Vol 7 No 1 - Roger Williams University School of Law

Symposium – Information andElectronic Commerce Law:Comparative PerspectivesIntroductionDavid A. Rice*Information technologies and electronic commerce presentdomestic and international law challenges on many dimensions.The Internet, World Wide Web and telecommunicationstechnologies facilitate information dissemination, access and usewithout regard for national boundaries. Technological innovationsinfuse commercial markets and transactions with changes thatpresent new prospects, risks and legal issues. Software anddatabase protection issues challenge traditional intellectualproperty paradigms. Personal data collection, freedom ofinformation access and freedom of communication pose newquestions within domestic and international political realms.Other critical issues arise in the course of adapting privatecontract law to electronic contracting and from the extension ofintellectual property licensing notions to the distribution of digitalinformation products. Standard form contract regulation of copyuse transfer and restriction raise anew issues that have longvexedthe law in what now seem like more mundane sale of goods* Professor, Roger Williams University School of Law. B.B.A., University ofWisconsin; LL.B., Columbia University School of Law. Professor Rice was theorganizer of this symposium.237