02/21/17: Internet Designers as Policy-Makers | Berkman Klein Center

Those responsible for technical design of the Internet are essential among the policy-makers for this large-scale sociotechnical infrastructure.  Based on analysis of the RFCs (1969-1999), this talk looks at how these policy-makers thought and think about policy issues while addressing technical problems.  Findings include basic design criteria that serve as constitutional principles; interactions between human and non-human users; tensions between geo- and network-political citizenship; early internationalization; and what Internet designers can teach us about decision-making under conditions of instability in everything from the design subject on.