Annoyance and the free price of the Internet -- as well as, of course, privacy -- are the issues at the heart of this discussion The Progress and Freedom Foundation announced the launch of The Center for Internet Freedom last week. The Center is dedicated to advancing a “comprehensive market-oriented approach to Internet policy issues. Our approach minimizes government control and regulation while maximizing the freedom of the online sector to innovate, invest and grow.” The big agenda occupying the Center, according to its director Berin Szoka, right now is the push for regulation of online targeted advertising. “It is simply a matter of time until there is some legislation introduced,” he says. “And this is an enormously important issue.” “About a year ago,” explains Szoka, “The Center for Democracy and technology and some other privacy advocates started an uproar at the FTC by trying to get it to regulate the use of cookie data for targeted advertising. They called for (PDF) a do-not-track registry. Since then, the entire debate has been transformed by the introduction of another technology: deep packet inspection.” I can’t agree with Szoka more that this is a huge issue. The (similar) National Do Not Call Registry is, according to Dan Tynan, author of “Computer Privacy Annoyances” (O’Reilly Media, Inc., 2005), wildly popular. “It may be the single most popular thing our government has ever done.” [Full disclosure: That is not coincidence on the last name. He is my husband.] But forming a similar registry for targeted advertising does require more thought. For one thing, I like targeted ads. I think many people do. I doubt many consumers liked telemarketing calls — even if advertisers did. As a consumer, I find targeted ads less annoying than the blanket variety. In fact, they can sometimes provide a useful service. But like many geeky consumers, I’m also a blogger. And ads make it possible for me to deliver my content for free to my readers. I imagine that more targeted ads might annoy my readers less and improve their clickthrough rates on ads, making blogging an even more viable industry (not just for me.) I think these sentiments are fairly prevalent for other consumers — and bloggers. So I’m essentially a microcosm of the argument: Annoyance and the free price of the Internet — as well as, of course, privacy — are the issues at the heart of this discussion. Like most sane people, I don’t like the idea of a “honeypot” of data about every thought or whim I’ve ever decided to research online and every Web page I’ve ever visited being made available for sale to highest bidder, to a Big Brother government, or — for that matter — to anyone. And this deep-packet business does make that possible. Is there enough protection in place to protect me from this eventuality? There are a host of existing laws governing various aspects of this issue already in place. And some self-regulation is also working. But is it enough? The Center for Democracy and Technology (PDF) doesn’t think so. The Center for Internet Freedom, argues for a “‘layered’ approach to privacy protection that combines industry self-regulation, enforcement of industry-established privacy policies, consumer education, and user ‘self-help’ solutions.” Obviously, the Center for Internet Freedom has stepped into a hot debate. In fact I’m arguing with myself — and my husband (though we keep changing sides) — over this one. What do you think? Other topics the site plans to address: privacy, online speech, intermediary liability, and issues affecting e-commerce, such as taxation. Coming up next? “We are dealing with various attacks on Section 230,” says Szoka. “That law is in our communications decency act. It creates immunity for the intermediary, which basically provides you [the blogger] with some protection if someone posts an inflammatory comment on your blog so that you aren’t held accountable for those statements.” Technology Industry