The prediction, in brief:

I do not believe that an International Digi-Police is the answer to transborder flows of material which is acceptable in its place of origin, but not in the destination. But we must recognize that this dilemma is likely to affect political constraints on tomorrow’s GII.

Predictor: Jipguep, Jean

Prediction, in context:

Jean Jipguep, chairman of the International Telecommunication Union Board, delivered the keynote address at the Internet Society’s 1995 International Networking Conference June 27-30. Jipguep says:”We must realize that unfortunately, but inevitably, this same infrastructure can serve to propagate distasteful, indecent, or immoral material such as pornography and racist hate propaganda. As we can see from current legislative initiatives in the United States, this kind of abuse of the GII [Global Information Infrastructure] might lead to imposition of contents controls on the Net … Although ITU offers a forum for the exploration of all sorts of international communications policy questions, I cannot imagine an active or institutional role for the Union in controlling communications contents. While it is possible to have international agreement concerning, for example, the priority of telecommunications concerning safety of life (which is established by the ITU Regulations) there is not likely to be international agreement about what communications should be forbidden … I do not believe that an International Digi-Police is the answer to transborder flows of material which is acceptable in its place of origin, but not in the destination. But we must recognize that this dilemma is likely to affect political constraints on tomorrow’s GII.”

Date of prediction: June 1, 1995

Topic of prediction: Global Relationships/Politics

Subtopic: General

Name of publication: ISOC INET '95 (conference)

Title, headline, chapter name: The Global Telecommunication Infrastructure and the Information Society

Quote Type: Direct quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.isoc.org/HMP/PLENARY/L1-6/html/paper.html

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney