what internet poker can do for internet. help confront and mediate authority in new engaging ways. come get a complementary berkman poker deck. take a seat at a berkman table. let me introduce you to a founder. let us talk about how we play the game. thank you to my fellow founders.
Daily Archive for Thursday, June 7th, 2007
fern just called to tell me what i missed by being on my back convelescing
missing your graduation with family proud around
i am proud of you as well
part of your family
congratulations to you and to susu and bill
you are my model of elena’s words
xox
think of our rhetorical space as 0.0 space
best idea wins
every time there is a fight
with judges drawn from the those who hear
the article in the new york times excites
democracy as a business plan compelled by an open environment
hello eve born again from adam
let the same offer be made by internet poker
run clean out in the open
including what you or what runs the code
what u make and where it goes
clean game from bottom up
let us see constitution
my email for today
andrew, i love your thought. i am forwarding this on to terry fisher and john palfrey. we have been thinking ourselves that we are coming up to the tenth anniversary of the founding of the berkman center, and feel the possibility of synergy here.
On 6/7/07, Decker, Andrew (Exchange) wrote:
I have been reading Jack Goldsmith ‘s and Tim Wu ‘s book ” Who Controls the Internet ” and noted that the tenth anniversary of ACLU v. Reno is coming up at the end of the month (June 26th ). Goldsmith and W u observed about this decision: “With Reno, the idea of an unregulated and post-territorial Internet seemed to many to have migrated from kooky obscurity to the law of the United States as announced by America ‘s highest court. ”
I also note an article in today ‘s edition of the New York Times titled “In a V irtual Universe, The Politics Turn Real ” (page E1 of the NY metro edition; copy attached in case you have not seen it).
I mentioned these to my son Benjamin Decker (who I think you know) and suggested that the 10 th anniversary of Reno might mark an appropriate moment to consider various issues relating to the developing of synthetic worlds in some sort of virtual forum. Although the time is short to organize something, perhaps there might be some benefit to hosting something online that could provide material for an upcoming piece in the Harvard Interactive Media Review. Some topics that might be worth addressing include :
1. Do terrestrial governments — those “weary giants of flesh and steel ” (Goldsmith and Wu) — have jurisdiction in cyberspace/virtual worlds, and/or should they?
2. Can and should virtual worlds be governed by independent, potentially more-democratic organizational forms of organically grown “govern ment” ? Would such governance be in lieu of RL governmental procedures or would the re be overlapping jurisdiction? If overlapping, how does Reno shape or define at least the boundaries i n the US?
3. As my son observes, assuming the need for an independent, novel form of governance, what kind…Engineer-Kings ; the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF ) ; a panel of luminaries such as Larry Roberts, Robert Kahn, Vint Cerf, Jon Postel, Dave Clark ; Distributed-Cognition Anarchy? Should a government be open, minimalist, and neutral serving mainly as an arbiter of disputes and enforcer of rules or should it pursue some agenda based on some consensus developed in some manner within the community ?
4. How would such a “government ” derive and maintain its legitimacy? What are the means by which it exercises powers of governance to enforce its authority/decisions?
5. H ow would a synthetic government fit within the tapestry of local, national and international governmental authorities? How would the ” laws” of a “government ” in one synthetic world correlate to those of another (perhaps a synthetic UN or League of Nations)?
I know it is very short notice but the topic seems ripe for attention.
Regards,
H. Andrew Decker
Senior Managing Director
Chairman, Global Telecom Group
what is the puzzle you are trying to solve
Information Technologies and government transparency—the role of (U.S.) law
the Project Statement
Background:
One of the most respected U.S. Supreme Court Justices, Louis Brandeis, wrote in 1914: “publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants”. It holds particularly true for publicity of government actions. Transparency makes government more accountable and therefore propels its modernization. For the last 20 years more than 50 nations (including the Polish one) have established the right to access public information. Apparently, therefore, government transparency gains importance.
i am reading darek adamski’s fulbright proposalm, hoping he will be able to join us at Berkman Center next year.
i want public access to the government action of prosecuting internet poker.
i care about this because poker is a powerful and entertaining way to learn skills of self-evident value in life.
i am a teacher wanting to express teaching power to address the problems of humanity and the planet. i love poker as form and thinking. i see poker’s reach on the net stiffled by an arbitrary act of government propounded in congressional form in a midnight act, compounded by the reach of prosecutorial discretion directed against the founders of internet gaming. i feel freedom curtailed, my freedom, internet freedom. i feel my citizenship impugned.
imagine
Suppose avatars come to me, eon, d of c, lawyer and teacher, in my Second Life office on Berkman Island – the founders of cyber poker, under threat of prosecution by agents of U.S. Govt.
i can quote for you the bunch of bullshit the prosecutor will give us about how the wire act and the midnight bill they snuck past without a single moment of committee deliberation gives them the right to prosecute poker. cyber poker. poker as a beautiful idea recreated in a game that’s not a game projecting out to a global citizenry through integrated media, multi media reintegrated by net.
prosecutor’ll try to tell you that they can indict you on what they’ve got, give you the choice of going to trial against rico counts in a federal court of the united states of america or you can plead guilty to one felony count under the wire act and we’ll let you go, no jail time. think RICO, Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, think prison time, think twenty years.
let’s go down the road of rico prosecution in the court of public opinion, like a version of fred friendly seminars on the cybernet. playing poker in the game of negotiating guilty pleas. help from alan dershowitz waiting in the wings.
eon to the founders of internet poker channelling billion dollar charlie
you are at the point in the legal process of being threatened but not yet indicted, being told you have two choices, plead guilty and take the no-jail time deal we offer, or duke it out in court against RICO with long prison time based on how a federal court jury decides with a federal judge presiding and determining your sentence. they are playing poker with you.
could an american jury be brought to see the importance to democracy of honoring rather than prosecuting the founders of internet poker.
could an american jury be brought to see the value of poker to american society and the value of its expression in cyberspace.
could an american jury be brought to see poker as a quintessential american game beloved and played by presidents and business leaders, generals and soldiers, judges and lawyers, teachers and students.
could an american jury be brought to see internet poker as a training school and means of global outreach for this wonderful american game.
what will be the make-up of the jury asked to pass unanimous judgment condemning the founders of global internet poker as criminals. how will jury selection go. will the prosecution succeed in striking all jurors who love and play the game. in the rhetorical space of a real american courtroom before a real american jury will prosecution be arguments ranting children and terror be backed by convincing evidence.
whom will we call as our witnesses. who speaks for the money losers in the game; have they gained enough in the experience to feel their monetary loss offset. who speaks for the mothers who have seen their sons invest in learning the game. who speaks for children. what data will we show. what questions will we have opportunity to rebut.
let us play it out in Second Life, Law in the Court of Public Opinion, even as we play it out for real.
i’ve been working on another case, dred scott — who is citizen of the united states of america. is a black man citizen of the united states of america. can a black man be citizen of the united states of america. or is the core of WE the PEOPLE of the United States of America white supremacy. yes, i am talking to you.
charles ogletree and i think of creating of creating a new kind of teaching instrument for our cyber environment. credit gene koo and co for bringing our dred scott video statement of the issue together, credit to bernhard drax, a cyber friend, for recording and editing and original music, credit to audiocasefiles.com for voice and framing. we have a production team. we are evolving our format. we hope to carry on to ever more interesting and useful cyber production. this is new casebook, early edition. reed elsivier meet audiocasefiles.com.
this fall i am offering Trials in Second Life as an educational offering with entertainment value. Dred Scott v. White Supremacy will be trial#1, RICO v. Internet Poker will be trial #2. as related activity i will teach poker in the form of one card war, and lead an internet class in tournament poker, with tables set on full tilt to play tournaments of one-card war. howard lederer, professor, will lay out the basics the game, i&i the meta game, chips, ante , button, blind, fold, bet, raise, call, with help from sister annie, like my ivy, annie duke, and annie’s friends, and mine.
RIAA v. the PEOPLE, will be cybertrial #3
i would like our cyber trials in Second Life to speak to and appeal to every constituency out in every language, which, with internet tools and people we can do.
university 
at this moment i am speaking with you as my complement, all who attended is2k7 thank you as audience and agent, medium and message, all to whom this message comes and goes. we are in rhetorical space mediated by an open net but up to us to keep it open with truth flowing. the net allows goodness in human beings to aggregate. together we create amazing things of inestimable value, we give open access to our art and common knowledge. have faith that in open access to the rhetoric of the past and to our collective intelligence in the present, truth and justice is trump and still the game we play, even as we play games of deception.