code version 2.0

Continuing Code 2.0 by Lawrence Lessig. I first read Code in 2000; Code 2.0 is an update to the 1999 edition, which also contains some extended arguments by the author.

Regarding the need for digital preservation, I found that the Tom Maddox/Vernor Vinge presentation file mentioned on page xiv isn't accessible online any longer. (The streamed recording should be accessible through the web site available from Link 1.)

I'm not much of a computer gamer, but I found Lessig's thought on people who commit large amount of their time to an MMOG intriguing: "While you and I spend up to seventy hours a week working for firms we don't own and building futures we're not sure we'll enjoy, these people are designing things and making a life, even if only a virtual one" (page 12).

I'm finding this book to be a nice blend between the 1999 and more current material. One discussion that I found interesting falls into the latter category, regarding an "identity layer," a concept discussed in this article by Professor Lessig. This would be a "minimal identification" layer that would provide the party demanding identification with only the minimum attribute(s) that it needs (page 70).

As a reader of Code at the time of its publication , I was intrigued by Lessig's reference in Code 2.0 to his 1999 book and the fact that the existing Internet doesn't match that book's vision of regulability. Lessig draws on Jonathan Zittrain's work to argue that a malware attack leading to catastrophic loss of systems or data would create the political environment needed to tip the existing Internet to the fully "regulable space" envisioned in Code (page 76).

I was reminded of the AOL community guidelines, which were also discussed in Code. Here's an interesting instruction from the content section: "Ask yourself if this is something that you would say in a room full of people you never met, or in the workplace." Given the coarsening of the culture, it's an admirable - but still strict - policy guideline for AOL customers. The important comparison made by Lessig is between the restrictions imposed in the guidelines (which draw the most attention, for obvious reasons) and those imposed by programmers in the AOL space (for example, a maximum number of 36 screen names per space) (page 90).

Much of the argument in Code and Code version 2.0 is built around the concepts of open code and closed code. The former is defined as "code (both hardware and software) whose functionality is transparent at least to one knowledgeable about the technology" (page 139). As a Visual Basic programmer, I'm trying to gain an understanding of how the .NET Framework fits into this distinction, with the availability of ECMA specifications for C# and the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI). As Dave Chappell noted in Understanding .NET (2006), these standards have enabled other developers to implement .NET, the best example being the Mono project.

In fact, there has been some work with Visual Basic in the context of the Mono project. I think the best way to put this, from the Visual Basic 2005 perspective, is that VB provides an architecture that nicely fits with the closed code practices strongly criticized by Lessig. I find it a great framework to work in to accomplish business tasks for my organization. It's a conflict....

Lessig's description of trusted systems (pages 176-180), drawn from Mark Stefik's work, is useful given the challenges that rightsholders such as the RIAA face. Trusted systems employ architecture (through code) instead of law to protect the rightsholder.

Lessig notes that the emergence of digital technologies have created an unappreciated change: it "has...radically increased the domain of copyright law-from regulating a tiny portion of human life, to regulating absolutely every bit of life on a computer" (page 193). To appreciate this fact, he notes, you have to think about the way that computers work and their reliance upon copies, including RAM copies.

In chapter 11. Lessig asserts that "contrary to the early panic by copyright holders, the Internet will become a space where intellectual property can be more easily protected" (page 200). Along this line, I came across this recent RollingStone.com article which describes the decline of the recording industry and some of the decisions that led to it (including its early strategy towards Napster and the RIAA lawsuits against "music fans").

Here's a great comparison by Lessig, and one that I would not have quite understood when Code was first published:

"it is interesting to note just how inefficient, relative to the current range of technologies, Orwell's technologies were. The central device was a 'telescreen' that both broadcasted content and monitored behavior on the other side. But the great virtue of the telescreen was that you knew what it, in principle, could see."
--compare with:--
"[Today,] you can't know whether your search on the Internet is monitored." (page 208)

Two methods that can be used to support search engine monitoring include: -by IP address and -by logging into the search engine itself (the latter more common because of the tie between search engines and services (Google and Blogger; MSN.com and hotmail).

In discussing the proposed options for regulating spam, Lessig makes a point that he clearly wants the reader to take from this book: "the key to good policy in cyberspace is a proper mix of modalities," the modalities being the market, norms, law, and architecture/code (page 262). Concluding that "regulation through code alone has failed," he proposes a system that requires vendors to include metadata in messages indicating advertising content, with heavy penalties for noncompliance (page 264).

In summary, this book is extremely informative about current technology and intellectual property issues across the board, though I found the material in chapter 8, "the limits in open code," to be the most interesting. I also found the large, softcover Basic Books 2006 edition easy to read from (both in terms of its print and its weight) and easy to transport from place to place with my other gear. Print is an underrated technology....