How Will the Metaverse Be Public? A Perspective from U.S. Digital Law

Speta James B. 서울대학교 법학연구소 2023 경제규제와 법 Vol.16 No.2

As our collective online experience becomes increasingly immersive and persistent, adopting widespread use of technologies such as augmented and virtual reality, this new “metaverse” (or these new “metaverses”) will force a further reckoning of when online spaces are “public”—both as a practical and a legal matter. A working definition of a metaverse probably includes at a minimum immersiveness, that users feel fully a part of (or surrounded by or embedded in) a virtual space, and persistence, that the virtual space continues even when particular users are not present. Some commenters add the requirement of interoperability and others add different kinds of interactivity. See, e.g., Ling Zhu, The Metaverse: Concepts and Issues for Congress, CRS Report R47224 (Aug. 26, 2022); Jon M. Garon, Legal Implications of a Ubiquitous Metaverse and a Web3 Future, 106 Marq. L. Rev. 163 (2022); Michael Zyda, Let’s Rename Everything “the Metaverse!,” IEEE Computer, March 11, 2022, at 124; Markus Weinberger, What Is Metaverse?—A Definition Based on Qualitative Meta-Synthesis, 14 Future Internet 310 (2022). Markets and governments will, over time, evolve fitfully as always, as will the social understanding. For now, immersiveness and persistence seem adequate. As they have with previous internet platforms, businesses and other private metaverse creators will choose degrees of openness based on economics, brand reputation, social acceptability, and a variety of other factors. Governments too will create metaverses: to interact with constituents, to provide services, and perhaps to engage in even greater surveillance and control. These choices will have legal consequences for both private and public parties, particularly raising questions of the extent to which governments might limit or otherwise control private platforms and services. In this paper, I focus on precedents in the United States that bear on public governance of emerging metaverse platforms. Legislative precedents reach as far back as 1887, when the U.S. federal government first regulated the railroads and began to extend utility and common carrier regulation across the U.S. economy. See An Act to Regulate Commerce, 24 Stat. 379 (1887) (now known as the “Interstate Commerce Act,” this statute applied common carrier regulation to railroads); see also James B. Speta, A Common Carrier Approach to Internet Interconnection, 54 Fed. Comm. L.J. 225, 258-68 (2002) (setting out the history of the ICA being copied into statutes governing much of the transportation and utility economy); Joseph D. Kearney & Thomas W. Merrill, The Great Transformation of Regulated Industries Law, 98 Colum. L. Rev. 1323, 1330-1332 (1998) (same). Some states passed common carrier and utility laws before the federal government acted. See William Z. Ripley, Railroads, Rates, and Regulation Ch. 2 (1999). Judicial precedents are even older, as the U.S. law of common carriage and public accommodation has its roots in English common law. See, e.g., Speta, supra note 2, at 251-58. These bodies of law provide examples for government enforcement of the publicness of the platforms. Here I will focus on more recent history, for the regulation of private communications services and internet platforms provide the most direct analogies. Indeed, as reflected in the renaming of Facebook to “Meta,E.g., Mike Isaac, Facebook Renames Itself ‘Meta,’ N.Y. Times, Nov. 10, 2021 (“The move punctuates how Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive, plans to refocus his Silicon Valley company on what he sees as the next digital frontier, which is the unification of disparate digital worlds into something called the metaverse.”). in both Apple E.g., Kellen Browning & Mike Isaac, Apple Is Stepping into the Metaverse: Will Anyone Care?, N.Y. Times, June 2, 2023 (on the launch of Apple Vision Pro VR technology). and Google’s VR E.g., Jack Kelly, The Metaverse Set Off A Battle Between Tech Giants Googl...

네트워크 중립성에 대한 장애물 통과에 관하여

James B. Speta,권경현 서울대학교 기술과법센터 2007 Law & technology Vol.3 No.2

Commentary Policy Levers and Demand Drivers in Korean Broadband Penetration

( James B. Speta ) 서울대학교 아시아태평양법연구소 2005 Journal of Korean Law Vol.4 No.1

The drive to increase broadband penetration has reached a critical policy point in the United States, with President Bush, the Federal Communications Commission, and numerous industry groups all offering new agendas. Naturally, many eyes have turned to Korea, which has been the undisputed world leader in broadband deployment for several years. The United States should consider the benefits of increasing on-line government services as well as the benefits of increasing computer education. These are costly projects to be sure, and so their prospects for adoption are uncertain, but they undeniably increase the attractiveness of broadband and decrease consumer reticence to subscribe. On the other hand, the United States should and probably will maintain its traditional skepticism for more direct market intervention, such as government provision of infrastructure or below-market rate loans to particular companies.

Entry Policy for the Fourth Industrial Revolution

James B. Speta 서울대학교 공익산업법센터 2017 경제규제와 법 Vol.10 No.2

The Fourth Industrial Revolution promises the radical reshaping of markets, of lifestyles, and, perhaps, even of governments and fundamental social order. Indeed, the Fourth Industrial Revolution assumes that innovation will come from widely disparate technologies into widely disparate markets, in fundamentally unpredictable ways. This paper argues that the premises of the Fourth Industrial revolution demand modesty about government policy, but nevertheless suggest certain general imperatives that should focus competition and regulatory policy. Because the Fourth Industrial Revolution promises innovation in new and surprising ways, the fundamental government imperative should be to ensure entry into markets. Indeed, entry should be the watchword across all domains. Focusing on two bodies of law and two areas of policy — competition law, regulated industries law, education, and research funding — governments can take concrete steps to improve the environment for the unpredictable and systemic innovation that the Fourth Industrial Revolution promises. This paper starts by establishing the importance of entry policy to the Fourth Industrial Revolution and then moves to each of the identified areas, concluding by noting that “entry” as a guiding principle can shape policy in other areas (and justifying this paper’s ignoring intellectual property policy, at least until the coda). In competition law, entry policy requires continuing to attack cartels, a U.S.-style approach to vertical restraints, and merger review that is sensitive to innovation effects. In regulation, governments should separate health and safety from economic regulation, ensure interconnection to persistent monopoly, attack externalities directly, and set competitively neutral universal service policy. Lest there be any mistake, entry defined narrowly or acting on its own cannot address all of the issues created by the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The expected innovations may create significant employment losses, population displacement, inequality, and even safety and security issues. But if entry policy is seen through a broad lens, one that is sensitive to human entry into markets and the public good aspects of education, entry as a guiding principle can support policies that themselves remedy some of the more jarring effects of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

The United States’ Uncertain Approach to Network Neutrality

James B. Speta 서울대학교 공익산업법센터 2014 경제규제와 법 Vol.7 No.1

Despite the prevalence and importance of the broadband Internet in the United States, the Federal Communications Commission’s regulatory approach remains quite unsettled. In 2010, the FCC adopted “Open Internet Rules,” designed to promote network neutrality. But while a federal court has upheld the FCC’s authority to regulate broadband, the court also held that nondiscrimination rules go beyond the FCC’s power. This paper discusses the FCC’s approaches to network neutrality and considers other U.S. institutions that may address discrimination issues on the Internet. The paper concludes that the U.S. Internet ecosystem remains fundamentally open, but that openness faces coming challenges from the development of carrier-managed services and the imbalance of traffic delivery between content providers and access networks.

제4차 산업혁명 진입정책

James B. Speta,김재광(역) 서울대학교 공익산업법센터 2017 경제규제와 법 Vol.10 No.2

제4차 산업혁명은 시장, 생활양식, 그리고 아마도 정부와 근본적인 사회질서의 급진적인 재편성의 조짐을 보인다. 실제로, 제4차 산업혁명은 광범위하게 다른 기술들로부터 근본적으로 예측할 수 없는 방식으로 이루어질 것으로 예상된다. 이 논문은 제4차 산업혁명의 전제들은 정부 정책에 대하여 보통 수준의 요구를 한다는 것을 논증하지만, 그럼에도 불구하고 일반적인 원칙은 경쟁과 규제 정책에 초점을 맞춰야 한다는 것을 제안한다. 제4차 산업혁명으로 새롭고 놀라운 방식의 혁신이 이루어질 것이므로 정부가 가장 근본적으로 해야 할 일은 시장으로의 진입을 보장하는 것이다. 실제로 진입은 모든 영역에 걸쳐 근본적인 표어가 되어야 한다. 두 가지 법률 영역과 두 가지 정책 분야 - 경쟁법과 규제산업법, 교육과 연구기금 - 에 중점을 맞춤으로써 정부는 제4차 산업혁명으로 이루어질 예측 불가능하지만 체계적인 혁신을 할 수 있는 환경을 정비하기 위한 단계적인 조치를 확고하게 취할 수 있을 것이다. 이 논문은 제4차 산업혁명의 진입정책의 중요성을 언급하는 것으로 시작해서 각각의 영역을 확인해서, “진입”을 안내지침으로 하여 다른 분야(이 논문에서는 종결부까지는 적어도 지적재산권 정책은 다루지 않고 있다.)의 정책들을 안내할 수 있다는 결론을 맺고 있다. 경쟁법에서 진입정책은 계속해서 카르텔을 공격해야 하며, 수직적 제약에 대한 미국식 접근법과 혁신 효과에 민감한 합병 검토를 요건으로 한다. 규제분야에서 각 정부는 경제적 규제로부터 보건과 안전을 분리해야 하고, 집요한 독과점과의 상호 연관성을 확보해야 하며, 외부성을 직접적으로 공격해야 하고, 서로 앞 다투어 중립적인 보편 서비스 정책을 수립해야 한다. 오류가 없도록 하려면, 좁게 규정된 진입의 의미나 의미자체만으로는 제4차 산업혁명으로 야기되는 수많은 쟁점들을 모두 다룰 수는 없다는 점이다. 예상되는 혁신으로 인해 상당한 실업, 인구이동, 불평등, 그리고 심지어 안전과 보안문제도 초래될 수 있다. 그러나, 만약 진입정책을 인간의 시장 진입과 교육의 공공재적인 측면에 민감한 확대경을 통해 들여다본다면, 안내지침으로서 진입은 제4차 산업혁명으로 인한 충격적인 효과에 대하여 어느 정도의 해결책이 될 수 있는 정책을 지원할 수 있다.

통신에서 반독점과 불공정 경쟁 사이에서 규제 영역의 획정

James B. Speta,권경현 서울대학교 기술과법센터 2006 Law & technology Vol.2 No.2