Technical Regulation by Configuring an Option

I talked about social protocols over a year ago on "Internet Control" and concluded with:

"A social protocol is not so much an 'Internet Control,' but a way of using meta-data and negotiation to control the interactions one has with others on the Internet/Web."

In the PICSRules debate, critics missed the true danger: regulations on the UI. As you promote configuration and preference expression to the UI (good things), governments may shift their strategy from infrastructure to UI.

• servers will not use PICSRules, but clients will -- that was the point
• easy to require a content or privacy configuration be available or activated in an extensible configuration architecture.