The move from an Internet of networks to an Internet of platforms represents a significant shift: from a hybrid, decentralized environment where freedom seemed the norm, to a centralized space where the default is privatized enclosure. Still, 1990s and current understandings of digital freedom, power, and law are pervaded by similar market-liberal ... See more

In this Article, I adopt a genealogical methodology to trace the evolution of digital platform regulation efforts and controversies. I connect current efforts to 1990s debates around the regulation of cyberspace: contestations on the meaning of freedom, law, power, and democracy in digital spaces. I isolate three paradigmatic views, or moments, in ... See more

At its inception between the 1960s and 1990s, the internet was imagined as a decentralized, horizontal and open space that would foster freedom and equality. Today, it is a collection of walled gardens, a hierarchical ecosystem ruled by a few gatekeepers who leverage access to data, attention and infrastructural capability to enclose users and comp... See more

"Now, that vision is fraying. The social fabric of the internet is built on very specific assumptions, many of which are giving way. Licklider envisioned the internet as a patchwork of decentralized networks, with no sense of how it would work when a handful of companies wrote most of its software and managed most of its traffic. Licklider conceive... See more

"What initially seemed like a new way to transfer information turned into a revolution that rewrote the basic assumptions of society. Entirely new kinds of economic and social organization evolved on these networks, taking root faster than anyone would have thought possible. For an entire generation — my generation — that process is all we’ve ever ... See more

"The biggest drawback of any hosted solution is lack of freedom, and the potential for censorship. Not just for controversial content, sometimes major platforms make mistakes. Scaled moderation is almost always heavily automated, robots are not excellent judges of context and character."

"Heading into the 2010s, platforms became increasingly relevant, and the open web less so. Internet forums gave way to subreddits, a centralized system controlled by a single for-profit corporation, Reddit, Inc."

" In 1989, the World Wide Web was invented by British scientist Tim Berners-Lee, and quickly took off, leading to the internet boom of the 1990s. The WWW is a real wild west, a real embodiment of the First Amendment. "