Back from the eG8

Was the eG8 a worthwhile experience? Will it change the Internet as we know it today?

The answer is in the question. During the forum I didn’t meet anyone who was naive enough to expect any concrete short and long term answers.

For the following reasons of course: This meeting was, first and foremost, an excellent communication operation for both Nicolas Sarkozy and the event’s sponsors. An imperative agreement reduced the recommendations to be presented to the G8 to somewhat trivial recommendations. We took part in a set conflict of opinions rather than in argumented and open debates. Eric Schmidt and Marc Zuckerberg were happy to give a lightning quick presentation to share their company’s opinions with the rest of us without listening to the opinions of the more common being. There were not enough representatives from civil society, and on rare occasions were there any questions and elusive responses during the debates. The heated debate on private copy* underlined France’s archaic and unrealistic position. This made a lot of professionals working in the sector laugh (yes, authors and authors rights need to be defended, and no, Hadopi** is neither a credible nor sufficient solution). There were also too many men and not enough women, too many dark suits and not enough artists, authors or teachers.

With all this in mind, was the forum organized in vain and unhelpful?
Certainly not.

First of all it gave all of the participants the fantastic opportunity to meet one another and to exchange with highly qualified speakers. I didn’t meet anyone who complained about it, everyone was enthusiastic and the format adopted meant that it was possible for real discussions to take place between the conferences. Such a gathering of experts from the sector had never taken place before, and it is not sure that it will ever happen again.

Secondly, the Forum did not cost the European tax payer a single penny. The spotlight was focused on Europe and Paris which for 2 days became the centre of the Internet galaxy. For a brief period California was no longer the only place to be.

Thirdly, if the discussions and challenges raised did not make it to the G8 in Deauville, it would be untrue to say that they weren’t dealt with in the eG8. Present were John Perry Barlow as spokesperson for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Jérémie Zimmerman from Quadrature du Net. Lawrence Lessig and Jeff Jarvis made sure that they didn’t go unnoticed and that their opinions were heard.

Fourthly, even though not all of the round tables were extremely exciting, some speeches were very stimulating, if not pure brilliance. I will not forget the speech given by Lawrence Lessig which I recommend you watch as soon as possible (relevant, hard-hitting and funny), or the speech made by Sean Parker (tired from the evening before, giving speeches outside the official receptions of the eG8) for a true mise en abyme of the relationship that exists between our real and digital identities.

Finally, a subject which affects us more directly, the debate on data protection and data privacy reached a high level, both in the plenary lecture as well as during the debate dedicated to this topic “Privacy in a Networked world”. We were reminded that education is the key to not steering away from the rules in place and that self-regulation and data information solutions are both more efficient and more realistic than any local legislation in place. It was then possible to go beyond the simple question of the cookie (value neutral) shifting attention from the fundamental question: a value associated with personalisation, who exploits and benefits from this value? How can the benefits from this value then be shared evenly amongst Internet users, advertisers and the media?

This is undoubtedly the most important point, but the forum was the chance for people to meet and ask questions. It raised new issues, gave universities, journalists, company managers and politicians the chance to look in the right direction and to discuss with one another whilst forgetting their own interests for a short time. The forum did not provide any answers but who had hoped to find answers to complicated questions such as:

• How can we combine freedom, education and private copy?
• How can we ensure smooth Internet connections when at the same time there is a rapid increase in the number of people watching online videos? How can we also ensure the neutrality of the web?
• How is it possible to preserve the anonymity of citizens in a country who are revolting against dictatorships whilst at the same time protecting them from false comments and other marketing spam on forums? Encryption has turned out to be more complex than a simple debate on the fight for freedom between good and evil.

To sum up, there were no answers but loads of sensitive questions, but isn’t that the main point? Picasso once said “computers are useless, they can only give you answers “. During the forum, we as humans were able to discuss with one another and ask each other questions, something which computers are unable to do. The foundations have been laid, it is now up to us to reap the rewards.

For those of you who were unable to, or who didn’t have the courage to follow the debates which were broadcast on the Internet here is my personal selection of golden treasures.

I have two comments to make:

• some of them are approximate
• mentioning them here does not mean that I support them, but they do merit some thought

“The content defines us“ Arthur Sulzberger, Jr./Chairman & CEO, The New York Times

“We are agnostic regarding the device“ Arthur Sulzberger, Jr./Chairman & CEO, The New York Times

“Test, learn, adapt. Do some mistakes“. Arthur Sulzberger, Jr./Chairman & CEO, The New York Times

“The true network is the human network that it connects. Not Computers“ Nadine Wahab. Egyptian activist.

“The response to bad speech should be more speech” Tony Wang. Twitter.

“It’s France, where is my duck confit?“ Sean Parker.

“Technology is value neutral” Almost everybody

“Do no harm“ Jeff Jarvis

“Government acts as if it should protect us from the internet. Instead, the Internet needs protection from government“ Jeff Jarvis

“We do not need to legislate on the net, its structure is its own best protection“ Jeff Jarvis

“Reality is fiction, and fiction is reality“ Sean Justin Parker – this quotation is less trivial than it may seem at first when it is placed in its context. Does exclusion from social networks and the media circus give people more or less control over their identity?

“Let’s not change the old monopolies by new monopolies“. Sunil Bharti Mittal (Bharti Airtel). Google, Facebook etc.

“The key moment: when machines start to communicate with one another“ Danny Hillis Applied Mind.

About information leaks on the Internet: “you cannot round up the usual suspects anymore” Tom Glocer/CEO, Thomson Reuters.

For his entire speech: Lawrence Lessig/Professor, Harvard Law School

* Private Copy: An exception to French author rights

** The HADOPI law is the French law promoting the distribution and protection of creative works on the internet”) and was introduced during 2009 as a means to control and regulate internet access and encourage compliance with copyright laws.