The Wealth of Networks: How U.S. Internet policies are undermin

Yochai Benkler presents a lecture entitled "The Wealth
of Networks: How U.S. Internet policies are undermining both freedom and
growth." The lecture was presented at the Center for American Progress on May
31, 2006

based on

The Wealth of Networks
How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom
by Yochai Benkler

With the radical changes in information production that the Internet has
introduced, we stand at an important moment of transition, says Yochai Benkler
in this thought-provoking book. The phenomenon he describes as social
production is reshaping markets, while at the same time offering new
opportunities to enhance individual freedom, cultural diversity, political
discourse, and justice. But these results are by no means inevitable: a
systematic campaign to protect the entrenched industrial information economy of
the last century threatens the promise of today?s emerging networked
information environment.

In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked
information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge,
and cultural production are changing?and shows that the way information and
knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can
create and express themselves. He describes the range of legal and policy
choices that confront us and maintains that there is much to be gained?or
lost?by the decisions we make today.

Yochai Benkler is professor of law at Yale Law School, Yale University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wealth_of_Networks
http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/book.asp?isbn=0300110561