As such, I invite you to take a look at the music page, or to view the relevant pages directly:

• Firefly
• Ombres et Collines
• What Might Have Been

It’s frustrating, because I hope to work in this very field (I find it fascinating), and all I seem to see are the manners in which people have been slowly destroying the system by acting in a way that they believe helps the system.

Copyright

First, a little introduction on copyright and Digital Rights Management (and here, I’ll be basing my analysis on the system in English law – see the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act (CDPA) 1988).

Copyright is an exclusive right for a person to certain acts, with respect to a specific “work” (a product, …): copying the work, issuing copies to the public, renting/lending the work to the public, performing/showing/playing the work to the public, communicating the work to the public, making an adaptation of the work (these are the “restricted acts”).

The most well-known right among these is the right to copy the work, and copyright implies that if A has copyright in work 1, B cannot copy work 1.

This right has limitations, the biggest one being that if A gives a licence to B (in effect an authorisation), B is allowed to copy work 1.

Now, Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems have gained in importance over the last few decades, as the digital revolution unfolded and it became surprisingly easy to copy works such as digital music recordings, computer games, digital versions of films, …

In effect, DRM systems enable the rights holder to prevent many of the aforementioned “restricted acts” by rendering them more difficult, through the use of technology.

DRM has been heralded by many as a means of reducing piracy, notably by the music industry after Napster and Kazaa brought file-sharing to the world of computer users.

However, more often than not, it seems that DRM hurts those who legally acquire an item more than it hurts those who acquire it illegally.

Let us look at a recent case study, a controversy around the upcoming Assassin’s Creed II game for the PC (AC2), a sequel to the popular Assassin’s Creed. Ubisoft released AC2 a few months ago for several game consoles, but the PC version is only set for release around mid-March.

As the release date approaches, reports have surfaced of a new kind of DRM: it seems that Ubisoft require gamers on the PC version of AC2 to have a constant internet connection for the game to work. If your internet connection quivers, you lose all progress since your last checkpoint. If you don’t have an internet connection, you can’t play.

Who does this hurt most?

Theory 1: “piracy”. This is the official explanation. Ubisoft believe that game piracy on the PC is so large that the only way to stop it is to ensure that only players with a legally acquired copy (so-called “legit users”) can save their progress. This does not convince me: Ubisoft have stated that they can “release a patch so that the game can be played in single-player without an online connection” (source), which means that pirates may very well create the patch themselves, and pirate copies will start floating around the internet very soon.

Theory 2: Ubisoft and “legit users”. This seems to be the point the entire internet community is making, from Ubisoft’s own web forums to Ars Technica. It boils down to this: many people who have bought Ubisoft games in the past are frustrated by the announcement of this limitation, and will not buy the game. Therefore, Ubisoft have less pre-orders of its games. People who buy this game will be frustrated by the sudden inability not to continue playing the moment their internet connection drops, and will perhaps not buy Ubisoft games in the future. Therefore, less profit for Ubisoft in the long run. And both kinds of users may resort to piracy to go around this limitation. Therefore, piracy goes up.

Unless Ubisoft realise this soon (the game will be released in a week), its DRM scheme will hurt Ubisoft’s profits and generate more piracy. How does this fulfil the purpose of the DRM scheme?

As for me, I’m still hesitating, waiting for now. I have had a pre-order of AC2 for some time now, but I may cancel it in the coming couple of days. We’ll see how things progress.

All in all, though, this perfectly illustrates one problem: technical implementations of copyright restrictions are alienating users who would adhere to the original business model. Too much copyright, through DRM, kills copyright.

Patents

Let us now examine patents (pronounced “pah-tent”, not “pay-tent”, in the UK, notably to distinguish the adjective “patent” [as in "patently"] from the noun “patent” [as in "patents"]).

This analysis is once again based on English law (the Patents Act (PA) 1977).

Patents are a monopoly right given to commercially exploit an invention. In other words, with a patent, the owner has an exclusive right to make this product or carry out this process, to the exclusion of everyone else, even if someone else creates it without having copied from the owner.

Patents are granted after a procedure that involves publishing information about the product/process, and thus the theory goes that the monopoly right conferred by the patent is counterbalanced by the publication of this information.

However, this right has limitations, two of which are of great importance: if B has created such a product or employed such a process before the publication of A’s patent, B will still be allowed to continue doing what he/she did beforehand; also, if A gives a licence to B, B is allowed to exploit the invention.

The patent system is generally given a few justifications: it serves as a reward for innovation (you invent something and are given a monopoly as a reward), it serves to incentivise innovation (the monopoly allows a return on investment – this is slightly different from the “reward” justification), it is a natural right (inventors should have a right in their invention), it allows the sharing of information (the patent allows the publication of information that would perhaps not have been shared otherwise). While one can disagree with these justifications, the first two seem to be still very present today.

There is one field in which patents have been the focus of debates and controversies: biotechnology, and we shall examine certain of the issues here.

The question of the patentability of biotechnology came to the forefront only in the late eighties/early nineties, with the OncoMouse case, which concerned one of the first transgenic animals, a mouse whose genes were particularly susceptible to cancer.

Biotechnological inventions have been the target of specific regulation in Europe since the adoption (after a long history of parliamentary debates, revisions, …) of the Biotechnology Directive, which takes into account the lessons from the OncoMouse case and other, later cases.

Taking cue from the Howard Florey/Relaxin case, the Directive specifies the following in Article 5:

1. The human body, at the various stages of its formation and development, and the simple discovery of one of its elements, including the sequence or partial sequence of a gene, cannot constitute patentable inventions.

2. An element isolated from the human body or otherwise produced by means of a technical process, including the sequence or partial sequence of a gene, may constitute a patentable invention, even if the structure of that element is identical to that of a natural element.

In layman’s terms, the situation is the following: when one discovers a discrete segment of DNA that contains the information necessary for producing specific proteins, one can reproduce it synthetically. Does this amount to a discovery, or is in at invention that can be patented?

The answer for which the Biotechnology Directive provides is that any gene that is isolated and thus created separately can be patented. The technical intervention is the creation of the artificial molecule, and this allows patentability.

Can you see the logic behind this rule? The more I think about it, the less I understand it. It may make sense to allow the patenting of the process used to isolate a gene, but what could possibly justify issuing a patent for the isolate gene itself?

According to this logic, if A isolates gene Z using method 1, whenever B isolates Z using method 2 there will be infringement, despite the fact that Z already exists in nature.

The patenting of a gene or of a molecule existing already in the human body causes all sorts of other issues, notably regarding innovation. Indeed, if A obtains a patent on molecule Y, A can oppose any use of molecule Y. Yet in the case of pharmaceuticals, medicine and other such areas of practice, the use of molecules is the starting point for any research.

The patent system is often seen as an incentive to innovation, but this is then surely one area where it stifles innovation, as one has to obtain a licence for the use of a molecule before one can even start doing any research. If one sees the patent system as a method of rewarding innovation, does this not go too far?

Closing comments

To me, intellectual property is a good thing to have in the Western society in which I live (I have very strong reservations about the way Westerners try to force intellectual property upon developing countries, but that’s another matter). Copyright especially has a special place in my heart as an author and composer: I would dislike to see any works I do be attributed to someone else, for example.

However, the current systems of intellectual property have flaws.

Copyright, which once favoured the author, has gone to favour the producer/publisher, and the latter has decided that fighting piracy is a topmost priority, to the extent of alienating normal users. What is the Creative Commons movement if not an indication that copyright in the minds of creators goes too far?

Patents, which cover most products and processes, may also be seen as going too far in certain cases. The biotechnological sphere provides us with illustrations, but it is by no means the only one. Furthermore, in the EU, incremental inventions gain as much protection (if not more) as a pioneering invention.

One major issue in all of this is that complaining appears to be of no use. The USA adore IP rights, and so does the EU. Powerful lobbies seem to always push for more rights for the industry (whether the publishers/producers for copyright or the companies with huge Research & Development sections for patents). Will the community of world users and creators/inventors ever take back what they have lost to the industry?

But today, something strange happened: I had tears in my eyes upon reading the ending of another book, a newly discovered gem of literature.

Tears in my eyes! When faced with writing, the only time this has happened to me was while writing certain sections of the Arpia novel.

I must conclude that this book, which I found hard to set aside, has conquered my heart.

Its title? Scaramouche, by Rafael Sabatini (an Italian gentleman who wrote in English).

Its content? The tale of a young man who goes from the robe (lawyer) to the buskin (actor) to the sword (maître d’armes) around the period of the Révolution française.

Go read it. Now.

Our world is like a garden,
Eternally in blossom
The saplings grow,
The flowers bloom,
And no plant can be forgotten

They come in all colours and sizes,
A feast upon the eyes
As I walk among them,
As if in paradise,
It is I that each one mesmerises

At first glance all I see is beauty
Superficial and yet so true
I draw closer and see
What they shall live to be
And behold them in all their glory

It is like being close to a phoenix
Or an angel whose heart is pure
When they shine like the sun with goodness,
With a smile any ill they will cure

Between passion and admiration,
Both in doubt and feeling too sure,
I cannot help respecting and loving them,
These beings with the power to lure

What would the world be without them,
With no such treasure to discover?
If we live, if we die,
These words are no lie:
We exist to serve these women.

The way I see it, this is something that has so far only been done using Flash, so it may be of interest to web designers & developers to see how they can achieve this without Flash, in a cross-browser compatible manner.

Our aim? To use CSS3 native support for multiple columns on the most “advanced” browsers (here: Safari, Chrome and Firefox), and to find a backwards-compatible technique for the others (in this case, Opera and Internet Explorer).

Basics: sources, …

These annotated files are used in this article:

• CSS: ie_multicolumn.css (for IE), main.css (for all browsers), multicolumn.css (for Opera)
• Javascript: css3-multi-column.js (for IE and Opera), pageturn.js, stylesheet.js

The web page that helped me the most with this design process was an article on A List Apart: “Introducing the CSS3 Multi-Column Module”, written by Cédric Savarese. In this article, Cédric not only explains the CSS3 multi-column module, but also the manners in which to emulate this behaviour using Javascript on browsers that do not support this CSS3 module. Cédric wrote a script in Javascript for this purpose.

There is, however, one issue with this article: the website to which it links, CSScripting.com, does not seem to respond (I’ve tried often). Using Google (or your favourite search engine), you can nevertheless easily find other websites using the script (“css3-multi-column.js”).

The HTML – containers

This may sound ugly, but the best way I’ve found to implement this trick, after much trial & error, involves as many as 4 DIVs around the content.

First, the DIV you would normally have used for the content. Second, the first DIV required by Cédric Savarese’s Multi-Column system (there must be a difference between these two, for reasons linked to the page turning effect – see below). Third, a DIV used for the transition between pages, for non-Internet Explorer browsers (this is linked to a fade effect, which doesn’t work as smoothly in IE – see below for the page turning effect). Fourth, the second DIV required by the Multi-Column system.

The HTML doesn’t look all that pretty, but I didn’t want to change the JS code too much, hence the remains of the “one” and “two” classes from the Multi-Column system:

<div id="article">
	<div class="one" id="content">
	<!--[if !IE]><!--><div id="columniser" style="margin-left: 0px;"><!--<![endif]-->
		<div id="columnified" class="two">
			[put content here]
		</div>
	<!--[if !IE]><!--></div><!--<![endif]-->
	</div>
</div>

The CSS – all browsers

There is one major issue with the CSS3 multi-column module: so far, the browsers implementing it are Firefox (since v3), Safari (since v3.1) and Chrome (since v2). Neither Internet Explorer nor Opera support it.

- Source

We will therefore define general CSS rules for all browsers, and then add some stylesheets specifically for respectively Opera and IE, as the latter will use the Javascript method of multi-column, whereas the others will not.

The first element for you to think about is the total amount of content you want visible. In the case of Arpia.be, I wanted two columns of a height of 430px and of a width of 330px to be visible, with a separation of 60px, i.e. a total width of 720px.

In experimenting, I found it better to add some “padding-top” to the columns, for better display of certain typefaces with a higher baseline. The height of the containing DIVs therefore takes into account this “padding-top”.

Non-annotated CSS:

div.one {
	height: 435px;
	width: 720px;
	overflow: hidden;
}
div#columniser {
	height: 435px;
	width: 720px;
	overflow: visible;
	opacity: 1;
}
div.two {
	column-count: auto;
	column-width: 330px;
	column-gap: 60px;
	-webkit-column-count: auto;
	-webkit-column-width: 330px;
	-webkit-column-gap: 60px;
	-moz-column-count: auto;
	-moz-column-width: 330px;
	-moz-column-gap: 60px;
	height: 430px;
	overflow: visible;
	display: block;
	padding: 0;
	padding-top: 4px;
}
#columnified {
	margin-left: 0;
}

See the annotated CSS here.

The CSS – IE & Opera

Because of the way the Javascript method for multi-columns work (see below), some additional CSS entries are necessary for Opera and IE. In addition, IE and Opera do not handle the multi-column Javascript in the same way, so it is necessary to have different CSS for each, in addition to the main CSS file.

Opera:

#article {
	width: 720px;
	text-align: justify;
	overflow: hidden;
}
div.one,#columniser {
	max-height: 435px;
	width: 15600px !important;
	overflow: hidden;
	margin: 0;
}
div.two {
	column-count: auto;
	column-width: 330px;
	column-gap: 60px;
	max-height: 430px;
	overflow: hidden;
	margin: 0 0 0 0px;
	padding: 0;
	padding-left: 0px;
	padding-top: 4px;
}
div.two .columns, div.two .wrapper {
	width: 330px !important;
	height: 430px !important;
}
.columns {
	padding-left: 0 !important;
	padding-right: 60px !important;
}

See the annotated CSS here.

IE:

Disclaimer: I have only attempted to get this to work on IE7 and IE8, as IE6 would most probably require a whole lot more work (I found that IE6 crashed using the current, modified multi-column JavaScript – I did not seek to find the source of the issue).

#article {
	width: 740px;
	height: 470px;
	text-align: justify;
	overflow: hidden;
}
div.one {
	max-height: 435px;
	width: 15600px;
	overflow: visible;
	margin: 0;
}
div.two {
	column-count: auto;
	column-width: 330px;
	column-gap: 60px;
	max-height: 430px;
	overflow: visible;
	margin: 0 0 0 0px;
	padding: 0;
	padding-left: 0px;
	padding-top: 0px;
}
div.two .columns, div.two .wrapper {
	width: 330px !important;
	height: 430px !important;
}
.columns {
	padding-left: 0 !important;
	padding-right: 60px !important;
}
div#columnified {
	float: left;
}

See the annotated CSS here.

The Javascript – Adapting css3-multi-column.js

Now that those basic CSS properties are defined, we must examine the multi-column script, to see how it will be used in Opera and IE, before looking at how we switch between pages.

Cédric Savarese’s script is brilliant at enabling multi-column layouts on browsers not supporting this CSS3 module. However, it was made with the idea of a fluid layout in mind, and one where all the content is visible. We, on the other hand, wish to hide some of the content.

There are some issues with the multi-page adaptation of multi-columns that led me to change certain elements within the code of the Javascript I use.

First, Cédric’s script creates DIVs within an “available width” generally limited to the browser window’s horizontal length. It is our aim, however, to have all these DIVs sitting right next to each other on a horizontal line, for as long as it takes to display all the content. It is therefore to fix the available width to an amount far greater than the browser window width. In the Javascript, the line is “var availableWidth = 15600;”, but you can choose to make it far larger. In my case, it was because I did not believe I would ever go beyond 40 columns of text (at 330px for a column, 60px for the gap between columns).

A second important change was fixing the height of the columns within the Javascript. I found this to be necessary, as the reading of data from the CSS did not seem to force the Javascript to create the DIVs exactly as I wished them to be (see “var newHeight = 430;” in the script, az well as all the instances of “430″, which force the value instead of “newHeight”).

These values, “430″ and “15600″, are the two main points in my modified version of the script that you will want to change to your own values.

As regards height, another important change was to replace “findSplitPoint(elem, newHeight*i, wrapper);” in the “processElement” function with “findSplitPoint(elem, newHeight, wrapper);”, to avoid the creation of DIVs greater than the newHeight limit (430px in my case), even if there are only 10px more to complete a tag (a “P”, a “DIV”, …).

Furthermore, whereas in Cédric’s script, the containing DIV, the “wrapper”, could have a random ID, in our case it is necessary to define this ID for the purpose of sliding it in Internet Explorer (see below for the page-turning effect). Therefore, ‘if(!wrapper.id) wrapper.id = “columnified”;’. On a similar note, to allow better control of the columns, it is useful to define a class: “elem.className = “columns”;” (I also defined the wrapper class: “wrapper.className = “wrapper”;”).

Finally, at the top of the script, there is a list of “splitableTags”. I expanded this list to contain table-related elements, because I use tables in certain areas.

You can find this adapted script here: css3-multi-column.js.

The HTML – Turning pages

Now that the infrastructure is there, it’s time to work on allowing the user to go between pages, i.e. to slide the content so he/she can view the hidden columns.

We’ll be using Javascript for this effect, so here is the HTML for calling the page-turning function:

<div class="nav">
	<ul class="arrows">
		<li id="previous"><a href="#" id="aprevious" onclick="changeColumns(1,'previous');return false;"><span>Previous page</span></a></li>
		<li id="next"><a href="#" id="anext" onclick="changeColumns(-1,'next');return false;"><span>Next page</span></a></li>
	</ul>
</div>

In the function “changeColumns()”, the first value shows the direction, while the second is the title of the ID of the element clicked.

Why “-1″ for “Next”? When the user clicks on “Next”, we want the two visible columns to go left, to leave space for the next two columns. Because we’re playing on “margin-left”, as you’ll see in the Javascript file, we want the value for “Next” to be negative.

The Javascript – Turning pages

To turn pages, one can proceed in several steps. First, we must ensure that when the user clicks on the “Next” or “Previous” button/link, the content moves, and it moves to the correct place. Second, to create a better experience, we can animate this change.

The essence of the sliding of the content is that we’re playing on “margin-left” of the relevant DIV (if IE: columnified; if not IE: columniser – this is linked to the animation).

For my website, I chose to do a “fade out/slide/fade in” animation, but found that it was sluggish on Internet Explorer. This is the reason for which IE users do not need the “columniser” DIV.

Other animation choices are possible: you may choose to fade out the entire content and show a page-turning effect, if you have a book design. This is what I did for a “book” proof-of-concept design on which I worked earlier (here, it seems as though the user is actually flipping through pages of a book).

Here are the three sets of functions (4 functions in total) we shall be using:

changeColumns()

In our HTML for turning pages, we defined the function as "changeColumns()", with two values: first, a value showing the direction, and in second instance the ID of the element clicked.

animateSlide()

animateSlide(), as its name indicates, will animate the transition between two pages by sliding the content. As was seen previously, IE users are not faced with this function, because of the transition lag it causes.

setOpacity() and fade()

The two last functions relate to the fading in/out of the content. These are very standard, and work in all browsers (through the use of "filter" for IE – I have retained this here for the sake of completeness, but it is not used, as IE users do not see the fade animation).

Full pageturn.js

As the JavaScript involved is long, I have not reproduced it in this post. You may view an annotated "pageturn" script to see the functions with explanations for each step.

Serving the CSS and the Javascript

Finally, how do we combine all of this? We want Opera users to have the main CSS file and the Opera one, as well as the multi-column Javascript, but we don’t want Safari users to have the additional Javascript, given that they have CSS3 Multi-Column support.

The solution is to feed different files to different browsers, using Javascript:

if (/MSIE (\d+\.\d+);/.test(navigator.userAgent)) { //test for IE x.x;
	document.write("<!--[if IE 8]><link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='main.css' media='screen, projection' /><link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='ie_multicolumn.css' media='screen, projection' /><![endif]-->");
	document.write("<!--[if IE 7]><link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='main.css' media='screen, projection' /><link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='ie_multicolumn.css' media='screen, projection' /><![endif]-->");
	document.write("<!--[if lte IE 6]><link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='http://universal-ie6-css.googlecode.com/files/ie6.0.3.css' media='screen, projection' /><![endif]-->");
	document.write("<script type='text/javascript' src='css3-multi-column.js'><\/sc" + "ript>");
}
else {
	document.write("<link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='main.css' media='screen, projection' />");
}
if (/Opera[\/\s](\d+\.\d+)/.test(navigator.userAgent)) { //test for Opera;
	document.write("<link rel='stylesheet' type='text/css' href='multicolumn.css' media='screen, projection' />");
	document.write("<script type='text/javascript' src='css3-multi-column.js'><\/sc" + "ript>");
}

Note: the reason for which the closing "script" tags are split is because they break HTML code if kept intact.

As you can see, IE6 is given the "Universal IE6 CSS" file, but you are free to define a different stylesheet for these users.

Given that having this script in the <head> element of your HTML is invalid in XHTML 1.0 Strict, I made it an external script, and put this in my <head> element:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.arpia.be/public/wp/stylesheet.js"></script>

Then, the “pageturn” script must go in the footer:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.arpia.be/public/wp/pageturn.js"></script>

Closing comments

And… there we go, a fully functional multi-page, multi-column layout, applicable to any number of web pages, without the need to resort to Flash. See a demo, without all the graphics of Arpia.be and using these files only, or a "book" proof-of-concept design on which I worked earlier.

The only issue, as far as I can tell, is that it’s impossible to determine in advance how long the content will be, and one cannot therefore avoid having the “Next” button still visible beyond the end of the content. My workaround, as can be seen on Arpia.be, is to add “easter eggs” for those who click beyond that limit.

Perhaps you can come up with another solution…

What is cyberlaw? Cyberlaw is the law applicable in ‘cyberspace’, a seemingly ‘global-economic zone, borderless and unregulatable’ (John Perry Barlow in 1966, quoted in Reed, 2004). Yet, as Chris Reed argues, it is possible to proceed to a localisation in the ‘physical’ world of the constituent elements of any given activity in cyberspace, and national laws will therefore apply, in accordance with rules on applicable law (such as the Rome I and Rome II Regulations, at the level of the European Union).

Therefore, there are as many legal orders in cyberspace as there are national (or supranational) legal orders.

Having made these preliminary remarks, the original question, to which the introductory statement refers, remains: is cyberlaw an area of law?

It is the opinion of the author of this essay that cyberlaw is not (yet) an area of law, but that it is a legal order. Let us examine why one might be led to such a conclusion.

Since the creation of the Internet and of the World Wide Web, where cyberspace activities mainly revolved around the exchange of purely academic information (see the first Usenet ‘newsgroups’), the array of activities carried out in cyberspace has never ceased to expand. The Internet is not only the realm of discussion, but it also houses commerce, crime, …

As cyberspace developed, so did national (and supranational) regulation of this ‘virtual’ world (e.g. the Convention on Cybercrime of the Council of Europe or the E-Commerce Directive of the European Union and their respective national implementations). While some laws provide for the application of specific rules to cyberspace activities, many aspects of these activities remain governed by rules crafted with the physical world in mind.

Any activity in cyberspace will thus be governed by rules relating to contract law (e.g. contract liability), tort law (e.g. defamation), intellectual property law (e.g. copyright infringement), constitutional law (e.g. free speech), …, just as it would be if there were a physical equivalent to the activity in question. Where specific rules exist for cyberspace activities, these rules replace those of the physical world.

The preamble of the E-Commerce Directive is telling in this respect, as it states that ‘[t]he objective of this Directive is to create a legal framework to ensure the free movement of information society services between Member States and not to harmonise the field of criminal law as such’. This establishes a distinction between services and criminal law, notably for reasons linked to the European Union’s competence, and thus perpetuates and transposes the existing distinction between areas of law of the physical world into the virtual world.

Cyberlaw today therefore comprises both law of the physical world and specific law made for cyberspace in particular.

Can cyberlaw nevertheless be considered to be unique enough to qualify as an area of law distinct from all others? Proponents of this idea may draw arguments from the existence of ‘aviation law’, ‘space law’, ‘admiralty law’, … Indeed, Andrew Murray writes that ‘the aviation industry created a complex set of socio-legal requirements’ for an array of activities related to flights (Murray, 2007).

However, it is the opinion of this author that such is not yet the case for cyberlaw: if there is a threshold of specificity of legal norms to be attained for cyberlaw to be deemed an area of law, the sheer proportion of rules from the physical world still applying in cyberspace without modulation places cyberlaw well beneath this threshold. The set of ‘socio-legal requirements’ distinct to cyberspace is not yet sufficiently complex, as cyberlaw holds too many ties to law of the physical world.

Furthermore, this author is unconvinced of the possibility of cyberlaw ever becoming a distinct area of law (or at least not in the short run). Indeed, if the first decade of this 21st century is any indication, activities in cyberspace ten years from now will not be limited to what they are today. As activities in cyberspace become more diverse, the number of existing rules of the physical world applying to cyberspace will grow, and it is unlikely that regulators will provide for rules specific to cyberspace in all instances, leading thus to a perpetuation of the distinction among areas of law (traditionally of the physical world) in the virtual world.

Therefore, rather than contemplating the issue of whether cyberlaw is an area of law, this author suggests that it would be more appropriate to view cyberlaw not as an area of law, but as a legal order parallel to a legal order applying to the physical world.

Just as the physical legal order concerns the law of contract, the law of tort and other areas of law, so does the legal order applying to activities of the virtual world. In addition to its own rules in certain areas, where regulators deem it necessary to provide for specific rules in light of the nature of electronic communications and of the Internet, the virtual legal order contains rules stemming from the physical legal order, not unlike the way in which the legal order of any Member State of the European Union contains rules stemming from the legal order of the European Union.

Murray set out to prove that cyberlaw was an area of law notably to prove Joseph Sommer wrong, after the statement that ‘"cyberlaw" and "the law of the internet" are not useful concepts’ (Sommer, 2000). Perhaps his task would have been easier, had he viewed cyberlaw as a legal order: in this context, cyberlaw is a useful concept, as it enables a better understanding of the legal landscape.

References:
A Murray, The Regulation of Cyberspace: Control in the Online Environment (Routledge-Cavendish, Oxon 2007)
C Reed, Internet Law: Text and Materials (2nd ed Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2004)
J Sommer, ‘Against Cyberlaw’ (2000) 15 Berkeley Technology Law Journal 1145.

I recommend trying things out, to find the hidden easter eggs and so on, to get used to the new functionality.
[Tested in Firefox 2-3, Safari 4, Google Chrome 4, Opera 9-10, Internet Explorer 7-8]

But to truly understand the design, I think a more extensive portrayal of the design process is in order.

In August 2009, I was working on a design for an online store of digital photos, based on the idea of a memory box. For one iteration of the design in question, I had the idea of scanning a paper file and using it to convey the idea of a file containing the photos. This idea was set aside for the project in question, because it did not perfectly fit the idea, but the design felt very well done (and I put some effort into it).
I therefore decided to slightly alter the design, and use it for my own website.

This “Arpia File” design boiled down to showing pages on documents linked to a file on a desk. See the design in action on the Arpia File design demo.
While working on this design, I realised that it did not fit the idea of science-fiction, so I attempted to make a specific page for the ARPIA2 plug-in, more “technical” through the use of a “blue prototype paper” pattern (click on “Game” on the Arpia File design demo).
I was somewhat pleased with it, and had the idea then of making a different page for the “Novels” section, closer to the idea of novels, creating an “old paper” effect (click on “Novels” on the Arpia File design demo).

Still, the Arpia File design didn’t feel right, not for my website.
I then had another idea, inspired by my last touches to the Arpia File design: to create a book-like experience, through the use of a “multiple column” layout.
This was the “Arpia Book” design, on which I poured yet more time and resources, making it look like an old book, with classical typography.
Getting this effect to work on CSS3-capable browsers, such as Firefox, Safari and Chrome, was easy. Getting it to work on Opera and, worst of all, Internet Explorer, was a true challenge. See the design in action on this webpage.
Once I had worked on it for some time, my enthusiasm was yet again damped by the realisation that it did not fit the website. I adored the layout, but most people visiting Arpia.be itself do so for the ARPIA2 plug-in and the iTunesque Mac themes. Why present them with an old book?

The latest version of this website is an attempt to reconcile the feel of a book with the science-fiction (and therefore more modern) setting of the Arpia universe.
It tries to look like a tablet, and with the constant rumours about an Apple tablet about to change the computing landscape, I hope the “Arpia Tablet” design brings an appropriate look to Arpia.be for 2010.

Of course, I’m sure it will undergo refinements as the year progresses.
And if you want to have a hand in that, just let me know what doesn’t work, what should be changed, what you like, what you don’t. After all, without feedback, a design is not worth anything!

PS: about being able to click beyond the last page, that is unfortunately a limitation of the design. Why not take a look at what it leads to?

In random news, I highly recommend that any and everyone go see Avatar, the new sci-fi/fantasy film, if possible in 3D (and if possible IMAX 3D), because seeing it a 3.40 a.m. in IMAX 3D was simply mind-blowing and awesome.
Now, off to do some more Christmas shopping‚ …

A monstrosity, that’s what they are. Freaks of nature.

This is their story, this is their tale. This is their suffering, this is their pain.

Centuries after humans adapted to our planet’s greater gravitational force, becoming more stout and strong than the original settlers, a genetic monstrosity was born in our country of Jorgan: a human whose weight would normally have meant his death. The baby died, unable to withstand the gravitational pull. But technology came to the aid of the following ones: their bones were artificially strengthened, so were their organs.

These babies, whose numbers seemed to be growing every month afterwards, were far too underweight to be considered normal. Then government-funded research came along and revealed the unthinkable: those of them with long and strong limbs could defy gravity and pull away from the ground. The media nicknamed them “fleaks”, as a mashed-up version of “freak” and “fly”.
The fleaks were hunted down by a large radical “anti-fleak” group (with strong political ties), who considered them to be so non-human that they did not deserve to live, to be given life by technology.

Years passed, and only a fistful of fleaks managed to survive and reach adulthood. By then, if a foetus was identified as a fleak, abortion was not only legal, it was mandatory under punishment of death: the “anti-fleak” group had such a league of followers that the government had been overthrown. Fleaks were not only hunted down by civilians, they were also on the government’s blacklist, considered to be “dangerous aliens” to be “isolated” when caught.

The few fleaks still alive went into hiding, but their exile led to their death, as they could only give birth to fleaks like themselves, and without the scientific community to help them, these babies did not survive.

One day, an army patrol found their hiding place, and saw that all had passed over.

So the government and Jorgani society in general forgot, and turned its attention to other matters, such as creating better machines, at first androids that would be capable of reproducing, thereby creating new machines.

This project has occupied and will occupy the government and the scientific community for many years to come, but we live in a time of peace and serenity, inside (in our home country) and outside (with the other country, Bargam).

The civil war of “normals versus fleaks” is over.

There are rumours, though…

May I ask why you are interested in this story?

Émilien Shu’pra
Presidential Archives of Jorgan

Disclaimer: This letter sent on 30 April 1114 EE and any attached documents are confidential and may be legally privileged.
Pursuant to the Regulations of the Presidential Archives, any disclosure, reproduction, copying, distribution, or other dissemination of this letter or of its contents is strictly prohibited. If you have received this letter in error please notify the sender immediately.

The link with the Arpia novels may become obvious if you go to the Arpia novels page…

I am in the process of finding a topic for the 15,000-word dissertation that I shall write during this year, and therefore wish to lay out my current ideas, in the hope that one or two might give their opinion.

When using the internet, most of us feel free: we can type anything in Google, and find our way to a million different results. We can go to Amazon or eBay, search for anything, and probably find one or two things of interest to us. We can read a blog, click on a link, and find ourselves reading articles of diverging points of view. A seemingly infinite realm of information is available at our fingertips.

However, all is not golden in this world of apparent freedom. In many States (from China to the UK), users are limited in their use of the internet by “filters”, which are meant to block access to specific (categories of) websites. Certain items of information are blocked in a more specific manner at the level of websites, when the website owner/administrator/moderator applies censorship. All in all, these intermediaries control available information.

As such, when user tries to access content, such access may be denied. Sometimes, the user is fully unaware of the existence of the information in question, but not all the time. Does this hinder freedom of access to information? Does this hinder the information creator’s freedom of speech? Whence does the right to censor/block information come? Is the creator or intermediary liable to the user if illegal/offensive/… material isn’t blocked? Is the intermediary liable to the creator or to the user for information wrongfully blocked? Does the creator not have a right to access the information created by himself?

This is the kind of question that I believe I would ask and try to answer. Concerns of legitimacy and effectiveness must be addressed, though the focus would be the legal point of view.

Any thoughts on the matter?