6. Summary – Four theses on the current state of the Internet debate

No one is offline anymore – life without the Internet is an illusion

All opinion-leaders maintain that the Internet is becoming increasingly important to more and more aspects of daily life, and that online and offline spheres permeate in such a way that it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish between these two “states”.

It is therefore not surprising, that many opinion-leaders view the problem of social division in a digitalized world not as a challenge or threat, but as a situation that will ultimately resolve itself. This is not because demographic change or more educational/training initiatives will get more people “online”, but because people will soon no longer have to “go” online. Most daily transactions will be running online anyway. In addition, “being” online will no longer mean having to turn on a computer, dialing in and connecting to the Internet.

 “Whoever thinks he truly lives 100 percent offline is just as crazy as the person who thinks he is 100 percent online.”

Being online will be taken for granted and no longer regarded as an activity per se. Just as one does not consciously go on to the utility grid to use electricity or access the water system to tap water, the Internet will be considered basic feature of daily life that hums along in the background and only gets noticed when it malfunctions. People are, in fact, hardly aware of how “digitalized” they have already become.

 “People think they have nothing to do with it, and then you take a minute to explain to them that their cell phone is actually a small computer that converts their words into a digital signal, which then gets digitally converted back to analog sound on the other end so that they can even hear anything. And then they’re completely surprised and say ‘Huh, really? This thing is digital?’”

Internet “use” itself is thus becoming increasingly invisible. It takes place less and less in the form of communication between person and machine, and increasingly as communication between networked devices. With modern automobiles, people might think they’re just starting the engine when they turn the key, but in reality they’re turning on a sophisticated on-board computer. People under- estimate the complexity and scope of the “Internet of Things” in a similar way.

Ultimately, responsibility lies with the user – and no one wants to take it off his shoulders

The conversations with opinion-leaders from politics/government, business, civil society, media and the academic community have revealed an extremely multifaceted, controversial and passionate debate on the opportunities and risks associated with the Internet. The debate is not only about asserting one’s own position but often an attempt to first find a common language and establish a productive dialogue.

Still, participants in the debate often believe that their own Internet knowledge and experience is superior to that of the other opinion-leaders from other sectors. This attitude, along with their different priorities and goals, tends to hamper the discourse. At same time, they feel an enormous amount of pressure to allocate responsibilities, so that the stalemate can be broken and progress can begin to be made. Overall responsibility for “the Internet” is considered neither structurally possible nor desirable. The solution is, therefore, to pass on the lion’s share of the responsibility to the user. Opinion-leaders do acknowledge that there are limits to the amount of responsibility an individual should be expected to shoulder, but it remains unclear where exactly a user’s personal responsibility begins and where it ends. A clearer set of boundary markers is part of what the current discourse is trying to achieve.

Policymakers consider it their task to create a legal framework that defines and distributes responsibility, but they feel hindered by the current “balance of power” (business vs. government) and by the limited (local) reach and impact of their decisions. In addition, they feel limited by the pace of “analog” democracy.

The Power is in the hands of the movers: The world’s leading companies shape the rules of the game

Nearly all opinion-leaders from politics/government, media, civil society and academia see private-sector companies as the clear drivers of current developments on the Internet. These companies are not only players in the game offering their products and services, but also the ones defining and continuously changing the rules. This takes on added relevance as more and more areas of economic activity move online and as various providers evolve to become larger infrastructure providers, who then face little or no competition. It is striking to observe here that nearly all opinion-leaders notice a clear concentration of power in the hands of just a few global players who have “split up the Internet among themselves.“ They also make a clear distinction between business as a whole and “the big four”.

“We’re entering a totally new stage, where we find ourselves in an infrastructure that is white-male- western-American-Silicon-Valley-dominated, and nobody is talking about this. There is not a single European company that is really in the game. It’s just the big four, and they’re all sitting there in a single spot and shaping the Internet.”

Opinion-leaders from the business community, on the other hand, stress the “power of the consumer” as the foundation and enabler of the private sector’s ability to operate and succeed. They attribute their own sphere of influence to the forces of supply and demand in a highly competitive market. In their view, this market is at risk of being constrained by excessive regulation – and the user is the one who will suffer in the end. The solution? Users must learn self-reliance, assume personal responsibility and resist the temptation to have government step in and protect them from themselves.

Key players on the Internet

Key players on the Internet

Business and politics/government are the two most prominent variables and serve as the most important points of reference for the other players. Media professionals, as well as members of the academic community, closely follow the action as policymakers and how business leaders “negotiate the terms” of the Internet; they also keep an eye on which players hold the upper hand at any given time. Representatives of civil society also have their eye on private and public sector players. They see themselves as consultants and idea-generators for policymakers, and as critical readers of proposed policies. Their main focus is on the rights and freedoms of private citizens, and on making sure government does its part to maintain these rights and freedoms. Representatives of civil society see themselves as an integral part of Internet culture and are thus part of the core Internet “shapers”. The media and academic communities are located outside this core; they are responsible for observing, recording and classifying. The academic community sees itself, nevertheless, in a much more active role. Academics see themselves as consultants (and admonishers), who are in a position to assign tasks and responsibilities to decision-makers in business and government. As it is, they are largely ignored by these decision-makers.

The points of tension and conflict in the debate between policy-makers and business leaders are familiar. Just as with other controversial issues on today’s agenda – such as the financial crisis or the transition to clean energy – core issues such as regulation, voluntary commitment, cost burden, and the interests of private citizens are at the core of the debate over trust and security on the Internet. The debate can thus be considered symptomatic of the relationship between business and government.

The Internet does not exist (anymore)

Opinion leaders see a small window of opportunity for influencing the future course of the Internet with regard to trust and security. This is because “the Internet” will not exist much longer. One can no longer refer to the “Internet per se”, they insist, but must view all fields, issues, matters, aspects of life in terms of their online dimension. So it should come as no surprise that these key players question the feasibility – and the logic – of trying to define across-the-board guidelines for security vs. freedom or trust vs. control for the Internet as a whole. But this also means that it will become increasingly difficult to establish universally valid regulations and mutual agreements that actually apply to the space known as “the Internet”.

“In the foreseeable future, for most members of society, there won’t be an Internet. Instead, we will all simply be accessing online products and services – each in our own very different way. And in many cases we won’t even be aware that this thing used to be the Internet.”

“Sorry, but you keep referring to the Internet. The Internet doesn’t exist. Sure, you can log on to the Internet, but you’re probably not going to sit and watch the beautiful TCP/IP packets. You’ll go to Amazon, to a travel agency, or maybe to a garden store.”

“‘The Internet’; that’s like saying ‘the Germans’ – that doesn’t even exist anymore. Just as the Germans are made up of many different population groups, immigrant backgrounds, or categories such as singles and senior citizens, etc. These are people who have little or nothing in common with one another. The same thing will happen with the Internet as well.”

„You can’t have a book of etiquette for digital use; instead, there is a book of etiquette and digital use can be considered a part of it. Because it doesn’t distinguish between the ways in which I communicate with you right now – whether we’re sitting across from each other, or we write an email or we speak on the telephone.”

This demonstrates all the more clearly that developments in the “battle for the Internet” will have a significant impact on how we live in the future and what role that digital infrastructure will play. The issues being debated also make clear that the discourse is moving from a purely technological perspective increasingly towards a question of the “digital culture”. Unlike with previous technological revolutions, the question is not just how this technology can make life better and best be integrated into existing economic and social structures. Instead it’s about redefining core social values. Due to the tediousness and complexity of democratic decision-making processes and the relatively narrow scope of policymakers’ sphere of influence (national or European level), it seems that the power of government to influence developments on this front is, ultimately, limited. At the same time, however, the general population in particular puts the responsibility for ensuring trust and security on the Internet squarely in the hands of the government.

Still, the normative power of the factual is the driving force on today’s Internet. Those who have already arrived and established themselves will determine the rules of the game – because where there is open space, there is great opportunity to shape something new.