Upcoming Events: Certificate Authority Collapse; Infrastructure: The Social Value of Shared Resources; DPLA Midwest

Certificate Authority Collapse

*Tomorrow* Thursday, September 20 , 12:30pm ET, Harvard Law School.

Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (‘HTTPS’) has evolved into the de facto standard for secure web browsing. Through the certificate-based authentication protocol, web services and internet users protect valuable communications and transactions against interception and alteration by cybercriminals, governments and business. In only one decade, it has facilitated trust in a thriving global E-Commerce economy, while every internet user has come to depend on HTTPS for social, political and economic activities on the internet. Recent breaches and malpractices at several Certificate Authorities (CA’s) have led to a collapse of trust in these central mediators of HTTPS communications as they revealed 'fundamental weaknesses in the design of HTTPS’ (ENISA 2011). The research finds that the EU eSignatures proposal lacks an integral vision on the HTTPS value chain and a coherent normative assessment of the underlying values of HTTPS governance. These omissions lead to sub-optimal provisions on liability, security requirements, security breach notifications and supervision in terms of legitimacy and addressing the systemic security vulnerabilities of the HTTPS ecosystem. Nico van Eijk is Professor of Media and Telecommunications Law and Director of the Institute for Information Law (IViR, Faculty of Law, University of Amsterdam). Axel Arnbak is a Ph.D. candidate at the Institute for Information Law. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Infrastructure: The Social Value of Shared Resources

Tuesday, September 25 , 12:00pm ET, Harvard Law School. **Please note earlier than usual start time**

Infrastructure resources are the subject of many contentious public policy debates, including what to do about crumbling roads and bridges, whether and how to protect our natural environment, energy policy, even patent law reform, universal health care, network neutrality regulation and the future of the Internet. Each of these involves a battle to control infrastructure resources, to establish the terms and conditions under which the public receives access, and to determine how the infrastructure and various dependent systems evolve over time. Infrastructure: The Social Value of Shared Resources devotes much needed attention to understanding how society benefits from infrastructure resources and how management decisions affect a wide variety of interests. The book links infrastructure, a particular set of resources defined in terms of the manner in which they create value, with commons, a resource management principle by which a resource is shared within a community. The infrastructure commons ideas have broad implications for scholarship and public policy across many fields ranging from traditional infrastructure like roads to environmental economics to intellectual property to Internet policy. Economics has become the methodology of choice for many scholars and policymakers in these areas. The book offers a rigorous economic challenge to the prevailing wisdom, which focuses primarily on problems associated with ensuring adequate supply. The author explores a set of questions that, once asked, seem obvious: what drives the demand side of the equation, and how should demand-side drivers affect public policy? Demand for infrastructure resources involves a range of important considerations that bear on the optimal design of a regime for infrastructure management. The book identifies resource valuation and attendant management problems that recur across many different fields and many different resource types, and it develops a functional economic approach to understanding and analyzing these problems and potential solutions. Brett Frischmann a professor at Cardozo Law School and has held visiting appointments at Cornell and Fordham. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

DPLA Midwest Conference

October 11-12 , Chicago Public Library, Chicago, IL.

DPLA Midwest—taking place on October 11-12, 2012 in Chicago—is the third major public event bringing together librarians, technologists, creators, students, government leaders, and others interested in building a Digital Public Library of America. Convened by the DPLA Secretariat at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society and co-hosted by the Chicago Public Library, the event will assemble a wide range of stakeholders in a broad, open forum to facilitate innovation, collaboration, and connections across the DPLA effort. Registration Required. more information on our website>

Brad Abruzzi: Amazons, Witches, and Critics – A Liberated Novelist Asks, “Now What?”

In the olden days, a writer hoped to catch the eye of an aristocratic patron who might supply a well-placed word of endorsement. The Gutenberg press wrested authors free from this feudal condition, only transfer writers' indenture to publishers, who by owning the means of [re]production acquired the final say regarding what volumes would and would not land on store shelves. This gatekeeping privilege of publishers largely survives to this day, and depending on how well you think they do the work, we might celebrate publishers as Stewards of Culture or lament the state of a Literature Held Hostage. Now digital media and the Internet propose to devolve the means of [re]production upon authors themselves. Any would-be novelist can flog his work in a digital format over Amazon KDP, Smashwords, and other open outlets for textual works. video/audio on our website>

RB 206: Unlocking Research

Disseminating knowledge was once a costly undertaking. The expenses of printing, distributing, and housing the work of researchers and scholars left most research in the hands of publishers, journals, and institutions in a system that has evolved over centuries. And the licensing model that has arisen with that system butts heads with the quick, simple, and virtually free distribution system of the net. The key to breaking free of the traditional licensing model locking up research is the promise of the "Open Access" movement. And the movement has already made significant strides. Over the summer the United Kingdom was enticed enough by the potential for greater innovation and growth of knowledge to propose Open Access for any research supported by government funds. But Open Access still remains a wonky, hard to understand subject. Today, Peter Suber — Director of the Harvard Open Access Project — shares insights with David Weinberger from his new guide to distilling Ope n Access, called simply Open Access. video/audio on our website>