Electronic Rights & Responsibilities V0.13

From: Peter Merel <pete@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU>
Date: Wed, 24 May 1995 04:21:02 GMT
Organization: Softlife Pty.Ltd.
Keywords: Electronic Frontiers


Not certain that this fits your bill of fare, but maybe. This is a draft
being proposed for Electronic Frontiers Australia. Comments, criticisms,
advice, proposals and any other assistance very welcome and greatly
appreciated.

--

            A BILL OF ELECTRONIC RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES, V0.13
                                       
   The intention of this document is to provide an ethical standard with
   which to measure the policies of states and corporations with regard
   to the Internet and related multicast communications networks.
   
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
0. Rights

   The following section represents rights that belong to every adult
   Internet participant. Laws or policies that infringe upon these rights
   endanger the personal liberty, property, security, and ability to
   resist oppression of all Internet participants.
   
   
0.0

          The right of access to any publicly available information,
          restricted only by cost.
          
0.1

          The right to control and license intellectual property invested
          in original expressions, but not in algorithms nor other
          abstract specifications.
          
0.2

          The right to accept any information from any source.
          
0.3

          The right of every person to transform in any way any
          information they originate or receive.
          
0.4

          The right of every person to restrict access to any information
          that they originate or receive.
          
0.5

          The right to transmit any information to any person, as limited
          only by intellectual property rights.
          
0.6

          The right to ignore information of any nature provided that
          this ignorance does not infringe upon the rights of others.
          
0.7

          The right to seek legal recourse for damages caused by the
          actions and expressions of others.
          
0.8

          The right to publish any information in any public forum, and
          to submit any information to any moderated forum.
          
0.9

          The right, as administrator of a system or as moderator of a
          moderated forum, to deny participation in that system or forum
          to any person for any reason, as limited by contractual
          obligations.
          
0.10

          The right of every person to abide only by those laws and
          regulations that apply at their physical location.
          
0.11

          The right to distribute in electronic form any publicly
          available report, policy, regulation or law.
          
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
1. Responsibilities

   These are responsibilities that inhere to the exercise of the above
   rights. None of these responsibilities can be nor should be guaranteed
   by law, as any law that provides such guarantees will infringe upon
   one or more of the above rights.
   
   
1.0

          The responsibility to tolerate the expressions of others, even
          when these expressions directly offend your own opinions and
          beliefs.
          
1.1

          The responsibility to refrain from transmitting information to
          persons and forums not explicitly concerned with that
          information.
          
1.2

          The responsibility of parents and educators to control the
          information that they make available to children.
          
1.3

          The responsibility to neither harass nor threaten others.
          
1.4

          The responsibility to be considerate of the costs of network
          bandwidth and storage space.
          
1.5

          The responsibility to include adequate warning with any
          information that may mislead or endanger a naive reader.
          
1.6

          The responsibility to represent yourself, your observations and
          opinions, and the expressions of others sincerely and without
          misrepresentation.
          
1.7

          The responsibility not to publicly distribute the expressions,
          images, or particulars of others without their consent.
          
1.8

          The responsibility to pursue all conversational remedies for
          perceived damages and inequities before seeking judicial
          recourses.
          
1.9

          The responsibility to observe, discuss, refine and promote the
          rights and responsibilities represented in this document.
          
1.10

          The responsibility of the representatives of states and
          corporations to provide and maintain guarantees in law and
          policy of the rights represented in the first section of this
          document.
          
1.11

          The responsibility of the representatives of states and
          corporations to avoid and remove any guarantee in law or policy
          of the responsibilities represented in the second section of
          this document.
          
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
   This document has been constructed from suggestions by and discussions
   with many Internet participants from diverse countries and cultures;
   If you would like to discuss modifications or additions to this
   document, please post to both aus.org.efa and comp.org.eff.talk. If
   you would like to promote this document you might link to it in your
   own web pages, or mention
   
   http://www.usyd.edu.au/~pete/err.html
   
   in your .signature file. Thank you for your trouble.
   
     _________________________________________________________________
-- 
Internet:pete@extro.su.oz.au           |         Accept Everything.          |
http://www.usyd.edu.au/~pete/          |         Reject Nothing.             |