Wired to Win !
Canada’s Positioning Within The World’s Technological Revolution
II. THE INTERNET AS A NEW PARADIGM
World Wide Web
Internet Regulation
Hate Sites
II. THE INTERNET AS A NEW PARADIGM
Much of the Subcommittee’s discussion on technology dealt with the Internet. Witnesses discussed how the Internet functions today as well as its likely impact in the near future when digital set-top boxes merge TV and computers to bring the Internet into living rooms.
In a recent Statistics Canada study entitled Household Facilities and Equipment 1997, it was reported that in May 1997, 4.2 million Canadian households were equipped with a home computer. This represented 36 per cent of all households. More significantly, the number of Canadians connected to the Internet is growing at a rapid rate. According to StatsCan, although only 7 per cent of Canadian households were "surfing" the Internet in 1996, a year later that figure had doubled to 13-15 per cent. This trend is continuing, and indeed is rapidly increasing.
More recent data from a survey by Nielson Media-Research and CommerceNet in the U.S. revealed continuing high growth in Internet use. In June 1998, 70.2 million American adults – 35 per cent of that demographic group – were using the Internet. The survey also found some 8.5 million Internet users in Canada – or more than a quarter of the population of about 30 million.
Another survey conducted in mid-April, 1999, by International Data Corp. (Canada) Ltd. found that at least half of Canada’s households have one or more persons who have regular access to the Internet. By this measure, Canada is second only to the United States in being wired.
While these figures may seem modest, especially compared with TV and telephone household penetration, they represent a phenomenal growth rate in the few years since the World Wide Web (WWW) exploded in 1993-94. For example, it took nearly 40 years for radio to reach 50 million households worldwide and it took 13 years for television to reach the 50-million penetration threshold. The Web took only four years to reach that same figure.
A fundamental condition for the Web to become a mass medium is its virtually unlimited distribution capacity. Network systems – the "pipes" to the home – will need high bandwidth capacity and high speed for delivering video and other software applications to homes. In this way, content can be stored on giant servers and delivered to consumers on an on-demand basis. The Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP) told the Subcommittee:
Today we have the ability to store a bit of information in an individual atom. That means this is technology that will allow us to store the entire contents of the Library of Parliament on a disc the size of a dime. Even more impressive is the powerful explosion that we will see in bandwidth capacity. In fact, it will increase orders of magnitude faster than the rise we have seen in microprocessor speeds due to the adoption of fibre optics.
Several witnesses underscored the essentially trans-border nature of the Web, and how this presents a serious challenge to traditional regulatory tools. The Canadian Cable Television Association (CCTA) told the Subcommittee:
The Internet is impossible to restrict geographically. It flows through transparent data networks that are endlessly reconstructing themselves in new configurations. It is simultaneously everywhere and nowhere. This is the opposite of broadcasting, which is rooted in very particular cities, provinces and countries.
The CCTA noted, for example, that to listen to CBC radio off-air in Toronto one has to be physically in the Toronto area. But you can be in Australia or China or anywhere else in the world and listen to CBC radio live, in real time, on the Internet via the CBC’s Web site: www.radio.cbc.ca
Regulation of the Internet was a controversial topic during the Subcommittee’s hearings.
In dealing with content regulation, Canadian policymakers have employed two approaches. The first is negative regulation. This method attempts to curb the flow of objectionable material, as well as seeking to ban entry into Canada of cultural products and services that compete directly with Canadian monopolies, and to impose quotas and other restrictions in order to create a market for domestic products. The second form is positive – or proactive – regulation, which attempts to create incentives for the production and dissemination of Canadian materials to achieve social and cultural objectives.
The emergence of new delivery systems, especially the Web, has led many to wonder whether negative regulation will be feasible in the future.
Speaking about the role of governments in the regulation of new media, a witness from the telephone company Telus commented:
I am afraid that the debate over how we should best control the distribution of visual content is becoming increasingly academic. The question, in our view, really ought to be: What happens when that power to control is no longer there?
Other witnesses stated that with a little ingenuity, regulating the Web could be possible. As a witness from the Canadian Conference of the Arts (CCA) observed:
The Internet is an excellent way of reaching people everywhere. However, there has to be some control over the content of the Internet. The Louvre is a beautiful museum, but it is also important to see Canadian museums on the Internet. People must have access to things that are happening in their own country.
Others argued that it is impossible – and therefore a fruitless enterprise doomed to frustration – to impose regulations on the Internet. Timothy Denton, legal counsel for an association of Internet Service Providers (ISP), told the Subcommittee:
The Internet cannot be regulated technically. The Internet should not be regulated politically. And the Internet is already fully subject to the rule of law.
Mr. Denton argued that the Internet cannot be regulated technically because there are no control points on the network. He noted, moreover, that Internet Service Providers should not be subject to licensing because, technically speaking, there is no scarcity that attaches value to a licence. Broadcasting licences, he said, have value because they occupy scarce frequency that cannot be used by someone else. Finally, Mr. Denton noted that prior restraint is not necessary for the Internet because the rule of law is sufficient.
Mr. Denton added:
When you pick up a telephone, when you write a letter, all these forms of communication are extensively subject to rules concerning libel, slander, some Criminal Code offences and many other kinds of rules. However, none of these rules amounts to a requirement for prior permission from the state to write, print, preach, pray or speak…The rule of law is that, as long as you obey that law, you need not seek the permission of anyone to do what you are going to do. If you stay within the speed limit, you are within the rule of law, and you will never need the permission of anyone to continue at that speed.
A witness from the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada (SOCAN), which represents the intellectual property rights of Canadian artists, stated that current laws and regulations applying to the Canadian broadcasting system must also be applied to new media technologies, including the Web. The witness told the Subcommittee:
The fact that media systems evolve does not mean that the CRTC should automatically drop all of its Canadian content rules. As you know, new media are already being used to distribute music. Unfortunately, many of those involved in these new media believe that the Broadcasting Act should not apply to them and, thus, they should not be obliged to program Canadian content like other domestic broadcasters. SOCAN believes that if the CRTC doesn’t regulate new media, it will effectively create two types of broadcasters – those who are subject to the law, and those who are not.
Professor Eli Noam of Columbia University in New York told the Subcommittee that the debate about regulating the Internet has become "an ink-blot test" onto which everyone projects their fears, fantasies and expectations. He cautioned against the stridently libertarian view that the Web, by its very nature, will be free of all government controls:
The point is that each society has a set of values and interests for better or worse which underlie its legal arrangements. No society will drop these values and interests just because these activities are now done over computer networks. It is totally naive to think that the Internet will be some form of libertarian island in a society that runs on some rules.
Professor Noam added that, contrary to the assertions of many, the Internet can indeed be regulated by states:
At this point, people will usually assert that even if you wanted to do something about this, you simply cannot regulate the Internet and transactions over the Internet, so it is hopeless…In a way, that is not true. It is difficult to regulate the electronic transactions themselves, but communications is not just about bit streams and transactions. They also involve physical entities, people, institutions with domiciles and assets. Therefore, if you cannot catch the mobile parts in the system, you can go after the immobile parts, such as underlying transmission networks, physical delivery, packages, people, transmission facilities, assets, advertisers or whatever. This might not be a perfect or elegant way do that if you wanted to do it, but neither are the income taxes or the traffic loads particularly elegant. Simply because there is a certain slippage, you cannot control every transaction in anything, just as in the cases of taxes, it does not mean that you cannot try if you wanted to. My conclusion is if you want to regulate the Internet, you can.
Professor Noam said the important question is not whether states can regulate the Internet, but whether they should regulate it.
Laws concerning pornography, privacy and copyright protection are already hotly debated when applied to the Web. Traditionally, "telecommunications" traffic is considered to be "common carriage." Distribution systems, therefore, are not expected to interfere with the content carried on their wires. Only "broadcasting" content has been regulated. However, there is increasing pressure to force Internet Service Providers, which have physical assets that can be seized by governments, to block out any Web-based content that violates laws.
In Europe, a number of controversial precedents exist in this area. Germany passed a law in 1997 that holds network providers responsible for any illegal content carried on their systems, if they know about it and can be reasonably expected to block it out. In the Netherlands, Internet Service Providers can be held criminally responsible for complicity in the distribution of illegal material – notably child pornography and hate literature. Sweden has adopted similar legislation. These issues are also being debated in North America, pitting those in favour of a hands-off approach to the Internet against those who want governments to take firm action against the distribution of offensive or illegal content.
Sooner or later, Canada will have to deal with this problem head on. One estimate puts the number of Internet hate sites at 800. Targets include religious groups, visible minorities, women and homosexuals. At an international symposium organized by B’nai Brith Canada in Toronto this spring, the federal government was urged to impose laws to quell racist and violent Web sites.
While the Subcommittee recognizes that developing laws to control Internet traffic may be difficult, it also feels that the gravity of the situation is such that urgent action is warranted.
Indeed, the symposium suggested penalties for downloading and possessing hate propaganda with intent to promote hatred. Given the vile nature of some sites, Canada cannot simply choose to ignore the problem.
RECOMMENDATION 1:
The government is urged to proceed with haste, with other governments, within the appropriate international forum, in addressing Internet content that promotes racism, pornography and violence.