Britain's Oxford University says it will create the world's first institute dedicated to studying the Internet.
The Oxford Internet Institute, set up at a cost of US$22 million, will carry out research and make policy recommendations about what effects the Internet has on society.
"You can already shop, bank, vote, debate, argue, consult a doctor and get your degree over the Net - and do so all around the globe," said Andrew Graham, Master-Elect of Balliol College, where the institute will be based.
"However, there is also an enormous amount of rubbish out there and some material that is harmful," he said in a statement.
"To understand what is happening and to formulate helpful policies you need people such as political scientists, lawyers, medics, economists and computing scientists working together," he said.
Among topics under consideration by the institute are global law enforcement, privacy and regulation, and the boundaries of the nation state.
The university said it hoped to put Oxford and Britain at the centre of the debate about how the Internet could and should develop.
The bulk of the funding for the institute has come from the Shirley Foundation, set up by Stephanie Shirley, one of Britain's richest women.
Oxford is already a partner in what could become the world's biggest online project - a screen saver scheme which aims to link millions of personal computers to accelerate research for new drugs to treat leukemia.
The idea is for people across the world to share the unused power on their computers to process information on millions of molecules and send it back to a central server at US technology company United Devices in Austin, Texas.
In the three weeks since it was set up, 250,000 people have registered.
