Information Freedom: Possible and Good.

Maybe its just me, but the web, as represented in my aggregator, seems to be drawing these threads together tightly this morning. First, we have the news that file sharing is good for the music business, plus the fact that some US universities are starting to rebuff the RIAA‘s requests for data on file-sharers. Anonymity is good for information quality where the information being exchanged is somehow protected or proscribed. But where the information is not controlled, anonymity is less crucial, and increased access makes markets work better. When the information is free (as in speech), social networks can flourish, and innovate, assuming the basics are covered. All this adds up, for me, to the obvious fact that regulation that ensures access and freedom of information is good for markets, but not necessarily for individual businesses, who will tend to protect themselves however they can.