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Five million registered users and counting - Second Life is the current darling of the media. With its decision to let users build their virtual world and retain intellectual property rights in their creations they broke new ground, then they opens-sourced their client software. Soon we may see multiple Second Life-like virtual worlds competing against each other - on what? Should lawmakers care? Should we care?
About Viktor
Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger is Associate Professor of Public Policy. His research focuses on information and communication technology policy as well as European Union and transatlantic issues. In 1986, he founded Ikarus Software, a company focusing on data security. He was voted Top-5 Software Entrepreneur in Austria in 1991 and Person of the Year for the State of Salzburg in 2000. He cochairs the Rueschlikon Conference on Information Policy, the faculty group on information technology policy, and the governance of information seminar series. He is the cofounder of the SubTech conference and served on the ABA/AALS National Conference of Lawyers and Scientists. He is on Microsoft's TC Academic Advisory Board, and the boards of Evolaris, the Research Center on Information Law (St. Gallen), and ITM at the University of Muenster. He holds a bunch of law degrees, including one from Harvard, and an MS (economics) from the London School of Economics. In his spare time, he likes to travel, go to the movies, and learn about architecture.
