A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace

"A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace" is a widely distributed early paper on the applicability (or lack thereof) of government to the rapidly growing Internet. Commissioned for the pioneering Internet project 24 Hours in Cyberspace, it was written by John Perry Barlow, a founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and published online on February 8, 1996, from Davos, Switzerland. It was written primarily in response to the passing into law of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 in the United States. In 2014, the Department of Records recorded and released audio and video content of Barlow reading the Declaration.