Since the CJEU’s ruling of May 2014 in the Google Spain case (also known as the Costeja case), the “right to be forgotten” on the internet has been hotly debated in Europe and beyond. The Court in Strasbourg has been reluctant so far in upholding erasure or anonymisation of news archives (or parts of them), but it suggested that ‘less restrictive measures’ might be tolerable. The latter arguably enables one to tailor approaches to what the balancing requires in individual cases.

This chapter examines the development of digital business. It commences with a reflection on the huge benefits arising from digitalisation, including greater productivity, more competition, greater choice and convenience, innovation and profitability. It also notes that it is extremely difficult to separate the digital economy from the rest of the economy. The key features of digital businesses include direct and indirect network effects, economies of scale, anti-competitive lock-in effects, the importance of data and complementarity. The four most significant new types of business models are explained: multi-sided platforms, resellers, vertically integrated firms and input suppliers. Lastly, there are observations made about the key characteristics of highly digitalised business models which have significance and importance in the context of looking at the challenges to the international tax system.

This chapter examines the development of digital business. It commences with a reflection on the huge benefits arising from digitalisation, including greater productivity, more competition, greater choice and convenience, innovation and profitability. It also notes that it is extremely difficult to separate the digital economy from the rest of the economy. The key features of digital businesses include direct and indirect network effects, economies of scale, anti-competitive lock-in effects, the importance of data and complementarity. The four most significant new types of business models are explained: multi-sided platforms, resellers, vertically integrated firms and input suppliers. Lastly, there are observations made about the key characteristics of highly digitalised business models which have significance and importance in the context of looking at the challenges to the international tax system.

This chapter explains why horizontal (or general purpose) search should be seen as a natural monopoly. First, it shows that a horizontal search like Google Search is characterized by a cost structure with high fixed costs and very low marginal costs on the supply side, as well as extensive economies of scale generated by data that increase the efficiency of search results in terms of quality-adjusted costs. This chapter then discusses the regulatory implications arising from the natural monopoly framework, including the ability to exercise market power both on the searchers and advertisers’ side, and inventives to leverage market power through discriminatory behavior in vertically related markets.

Barlow’s declaration of independence was a cry for the preservation of the libertarian wild west of the early internet, an ideal of a space of limitless opportunity that its denizens could shape to their liking. He makes two claims here: first, that governments have no real power over the internet, which is a fundamentally unregulable, separate space, both outside of legal jurisdiction and practical reach of governments. The second – a moral claim – is that the rules of online social spaces would evolve to be better – more democratic, more free – than the rules of territorially bound nation-states.

In August 2017, several hundred white nationalists marched on the small university town of Charlottesville, Virginia. The rally turned tragic when one of the protesters rammed his car into a crowd of counterprotesters, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer. The Washington Post characterized the protesters as “a meticulously organized, well-coordinated and heavily armed company of white nationalists.”1

This chapter explores "comprehension asymmetries," which occur when speakers have a greater ability to understand or process information relative to their target audiences. By synthesizing work from economics, communications theory, and information theory, we offer a simple conceptual model for understanding and locating comprehension asymmetries in legal programs.

Nobel prize-winning economist Herbert Simon warned more than 70 years ago that if we did not find a way to manage the flood of information that threatens to overwhelm us, we would find ourselves unable to make sense of it. This short introductory chapter explores the various ways that legal architects have failed to heed Simon's warning in legal areas as diverse as consumer protection, financial regulation, patents, chemical control, and administrative and legislative process. A number of significant legal programs in the U.S. are designed to facilitate the sharing of complete information, yet these programs often neglect to ensure that the information is also comprehensible to the target audience.