In my past and upcoming papers on this issue, I argue that lawmakers are opening up a huge Pandora’s Box of problems here in terms of unintended regulatory consequences. That’s because “social networking” defies easy definition since, in many ways, the Internet and most of the websites that make up the World Wide Web have been fundamentally tied up with the notion of social networking from their inception.
So, here’s how I need your help. Below the fold you will find the amorphous legislative definitions of “social networking websites” that lawmakers have proposed so far. Using those definitions as a guide, I am hoping that you can list for me a couple of your favorite websites that might be subject to federal or state regulation should lawmakers pass bans on social networking sites or demand age verification of them. This will help me construct a diverse list of websites that will be negatively impacted by regulation which we can then present to policy makers and the press in coming months as these debates unfold.
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Despite our differences on many issues, David Isenberg was kind enought to invite me to address the “Freedom to Connect” conference this week. Luckily, David didn’t ask me to comment on Net neutrality, municipal networks, or anything like that or else it is likely I would have been drawn and quartered on the stage!
Instead, David asked me to give the audience an overview of some the things happening on the First Amendment front in Washington right now and focus on the prospects for data retention and age verification mandates in particular. I was about to write up my remarks from the event, but Susan Crawford of Cardozo Law School and Andrew Noyes of National Journal were there and did a much better job summarizing what I had to say, so check out their blog posts if you are interested.
Last week I was a guest on a Seattle radio station (KVI 570) program hosted by conservative talk show host Kirby Wilbur. He invited me on to talk about various First Amendment issues including efforts to regulate video games. Like many radio hosts I’ve dealt with in the past, he was very sympathetic to my free speech leanings. But Kirby Wilbur has another good reason to love the First Amendment: It’s the only thing he has to rely on in his fight against our nation’s absolutely absurd campaign finance laws.
Here’s Kirby’s story. Back in 2005, Mr. Wilbur and his KVI colleague John Carlson had the audacity to speak their minds about a ballot initiative pending in their home state of Washington. The ballot initiative was an effort to repeal the state’s recent gas tax increase. Proponents of the tax (mostly municipal government officials) were none too happy to hear people speaking their minds about the issue on a talk radio show. So, they decided to file a lawsuit demanding that the grassroots “No New Gas Tax” organization that had mobilized to fight the tax actually disclose the value of the hosts’ radio advocacy as an “in-kind campaign contribution”! And, amazingly, they got a judge to agree with them!!
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I’m putting the wraps on a big paper on the dangers of mandating age verification for social networking websites. One of the questions I ask in the study is exactly how broadly “social networking sites” will be defined for purposes of regulation? Will chat rooms, hobbyist sites, listservs, instant messaging, video sharing sites, online marketplaces or online multiplayer gaming sites qualify? If so, how will they be policed and how burdensome will age-verification mandates become for smaller sites? Finally, does the government currently have the resources to engage in such policing activities since almost all websites now have a social networking component? I explore these and other questions in my paper.
But now I have another type of site to add to list, and not one that I originally gave much consideration to: online newspapers. Over the weekend, the
USA Today relaunched its website, not only to freshen up its look, but also to fundamentally change the ways the site works. According to the editors, the new features of the site will give readers the ability to:
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Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune has long been one of my favorite newspaper columnists. He’s penned another excellent piece for today’s Trib pointing out how illogical it is that the government continues to regulate broadcast speech as if nothing has changed over the past 30 years.
He points out that the FCC’s recent fines for “indecent” content on broadcasting are increasingly silly in a world where kids can get the same programming online simultaneously. He also points out the absurdity of this week’s record $24 million fine against Univision for violating the hopelessly out-of-date Children’s Television Act. He argues:
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Well, it’s been more than 48 hours since my last post blasting the Wu-Skype “wireless Net neutrality” proposal, so I’ve been itching to write another essay about my favorite subject du jour! Luckily, when I arrived home today, I found my monthly copy of PC World magazine in the mail–yes, I am a geek–and randomly opened to an article by Cyrus Farivar entitled “Six Things You Never Knew Your Cell Phone Could Do” He begins the essay by noting that:
Right before your eyes, your cell phone has morphed into a portable computer. Whether you’re searching Google via text messages, using Short Message Service (SMS) to make international calls, or e-mailing a voice message, these tips will help jump-start your cell phone’s inner PC–and make your life easier to boot.
… and then Farivar goes on to highlight many “useful tips and tricks that you can teach even an old cell phone to do.” As I read through the article, all I kept thinking to myself is: “But according to Tim Wu and Skype, this stuff isn’t supposed to be possible!”
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.