The Internet: A Battleground of Human Rights and Freedoms

When the internet was invented, our perception of available knowledge was revolutionized. Not only could data be transferred faster and on a larger scale than ever before, more of it now remains in the public sphere than ever before. While this was beneficial in many ways, especially in an economic sense, it caused several problems. 

One such problem is that of restricting said knowledge. In the early years of the printing press, governments were faced with a pressing issue. When knowledge can be produced quickly and en masse, it can also be distributed on a large scale with little effort. As well, once books are sent out in the thousands, it's virtually impossible to get them all back. 

No longer could governments mediate philosophies and political ideologies in the same manner. Similarly, the internet is notoriously hard to regulate. Data can be stored in the most obscure of (virtual) places, but still be accessible to anyone in the world, and suddenly people can easily steal copyrighted products or learn things that the government would rather not have them know.

But even if people begin to view the internet in a negative light, there are several obstacles in the way of trying to restrict it. One of these is unique to the internet and reflects the changes that have happened in the wake of Globalism in the 20th century. 

Internationalism has allowed for global markets and better political cooperation, but the internet is a special beast to deal with, for it transcends even designated political boundaries. In a way, to truly restrict the internet the world would need to become even more globalist; to control an international entity, countries must first agree on how to deal with it. 

It is questions like these that accompany the wonderful benefits we get from the internet, and sometimes the internet itself seems to me just a slippery fish in wet hands. It might just take a whole world of unified countries to truly begin moderating the power it is.