Following up on the last blog entry and broadly on the topic of the ‘the future of…’, I just wanted to share the news about a couple of books that came out in 2008. Both of them, while not necessarily scientific per nature, and mostly directed to a wider audience, deal with the “future”, albeit in a different manner. The first book is called ‘Born Digital’ and was written by John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, two people that I happen to know personally and have great respect for. The book deals with the topical issues of understanding how young people who have been born digital tick, what the impact of new media upon the forming of this generation is (and vice versa), and what could we, the digital migrants, do to support this new generation of people. The book is not a one-off product but part of the ongoing initiative of the Digital Natives project of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard and the Research Center for Information Law at the University of St. Gallen, so we can expect a range of other upcoming initiatives there.

The reason I mention the book in the ijclp blog might not seem straightforward at first because it has little to do with the existing law. This is however only at first sight - if one cares to look closer, we could see in the last decade that law has expanded vastly and States have taken up more and more measures that more or less directly impinge on the digital media and on the whole information and communication environment. Some of these measures show profound lack of understanding of how young generations share, create and communicate in the digital networked environment. So, this book is timely, and being written in a pleasant and readable style, it might even get in the hands of some policy makers…

The second book I wanted to post a note about is by Lawrence Lessig and considering his ‘celebrity’ status, I will keep it brief. It is Lessig’s new and as announced last book on copyright issues, and it’s called ‘Remix Culture’. It exposes the influence of the aggressive record, film and music lobbies upon the evolvement of the copyright system and how it restricts creative activities. In this sense, the book is a follow-up of Lessig’s previous works, in particular Free Culture. Although in this manner, there is already some remixing within the book, it is still worth reading (and talking about). The book will be available under the creative commons licence some time soon. 

On the 28th and 29th October 2008 the European University Institute hosted in Florence the first edition of “The future of…” Conference on Law & Technology.
The conference, organized by several young researchers of the InfoSoc Working Group (with the Law department of the EUI), provided several multidisciplinary insights on topicsof the greatest interest for the readers of the IJCLP.

Among the cutting-hedge topics touched, it is possible to list ambient technologies, pervasive computing, web 3.0, and various papers concerning the convergence between virtual and physical realities, without forgetting more “traditional” topics of law&technology, as DRMs and interoperability-related issues.

Conference papers will be published in a special edition of the European Journal of Legal Studies, but some of the abstracts and drafts are already downloadable from the Conference’s website.

Just a few minutes ago in Geneva, the A2K3 Conference , organised by the Yale Law School Information Society Project (ISP) and a number of other affiliated institutions, began with an opening address by Jack Balkin, a Yale Law School Professor and Director of the ISP. The objectives of this event, which follows the tradition of making prominent to scholars, policy-makers and the broader public and of analysing the dimensions and role of A2K, are further reaching. It seeks to provide distinct enquiries and a broader understanding at the same time of the incredible variety of issues that the A2K movement brings together, such as health, government, culture, competition, and standards, just to name a few.

Referring to the words of the organisers, the conference considers how, in a global knowledge economy, the ability to access and produce information and control its dissemination increasingly determines wealth, innovation, human development, and individual freedom. Panels address such topics as media and communication rights, electronic health issues, open access to science and scholarship, copyright exceptions and limitations, prizes as alternative innovation models in areas such as health and climate change, access to knowledge and global trade, open business models, and the development agenda at the World Intellectual Property Organization. 

All these issues are understandably critical for the IJCLP project itself. We are most fortunate to have the partnership with the ISP and to publish the best papers submitted for the fifth interdisciplinary writing competition (the winner of which has been shortly announced) in conjunction with the A2K3.  

I will keep you posted on some intriguing topics that will surely come up during the next three days.
If I miss on something (which I probably will), the very kind ISP people have provided us with a live blogging of all panels http://a2k3.org/.

Welcome to the ijclp blog.

It is our purpose in the blog lines that will follow to inform you about current and forthcoming ijclp-related events ad developments in international (and occasionally regional and national) law and policy making that affect the regulatory environment of media and communications.

It is beyond our capacity to provide a comprehensive oveview and detailed analysis of all the issues. We would rather be ‘cherry-picking’ out of the huge variety of ijclp-pertinent topics in the hope to offer the tastiest of ‘cherries’.

As an interactive and participative platform, the second distinct objective of the blog will be to engage in discussions and to develop ideas through debate. All comments are therefore much appreciated and welcome.