[This is] the most challenging area of public policy since the beginning of the auto industry. We have to come to these issues with both humility about how big the changes are and a commitment to the principle of democracy.
Predictor: Rotenberg, Marc
Prediction, in context:In a 1995 article in CQ Researcher, Charles Clark quotes Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Clark writes: ”In January, University of Michigan sophomore Jake Baker was charged with sending threatening communications and jailed after he put a fictional story on the Internet that contained sex, violence and the actual name of a female fellow student. (The charges were dropped in late June.) And a new legal conundrum was raised in July 1994, when Robert and Carleen Thomas of Milpitas, Calif., were convicted on federal obscenity charges in a sting operation run from faraway Memphis, Tenn. A postal inspector had contacted them by computer, downloading their sexually oriented images and ordering a pornographic videotape. Combine these concerns with longstanding issues involving computer security, privact and the gap between society’s haves and have-nots, and ‘[This is] the most challenging area of public policy since the beginning of the auto industry,’ says Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. ‘We have to come to these issues with both humility about how big the changes are and a commitment to the principle of democracy.'”
Biography:Marc Rotenberg, was founder and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), in the 1990s. He won an EFF Pioneer Award in 1997 for his work as a “champion of privacy, human rights and civil liberties on the electronic frontier.” He targeted the impact of computer and telecommunications technologies on freedom and privacy and was an active writer and speaker on associated topics. (Advocate/Voice of the People.)
Date of prediction: June 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Controversial Issues
Subtopic: Jurisdiction/Control
Name of publication: CQ Researcher
Title, headline, chapter name: Regulating the Internet
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/search.php
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney