Social Network Regulation

Telecommunication companies unbundled the local loop in the past decade to comply with government regulation designed to spur competition in broadband services. The regulation was enacted for allowing competitors to use the last-mile copper, which belongs to incumbent telecommunication companies, in return for a fixed (small) fee. For example, Germany has dozens of broadband providers that use Deutsche Telekom's infrastructure to reach all customers that DT reaches. A customer can switch from DT to another provider if she prefers. Therefore, the governments motive of creating competition in the marketplace has succeeded.

Now lets fast-forward to 2015. Social networking has become ubiquitious. The inevitable shakeout, M&A and standardization forces have linked up all social networks into one huge giant network. People communicate primarily over social networks. The search engine has become second to this the human Gaia - the social uber network. A collective virtual intelligence, call it society 2.0, overlaid over the society we know. Last time a technology, voice telephony, became the flagship mode of communication, government stepped in to regulate it, control it, and overhear if needed. Before last time another technology, snail mail post, became the flagship mode of communication, government stepped in to regulate it, control it, and read it if needed. And so it shall be with be with social networks.

How and when will social network regulation come about?