Welcome to the Tech Policy Podcast, your source for policy rants and raves from Tech Freedom,

your Washington, D.C. advocate for the freedom to tinker and innovate. On today's show,

The Future of the Internet, as depicted in theater. Joining me to discuss her play is Jennifer Haley, playwright for The

Nether, a show about the future of the internet. Jennifer, thank you so much for joining the show.

Thanks for having me. So Jennifer, before diving into the ways that your show intersects with

tech policy and the issues we discuss on the program. Tell us about your play,

you know, the premise, and what inspired you to write it? The premise of the play is, basically,

it starts off with an interrogation and a female detective is interrogating this man about a place he's created in virtual reality.

We're somewhat in the future here.

A realm he's created in virtual reality where the ethics of the behavior of people operating in that virtual realm has come under question.

I don't want to give too much of the play away in terms of what they're actually doing there,

but it does pose a pretty big question about should this kind of behavior be allowed.

And there's a question of whether that behavior should be allowed in your imagination but more so whether it should be

allowed in a shared imagination where other people can also participate in these very

dark fantasies.

Right.

And I want to make sure that we don't give away too much because the show is very interesting.

And listeners should go check it out.

And we'll make sure to provide you with that information.

But just to kind of give us a sense of how the internet known as the nether in this play,

how does that differ from the internet that people are using,

that we're using now to record this podcast?

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