CSTB report on rights and responsibilities

[David Farber <farber@central.cis.upenn.edu>]

    The Computer Science and Telecommunications Board (CSTB) is
  pleased to announce the availability of a new report entitled _Rights and
  Responsibilities of Participants in Networked Communities_.  Given
  increasing public interest and concern over the behavior of people on
  electronic networks, the report seeks to illuminate, to question, and to
  articulate difficult issues that arise in this context, and thus to help to
  lay a
  foundation for a more informed public debate and discussion of the rights
  and responsibilities of those who operate in this domain.


      The report is based on a workshop and a public forum involving
  technologists, lawyers, policy analysts, network service providers, and
  network operators in the exploration of several hypothetical but plausible
  scenarios in four areas (free speech, electronic vandalism, intellectual
  property interests, and privacy).  The report illustrates how disagreements
  in these areas are rooted in value judgments; for example, the extent to
  which continuity with past precedents is desirable.  Lawyers and
  policy-makers often argue that rights and responsibilities in a new domain
  inherently derive from existing rules, the report says.  By contrast,
  technologists with extensive network experience often assert that with a
  new medium and a new form of human expression should also come new
  rules of social intercourse.  The report notes that these four areas have
  always been inherently contentious, but over time certain compromises and
  understandings have evolved that guide what people do when
  communicating via traditional media such as print, telephone, radio, and
  television.  Today the proliferation of networking technology threatens this
  state of understanding because it changes the environment in which
  previous compromises were achieved, leading to a re-examination of the
  same fundamental issues.


      The report is available from the National Academy Press for $25.00
  (prepaid) plus $4.00 shipping for the first copy and $.50 shipping for each
  additional copy; tel. (202) 334-3313 or 1-800-624-6242.  It will also be
  available soon on the WorldWide Web at http://www.nas.edu; via Gopher
  at gopher.nas.edu; and via FTP at ftp.nas.edu.


      The National Research Council is the principal operating arm of the
  National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering.
  It is a private, non-profit institution that provides independent advice on
  science and technology issues under a congressional charter.  CSTB
  addresses national scientific and policy issues in computing science,
  telecommunications, and computer technology and their applications.