Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives

Based on original research and advancing new theories, leading internet and technology experts John Palfrey and Urs Gasser offer a sociological portrait of the 'Born Digital' generation, and explore how they are changing the meaning of privacy, revolutionizing conceptions of copyright, and navigating the tidal wave of information in the digital world.

New Skills, New Learning: Legal Education and the Promise of New Technology

Today's legal workplace demands technology-related skills that the traditional law school curriculum does not cover. The original research conducted for this white paper finds that these skills include organizing complex distributed teams, exploiting data and information on the Web, and "meta-lawyering" (establishing systems of practice). The study also finds that traditional methods of training such as apprenticeship have eroded in recent years and that law schools often overlook skills education, leaving a large gap in training of all skills and not just technology-related ones. The paper discusses how thoughtful use of pedagogical technology can address these needs, arguing for integrated and authentic learning experiences rather than "teaching technology" in the abstract.

Global Networked Readiness for Education

Preliminary findings from a Pilot Project to Evaluate the Impact of Computers and the Internet on Learning in Eleven Developing Countries.

The Law of the Horse: What Cyberlaw Might Teach

A few years ago, at a conference on the “Law of Cyberspace” held at the University of Chicago, Judge Frank Easterbrook told the assembled listeners, a room packed with “cyberlaw” devotees (and worse), that there was no more a “law of cyberspace” than there was a “Law of the Horse”;that the effort to speak as if there were such a law would just muddle rather than clarify; and that legal academics (“dilettantes”) should just stand aside as judges and lawyers and technologists worked through the quotidian problems that this souped-up telephone would present. (December, 1999)

The Digital Learning Challenge: Obstacles to Educational Uses of Copyrighted Material in the Digital Age

This foundational white paper reports on a year-long study by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, funded by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, examining the relationship between copyright law and education. In particular, we wanted to explore whether innovative educational uses of digital technology were hampered by the restrictions of copyright. We found that provisions of copyright law concerning the educational use of copyrighted material, as well as the business and institutional structures shaped by that law, are among the most important obstacles to realizing the potential of digital technology in education.

The Wealth of Networks

How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom

In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing -- and shows that the way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves.