Lunch lecture: The Future of the Internet June 19, 2008

The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It – How Internet Innovation, Participation, and Security Conflict

Speaker: Jonathan Zittrain, Chair, Internet Governance and Regulation, Oxford University; Berkman Visiting Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies

Cost: $20.00 Club Members & Students, $25.00 Non-Members (both prices include tax and gratuity)
Hot Entrée, Dessert and Beverage will be served.

RSVP REQUIRED: 412-281-5858 or Beth Kurcina [email protected] (space is limited)

North Korean radios that receive only official stations. Cars that listen in on owners’ conversations. Digital Video Recorders that self-destruct in viewers’ homes due to court orders. How do these events reflect the Internet’s success and the resulting “future” of the Information Age? Jonathan Zittrain, a defining legal expert on the Internet, will discuss how the Generative nature of the Internet benefits Innovation and Participation­but also raises Security issues that could result in “Web Lockdown.” He will also discuss how “tethered appliances,” such as iPods, iPhones, and TiVo’s represent a dark rather than positive outcome of these trends.


Jonathan Zittrain holds the Chair in Internet Governance and Regulation at Oxford University and is a principal of the Oxford Internet Institute. He is also the Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman Visiting Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School, where he co-founded Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. He performed the first large-scale tests of Internet filtering in China and Saudi Arabia in 2002. His book "The Future of the Internet -- And How to Stop It" was just released from Yale University Press and Penguin UK -- and under a Creative Commons license. The Lunch Lecture will be followed by a Book Signing.