"Physical Reality III"

[Duncan Frissell <frissell@panix.com>]

Bad Boys, Bad Boys
Whatcha gonna do? 
Whatcha gonna do when they come for you? 
Bad Boys, Bad Boys

repeat endlessly.

We did 3) last Wednesday.  Here are some more points.

4)  There must be a you.

In order for the Bad Boys to come for you, you have to exist in a form that
can be "come for."  This is tricky in a world in which "processes" can be
spawned more cheaply and easily than guppies.

Students of military tactics know that the basic tactical reality is the
force ratio.  This can be looked at in two parts:  1) the ratio of attackers
to defenders (or rulers to ruled in the civilian world) and 2) the ratio of
soldiers/law enforcement personnel to space.  The lower the ratio, the less
effective the force will be.  As the Bad Boys confront cyberspace, they find
both types of force ratios turned against them.  As we discuss here, there
are more "defenders" to attack and as we shall see under point 5) below,
there is much more space to try to rule.

Before there was cyberspace, there were front companies.  In the wondrous
Anglo Saxon legal system; people, sole proprietorships, partnerships,
trusts, and corporations all have somewhat equal and independent legal
existence.  People, sole proprietorships, partnerships, and trusts can all
be created without securing permission from any authority.  They come into
existence by simple act of will.

In times past however, the creation and maintenance of these entities took a
bit of time.  In a practical sense, a person could only create an maintain a
limited number of such "legal persons."  The wonder of automation is that
the creation of entities becomes much easier and cheaper.  Software agents
are just one of the new sorts of entities that we are capable of creating.
There are also the effects of applying automation to traditional entities.
"Let a thousand trusts bloom."  In addition to entities created for business
purposes, the authorities will have to deal with entities created for
entertainment and charitable purposes.  

This leads to a vast increase in the number of entities who act and who may
violate laws and who must, therefore, be subject to control by the Bad Boys
if they are to control things.  But it is much cheaper and easier to create
"legal persons" these days than it is to unravel them "pierce the corporate
veil(s)" and bring them under the control of "law."  If the permissions
aren't set right,  it will be very difficult for the authorities to pierce
the corporate veil of net-based legal persons.  Software processes are hard
to arrest and harder to coerce. 

Remember, as long as an entity pays its bills and meets its commercial
obligations, it can find a home and continue its "life."  Markets don't care
much what your nature is as long as they can buy from or sell to you.
Official status is not required.

In addition to the proliferation of entities, telecommunications lets each
of the traditional human actors do more of everything including those things
that regulators wish to regulate.  And by letting residents from everywhere
on earth into everyone's "home" market, telecoms multiplies the number of
potential law enforcement targets within popular jurisdiction.  As long as
jurisdictions are geographically bound, popular jurisdictions (like the US)
will find out that they have gained millions of new virtual
citizens/residents who must be ruled by US authorities (if that can be done).

But with more natural persons "entering" the jurisdiction, with the previous
natural residents doing lots more, and a swarm of new artificial persons,
the Bad Boys' resources are strained.   The more entities to "rule," the
less each entity (including natural persons) can be ruled.  

[If you believe that the control technologies can be scaled up at the same
rate as the entity creation technologies, see my later piece in this series:
"8)  They must have something to do to you when they 'come for you.'"]

<More Tomorrow> 

DCF