Seminar Schedule

 Under each topic is a link called "Resources", to a page of readings and resources. Required readings are indicated. Everyone should read at least some of the optional readings (they are not listed in priority order -- choose based on your interests). You should also be continuously exploring the net for other material of relevance.

 Also under each topic there is a "Discussion Topic". You are expected to prepare before class for discussion on that topic. These are the topics for the memo assignments.

 Assignment due dates are not indicated here because they are different for everyone. Click here for the due dates.
 
 

SECTION I: Policy Consequences of Information Technology Choices

• What are networks?
• History
• Examples
• Resources

• Communications engineering and physics
• Packet and circuit switching
• Integrated services
• Blind vs. aware architectures
• Resources
• Policy Memo #1 due (from everyone): Find an example information policy problem in which new or rapidly changing technology has rendered the accepted statement of the problem incorrect or problematic, or has turned prior solutions into problems themselves.

• What is scarce?
• Problems with public allocation
• Spectrum auctions
• Resources
• Discussion topic: (1) What are alternatives to congestion pricing for controlling congestion, and some of their pros and cons? (2) What do you think of Gilder's argument that the government should not auction exclusive use rights to the spectrum? (3) Are we approaching "infinite bandwidth for free"? Which info net policy questions are affected by the answer?

• Service layering
• Natural monopoly and market leveraging
• Resources
• Discussion topics: Should the U.S. Government have opposed Microsoft's inclusion of an "icon" (easy, built-in connection) to its own private network (MSN) on the Windows95 desktop? How else might Microsoft use its dominance in desktop operating systems to attempt to gain an advantage over other private networks (e.g., AOL and Compuserve)?

• Resources
• Discussion topic:

SECTION II: Individual, Society and Information Content

• Resources
• Discussion topic:

5 Nov: Free speech, censorship, pornography and all that

• GUEST LEADER: Prof. Paul Resnick, School of Information
• Resources
• Discussion topic:

• Resources
• Discussion topics: How should copyright protection be applied to works in digital form? In particular, should the purchaser of a copyrighted digital work be prohibited from redistributing that copy (contrary to the "first sale" rule)? Should any electronic copies made of a document to facilitate "browsing" be a violation of copyright protection? (The first writer should answer the questions "yes". The second writer should answer the questions "no".)

• GUEST LEADER: Prof. David Wallace, School of Information
• Resources
• Discussion topic:

SECTION III: Networks and Markets

• Resources
• Discussion topic:

• Resources
• Discussion topic:

• History of universal access policy
• Why universal access?  To what?
• Who should pay the cost?
• Resources
• Discussion topic:

SECTION IV: OTHER TOPICS

Cryptography and trade policy

Digital libraries

Software patents

Year 2000

Who owns personal information?

Children's TV

Cable TV pricing and competition

National Information Infrastructure: What role for government?

• What can the government do better than the private sector?
• Resources

• Network externalities and critical masses
• Technology convergence
• Multiple-jurisdiction, multiple-form regulation
• Information goods, digital commerce
• Resources

• Twisted pair and coax
• Fiber
• physics
• all-optical nets
• Wireless
• cellular
• PCS
• spread spectrum
• Resources

• Where is the natural monopoly?
• Technology drives economics of local and long-distance networks
• Economics of lines and switches drives market structure
• What are the bottlenecks? (local loop, numbering/routing, etc.)
• Resources

• Bilateral vs. multilateral agreements
• Resellers and free-riding
• Resources
• Discussion topic:

• Adoption, leapfrogging, etc.
• Resources
• Discussion topic:

• Internet telephony
• Number portability
• Allocating scarce names and numbers
• Resources

Return to:

• Schedule (top level)

---