Recasting the Web: Information Commons to Cash Cow

If the Bush administration lets large media conglomerates and local telephone companies have their way, the Internet as we know it -- that free-flowing, democratic, uncensored information superhighway -- could soon be a thing of the past.

The Internet itself is not going away. Rather, technological advancements, changes to the rules governing its use and the continued consolidation of media empires are combining to turn it into a conduit of commerce, booby-trapped with barriers and incentives designed to keep users where dollars can be wrung from them. As a result, a lot of freely accessible information and websites may become difficult or impossible to connect to -- hindering the efforts of those posting that information to reach others.

At a time when a handful of large media corporations produce most of the news people get, the television and movies they watch, the books they read and the music they listen to, the Internet offers a refreshing oasis of uncontrolled information and innovation. This network of networks, as Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig describes it, is an information commons, a place where anybody with a computer, modem and connection to a telephone line can log on and receive information from any of the more than roughly 3 billion (and growing) web pages posted worldwide. Internet users can also create their own websites, giving them the potential to communicate to millions of individuals around the world. (According to the Internet research firm Jupiter Media Metrix, an average of 80 million people use the Net on any given day.)

The Net's open platform has spawned a wide range of innovation. People have started email lists and online chat rooms on just about any topic imaginable. Individuals have created new ways to distribute books, music and other products online. Independent online journals and news services offer hard-hitting alternatives to corporate media. Many independent radio stations now webcast, extending their range to anybody around the world who logs onto the station's website.

This unprecedented ability of ordinary citizens and nonprofit groups to communicate with so many others has given them voice and power they otherwise would not have. Take, for example, the Organic Consumers Association, a citizen activist group that focuses on food safety and environmental issues. OCA executive director Ronnie Cummins says 85,000 people receive the association's action alerts and newsletter, BioDemocracy News, via e-mail; about 4,000 people a day visit its website and download an average of 10 pages of material.

"A lot of our activist clout is being able to communicate cheaply to people," Cummins says. "If we had to revert back to telephones, faxes, the mail and leafleting, it would reduce our campaign power considerably." OCA is not unique in its use of the Internet. A wide variety of nonprofit groups make savvy use of cyberspace to get their message out and spur ordinary citizens to take action.

Open and Neutral

When the Internet was first developed, its designers had no idea how it would evolve, Lessig wrote in his book "The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World." Nor did this community of communications researchers, computer engineers and programmers -- many of whose efforts were voluntary -- want to control it. They were fiercely committed to keeping the Net open and neutral, specifically so that innovation could flourish.

Initially, the Internet used phone lines, which government regulation subjects to "common carrier" rules. This means the telephone network operator must open its lines to all comers, and cannot interfere with the message or who sends or receives it. Most Internet users still access the Net through conventional phone lines. But as cyberspace becomes more populated with users, and as new multimedia applications require more bandwidth, these lines are increasingly too slow and inadequate to handle the traffic.