It’s been a while since I have posted a good article on here so it’s time I write about what I have been reading.   This particular post is going to talk about the impact of all the numerous big time lawsuits based on copyright infringement which seems to be the thing to do these days.    For example, the RIAA is suing what seems to be anyone and everyone, YouTube is being sued, Viacom is being sued, the Internet Archive is being sued, and all for relatively the same thing… Copyright Infringement.

The Internet is still very young relatively, and we are going through a learning process of how this flood of information can and should be handled.  Most people view the Internet as a free source for exchange of information and it has been viewed like that since the Internet became mainstream in terms of the sheer volume of people that utilize it for the purpose of exchanging information.

Many lawyers are seeing opportunity to make big money by exploiting how the overwhelming majority of people view the Internet as public domain.    People now are finding out the hard way that the Internet is not a free, open exchange of information and that attorneys are finding their hands in the pot more frequently.   Attorneys claim to sue in order to give financial compensation where it is due but in reality and overwhelming percentage of the financial contribution goes to the attorneys that are representing the so called victim’s of infringement.

There are multiple organizations that talk of an open internet but don’t really do much in creating the environment to support one from what I have found.   Because of this, I thought about if there is anything we could do to actually help support the idea of an open web into something more than just the idea.

Shown by the sheer volume of lawsuits, it is evident that we are already in too deep to fix the problem of the Internet.  How would you go about “fixing” something as big as the Internet anyways?

Is there anything we can do then?  There is nothing one man can do to fix this problem but as we all know there is strength in numbers in which the masses have the power to make change.  Seeing as the problems is that we are learning the World Wide Web is not a free source of exchange of ideas and information after the fact it presents us with the foregoing knowledge that we need to create a stated free or open web in which the exchange of all information is free and open before information and exchange occurs.  This would effectively remove the ability for any attorney to claim suite for any information exchanged in this open web.

Is it possible to create a new open web?  Probably not because it would require the restructuring of the Internet which would require millions if not billions of man hours.  That being said, let’s take a hypothetical look at what I think would have to happen in order to accomplish this.

1. We would need a new uniform resource location system.  Currently we use a “www.sitename.com” syntax which identifies that you are on the world wide web at the site called sitename on the .com extension.   In order to create complete inarguable distinction, I propose that we change this core attribute of the current web to a new syntax as follows.   The new uniform resource locator on the open web would be “open.sitename” which would signify you were on the open web at location “sitename”.  This would create a clear, undeniable sign that the information contained at that location was free for exchange.
2. Current businesses, blogs, and any other site that wanted to be included in the new open web would have to request their domain name in the new open domain registry.  This would have to be a free transition meaning if you own www.sitename.com you are automatically the owner of open.sitename.  It would be the domain owner’s responsibility to load their existing site into the new open domain via FTP if they wanted their site to be found on the new open Internet.    The only way that any site owners would consider this is if Internet users such as the masses of the public made a vow to only use the new open web.  This would force a transition.  Without that, there would be no purpose or justification for the time and money it would take for the transition.   Is it possible to get the overwhelming majority of people to boycott the WWW in order to start using open.web?   I don’t know, but probably not likely.
3. Make the open.web accessible through current www. Search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN.  If open.web domains found their way to the top of search results and user’s make a conscious effort to chose the open.web domain versus a www.sitename.com website, I think we could theoretically make the transition.
4. Site’s that have member areas which required payment could still be on the open.web because users would know in advance that information was only available by payment.

The idea is not to create a non profit web but to put profit on the web into the right hands.  To put profit into the actual websites that are selling products or services while creating a free exchange of information.   The idea is not unflawed and I don’t claim it to be.  It’s more to provoke thought to people in the public and hopefully someone that can take more action on these ideas.

Thanks for your time,

Brad Henry

 

This entry was posted on Monday, March 19th, 2007 at 7:59 am and is filed under Brad Henry's Post, Google, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.