Internet Access: Where Law, Economy, Culture and Technology Meet

Abstract

Internet growth has allowed unprecedented widespread access to cultural creation including music and films, to knowledge, and to a wide range of consumer information. At the same time, it has become a huge source of business opportunities. Along with great benefits that this access to the Internet provides, the open and free access to the Internet has encountered large opposition based on political, economical and ethical reasons. An ongoing battle over the control on Internet access has been escalating on all these fronts. In this paper we describe first some of the ideological roots of free access to the Internet along with its main opponents. We then focus on the problem of “Internet piracy” and analyze the efficiency of efforts to reduce the availability of copyrighted creations that are available for non-authorized free download.

Keywords: Internet access, fundamental rights, copyrights, public goods, commons

JEL Classification: O34, H41, K00