Speaking for Freedom, Normalizing the Net?

This article focuses on the efforts of large intellectual property exporters, such as the United States, to curtail Net freedoms by means restrictive copyright and anti-circumvention measures through the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA), other international agreements, and reforms of national legislation. These efforts have upset the historical balance between owners and users of copyright, leading to widespread global resistance. The defeat of the ACTA in Europe may represent the last hurrah of the U.S. and the European Union to globalize their norms of digital intellectual property rights. However, the U.S. and EU can still impose their standards on a bilateral basis.