Comment from Anonymous
Anonymous AnonymousOpposeIndividual
Summary: The commenter opposes the proposed policy, arguing that the regulatory scheme lacks sufficient technical expertise and scientific rigor. They further contend that the proposal lacks necessary checks and balances to effectively manage the flow of information.
Human success has always relied upon a triumph of adaptive information over maladaptive, whether that information be genetic or experiential. Today, we rely ever more heavily on experiential information, especially culture—information transmitted behaviorally. The web contains and transfers an ever-increasing fraction of culture. Its ratio of adaptive to maladaptive information is a matter of human survival. Improving that ratio is a primary challenge of our era. Threats come from many directions. Any effective strategy for thwarting them will entail vast technical expertise and commitment to scientific rigor. The FTC and the presidency to whom it is beholden lack these. Even were both present at some time in the future, the lack of effective checks and balances on policy about these matters that is implicit in the proposed regulatory scheme renders it fatally flawed.