The Limits in Open Code Regulatory Standards and the Future of the Net

This essay examines the effect that the open source, or free software movement (open code for short) might have on the regulability of behavior on the internet. I begin by distinguishing two kinds of rules, only one of which imposes constraints that individuals might ordinarily have a persistent desire to evade. I then claim that the emergence of open code movement undermines the government's ability to regulate behavior by regulating code. Open code, the argument is, thus functions as a limit on state power.