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Determining Place Regulations in Cyberspace:
Traditional public forum doctrine has centered on time, place and manner restrictions, leading to "compatible use" tests. At the heart
of these tests is the question of whether the activity is suitable for the physical location and whether the tangible limits of a given space
will work efficiently with a particular activity. The content of the message being communicated by the users must not be considered when making
a decision of compatibility. Only the measurable logistical aspects of space use such as scheduling, traffic flow and other content neutral
aspects of regulating a place may be weighed when restricting free speech use of a traditional public forum (Grayned v. City of Rockford, 408 U.S. 104 [1972]).Burning the Global Village to Roast the Pig John S. Gossett and Tami Sutcliffe (C) 2007 University of North Texas Previous - PAGE 2 - Next - The Problem of Place Regulations on the Internet Cognizant of these doctrines, persons wishing to express ideas-as well as governments desiring to regulate aspects of communication-are confronted with a myriad of legal concerns when such expression takes place via the Internet. The problem addressed in this study is: To what extent is it possible to define place in attempts to regulate Internet expression. What Kind of Public Place is the Internet? One could argue that the Internet has splintered American public forum doctrine. Since 2002, twenty five states have passed or are considering passing Internet censorship laws (ACLU 2006). This perceived need for new rules related to free expression in public places is not surprising, given the elastic and anonymous nature of the Web as an evolving communication medium, the widespread availability of Internet access in American society, and the deeply-rooted perception that genuinely free expression can exist online, despite a variety of efforts both governmental and private to control this vibrant and slippery communication system. Discussions of public forums often involve concepts of physical place, including spatial tactics, spatial neutrality and spatial tailoring (Zick, 2006). These terms all describe aspects of the tangible use of a definite geographical area. However, these traditional vocabularies of physical place fail to describe the Internet. By Supreme Court definition, the Internet is an international network of interconnected computers and is "a unique and wholly new medium of worldwide human communication" (Reno v. ACLU, 521 U.S. 844 [1997]). The Supreme Court in Reno further stated that the Internet is not a physical or tangible entity and used terms such as decentralized, global, international, instantaneous, self maintaining, redundant, and resilient to describe its organization. Two spatial concepts which do translate to the online communication environment are lived space, encompassing the tangible, ever-present, and constant world of real machines, phone lines, and assorted hardware connecting the Internet as a physical mechanism and measured space, the invented, timed, and artificially mapped vocabulary system we have created to discuss the "places" we principally go on the World Wide Web (Weinberger 2003). |