This morning at the Newseum in Washington, DC, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered remarks on Internet freedom and the future of global free speech and expression. [Transcript is here + video.] It will go down as a historic speech in the field of Internet policy since she drew a bold line in the cyber-sand regarding exactly where the United States stands on global online freedom. Clinton’s answer was unequivocal: “Both the American people and nations that censor the Internet should understand that our government is committed to helping promote Internet freedom.” “The Internet can serve as a great equalizer,” she argued. “By providing people with access to knowledge and potential markets, networks can create opportunities where none exist.”

Unfortunately, however, “the same networks that help organize movements for freedom… can also be hijacked by governments to crush dissent and deny human rights.”  Echoing Winston Churchill’s famous “iron curtain” speech, Sec. Clinton argued that “With the spread of these restrictive practices, a new information curtain is descending across much of the world.”  She noted that virtual walls are replacing traditional walls in many nations as repressive regimes seek to squash the liberties of their citizenry.  That’s why the Administration’s bold stand in favor of online freedom is so essential.

Importantly, Sec. Clinton made it clear that the Obama Administration is ready to commit significant resources to this effort. She said that, over the next year, the State Department plans to work with others to establish a standing effort to promote technology and will invite technologists to help advance the cause through a new “innovation competition” that will promote circumvention technologies and other technologies of freedom. Sec. Clinton also challenged private companies to stand up to censorship globally and challenge foreign governments when they demand controls on the free flow of information or digital technology.

That is particularly important because Secretary Clinton’s speech comes on the heels of the recent news that Google and at least 30 other Internet companies were the victims of cyberattacks in China, which raises profound questions about the future of online freedom and cybersecurity. Sec. Clinton’s remarks will make it clear to online operators that the U.S. government stands prepared to back them up when they challenge the censorial policies of repressive foreign regimes.

It’s also worth noting that, back in October, Secretary Clinton took a bold stand on global religious defamation policies, which are becoming a growing international concern from a free speech perspective. I praised her for that speech here and noted how important it was that Administration officials put issues such as freedom of religious worship and freedom of speech and expression front and center in future foreign diplomacy efforts. With today’s speech, Sec. Clinton and the Obama Administration have again risen to that challenge by making it clear that these issues will now be part of future diplomatic efforts and discussions.

At one point she joked that somewhere in the world a foreign government official was trying to censor her speech as she delivered it! But she’s right: Plenty of foreign government are still aggressively attempting to censor the Net and to repress digital technologies every second of the day. To put things in perspective, just yesterday, the OpenNet Initiative (ONI) reported that more than half a billion Internet users are being filtered worldwide. And if you want a country-by-country synopsis of just how bad things are, check out the amazing report, Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering, which is compiled by several scholars involved in the ONI project.

To understand the profound (and somewhat ironical) historical significance of Sec. Clinton’s speech today, you need to remember that less than 15 years ago in this country we had a heated debate over whether American citizens should even be allowed to use encryption technology, or if the government should “hold the keys” to such technologies. Luckily, the “Clipper Chip” wars ended when Hillary’s husband and his Administration basically gave up in its efforts to pursue it further. Moreover, I can’t help but recall what Mrs. Clinton said after the White House sex scandal erupted back in 1998 and the details spread rapidly across the Internet: “We are all going to have to rethink how we deal with [the Internet], because there are all these competing values,” she said. “Without any kind of editing function or gatekeeping function, what does it mean to have the right to defend your reputation?”  It seems like Mrs. Clinton has come a long way, so much so that she is now defending technologies — and is apparently willing to even subsidize technologies — that will allow citizens to evade “gatekeepers” of all sorts.

I also appreciated Sec. Clinton’s quip that “once you’re on the internet, you don’t need to be a tycoon or a rock star to have a huge impact on society.”  She repeatedly argued in her speech that the Internet has empowered every man, woman, and child to be heard and to make a difference in this world.  Amen.  But those opportunities for each of us to make a difference can only be realized if governments worldwide are willing to let them happen. I’ve always generally agreed with John Gilmore’s famous quip that “the Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.”  Nonetheless, I’m not a quixotic utopian when it comes to these things. I’m enough of a realist to understand that if governments put enough effort into the task, they can quash networks and silence a great deal of expression.  However, it’s a far more difficult undertaking today than it was in the past. The sheer volume and scope of online activity alone makes it an enormous undertaking.

Could we be on the verge of “the end of censorship” as I have wondered here before? Probably not any time soon, but thanks to the bold vision and steps that Secretary Clinton and Obama Administration announced today, we are a little bit closer.

Additional Reading / Listening:

• an NPR report about the issue this morning featuring Alec Ross, Sec. Clinton’s Senior Advisor for Innovation at the U.S. Department of State
• 21st Century Statecraft – Diplomacy in the Age of Facebook and Twitter – also w/ Alec Ross
• Freedom on the Net: A Global Assessment of Internet and Digital Media (Freedom House Publication)
• 2009 Report on International Religious Freedom
• Global Network Initiative Statement on U.S. Secretary of State Clinton’s Address on Internet Freedom
• Larry Magid (CNet.com) podcast on the speech
• thoughts from Craig Mundie, Chief Research and Strategy Officer at Microsoft
• more about the speech from New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Reuters, Ars Technica, Huffington Post,

A few months ago, I penned a mega book review about the growing divide between “Internet optimists and pessimists.” I noted that the Internet optimists — people like Chris Anderson, Clay Shirky, Yochai Benkler, Kevin Kelly, and others — believe that the Internet is generally improving our culture, economy, and society for the better. They believe the Net has empowered and liberated the masses, sparked unparalleled human creativity and communication, provided greater personalization and customization of media content, and created greater diversity of thought and a more deliberative democracy. By contrast, the Internet pessimists — including Nick Carr, Andrew Keen, Lee Siegel, and others — argue that the Internet is destroying popular culture and professional media, calling “truth” and “authority” into question by over-glamorizing amateurism and user-generated content, and that increased personalization is damaging deliberative democracy by leading to homogenization, close-mindedness, and an online echo-chamber. Needless to say, it’s a very heated debate!

I am currently working on a greatly expanded version of my “Net optimists vs. pessimists” essay for a magazine in which I will draw out more of these distinctions and weigh the arguments made by those in both camps. I plan on concluding that article by arguing that the optimists generally have the better of the argument, but that the pessimists make some fair points about the downsides of the Net’s radically disintermediating role on culture and economy.

So, this got me thinking that I needed to come up with some sort of a label for my middle-of-the-road position as well as a statement of my personal beliefs. As far as labels go, I guess I would call myself a “pragmatic optimist” since I generally side with the optimists in most of these debates, but not without some occasional reservations. Specifically, I don’t always subscribe to the Pollyanna-ish, rose-colored view of the world that some optimists seem to adopt. But the outright Chicken Little-like Ludditism of some Internet pessimists is even more over-the-top at times. Anyway, what follows is my “Pragmatic (Internet) Optimist’s Creed” which better explains my views. (Again, read my old essay first for some context about the relevant battle lines in this intellectual war).

The Pragmatic (Internet) Optimist’s Creed

I believe that the Internet is reshaping our culture, economy, and society – in most ways for the better, but not without some heartburn along the way.

I believe that the world of information abundance that has dawned is vastly superior to the world of information poverty that we just left. But I also understand that not all information is equal and that that the rise of abundance raises concerns about information overload, objectionable content, and the role of “authority” and “truth.”

I believe the era of traditional Mass Media is coming to an end, but “professional” media institutions and creators continue to play a vital role in the creation, aggregation, and dissemination of news, information, culture, and entertainment. The Internet, however, will force gut-wrenching changes on traditional media institutions and some of the more vital ones (ex: daily local newspapers) will struggle to re-invent themselves, or may wither away entirely.

I believe that “professional” journalism faces very serious challenges from the rise of the Internet and user-generated content, but I also believe that hybrid forms of news-gathering and reporting are offering society exciting new ways to learn about the world around them.

I believe Wikipedia is an amazing example of collection action / intelligence at work, but I also understand it is not without flaws and limitations. I believe Wikipedia is a wonderful complement, but not a complete substitute, for other media and information sources and inputs.

I believe that free and open source software (FOSS) has offered society enormous benefits, but I do not believe that FOSS (or “wiki” models) will replace all proprietary business models or methods. Each model or mode of production has its place and purpose and they will continue to co-exist going forward, albeit in serious tension at times.

I believe the Long Tail is a powerful phenomenon, but not “the future of all business.” It is now a more important part of the future of business, but not the entirety of it.

I believe there is a difference between “remix culture” and “ripoff culture.” Remixing (including mash-ups of all sorts) generally enhances and extends culture and creativity. Blatant content piracy, on the other hand, can discourage the creative efforts of the masses. Likewise, hacking, circumvention, and reverse-engineering all play an important and legitimate role in our new digital economy, but one need not accept the legitimacy of those activities when conducted for nefarious purposes (think identity theft or chip modding to facilitate video game piracy.)

I believe that the Internet has empowered the masses and created a world of “pro-sumers” that gives every man, woman, and child a soapbox on which to speak to the world. But that does not mean that all of them will have something interesting to say, and I won’t praise user-generated content as a good in and of itself. It’s quality, not volume, that counts.

I believe that the Internet’s empowering nature has changed much about society and culture, but I do not believe in the romanticism espoused by some about how the Net “remaking man” or changing human nature in a fundamental way. The Internet does not liberate us from all earthly constraints and it cannot magically solve all of humanity’s problems.

I believe that the Internet is reinvigorating deliberative democracy and giving us increased exposure to a breathtaking diversity of views that were previously inaccessible, at least for most of us. On the other hand, I understand that some Netizens will often seek out only those views that reinforce their pre-existing biases.

I believe in the power of freedom of speech and expression, and appreciate that the Internet and the rise of user-generated content has given us a world of unprecedented information and cultural riches. I also understand, however, that unrestricted freedom of speech and expression permits an increase in the prevalence of objectionable, even harmful, speech and content. On net, however, (excuse the pun) the Internet is the most important medium of human communication and expression that the world has ever known.

In sum, I believe there are more reasons to be optimistic than pessimistic about the Internet and its role in shaping our lives, culture, economy, and society. But that doesn’t mean it will be all roses going forward.