In the beginning - and by that I mean, say, 20 years ago - all was simple. The internet belonged to everyone and no one. It was a space free of state interference, a place for individuals to make their voices heard. The billions upon billions of digital connections defied national borders or crusty arguments about competing systems of political organisation. Oh, and the web promised untold riches for the technology geeks of Silicon Valley and beyond.
This idealised story of cyber space as an independent, anarchic realm still has great resonance. To suggest there might be a need for national regulation is to be accused of “Balkanisation” of the one truly global community. To blame Google or Facebook for publishing vile propaganda soliciting the murder of innocents is to challenge the liberties of everyone with a smartphone or a tablet.
You can see why. The web has been a source of empowerment and freedom. It serves as an ally of the individual against the overmighty and a channel of influence for those denied a say. It has broken the information monopoly of the elites and nurtured new communities across borders. It is completing the global political awakening that began with satellite television.
It is no accident that the governments most eager to control the web have been those most fearful of liberty and democracy. Wherever you see an unpleasant autocrat you will find teams of technicians censoring social networks and shutting down digital dissent.
There has, of course, been an element of pretence. Some rules have always applied. No one complains when websites promoting brazen criminality are shut down, when child pornography is expunged or when cyber fraudsters are caught. Democracy distinguishes between liberty and licence - free speech does not extend to shouting “fire” in a crowded theatre.
For their part, the technology companies have positioned themselves adroitly. Even as they have become global behemoths, they have cast themselves as guardians of the powerless against the state. When Apple refuses a legal request to break the encryption on one of its expensive gadgets, it wraps itself in the mantle of freedom.
When Google or Facebook are accused of publishing illegal incitements to violence they claim, straight-faced, that they are not media companies at all. No, they are libraries or post offices - mere agents at the mercy of their own algorithms. Of course, if someone else complains about this or that web page they will consider taking it down - and then expect applause for their social responsibility.
These nonsenses are born of a mindset that says such companies must be set above the rest of us. After spending a recent weekend with a significant slice of the Silicon Valley set, I think they actually believe their own advertising
The web cannot pay homage to national preferences or cultural sensitivities. Why should mere politicians decide where, for example, the border should be set between national security and the right to publish videos delineating the finer points of bomb-making?
By these lights, Apple has a stronger claim than government or the courts to decide if society is better served by unbreakable encryption or by arrangements to allow law enforcement agencies access to iPhones when they are chasing down terrorists.
So you must be on the side of the “deep state”, is the response to seditious thoughts otherwise. To suggest, say, that the spooks be permitted to monitor the digital traffic of extremists such as those responsible for the Manchester and London murders is to be in favour of “mass surveillance”.
In this Alice in Wonderland world, the technology companies scrape every detail of personal information from the accounts of their users in order to sell it on to advertisers. Then they rail against any state intrusion as a charter for snoopers or a march towards authoritarianism.
In truth, of course, the anarchic promise of an internet under the benign oversight of entrepreneurs, innovators and well-meaning geeks was always an unachievable ideal. Today’s web is dominated by a handful of global corporations whose self-serving sense of “otherness” has become an excuse to avoid the responsibilities demanded of everyone else. One-time disrupters - think of Amazon - are now rent seekers.
This market power - Google has three-quarters of global search; Google and Facebook together account for three-fifths of digital advertising revenues - allows the companies to set their own tax rates, to shut out competitors, and to choose what rules to apply.
The answer provided by the economics textbook is to break them up. No such concentrations of power would be tolerated in other sectors of the economy - witness past antitrust rulings in the oil and telecoms sectors. We also need, though, a statement of political intent: they cannot operate beyond the values and standards of our societies.
For a nation such as Britain, under attack from terrorists who have been inspired by propaganda on the web, there will never be a “right” answer on where to fix the balance between security and privacy, or free speech and licence. It seems clear enough, though, that this is a judgment that should be made in Westminster rather than on some Californian campus. Some call this Balkanisation. I think democratisation is a better description.
