France Puts Internet on G-8's Agenda

While touting the online economy's benefits, French President Nicolas Sarkozy's government in recent years has moved to protect France's music and publishing companies from online rivals, tax online advertisers and punish online intellectual-property thieves. Now, with an election looming next year, President Sarkozy is looking to build bridges to the online community and take the question of Internet governance to an international level.

On May 24 and 25, President Sarkozy will host executives from large Internet, telecommunications and media companies at a conference to discuss how governments can boost growth of the online economy while simultaneously regulating it. Those scheduled to attend, including Facebook Inc. founder Mark Zuckerberg, Google Inc. Chairman Eric Schmidt and Amazon.com Inc. Chief Executive Jeff Bezos, are expected to weigh issues ranging from taxation to intellectual-property protection. The conclusions of the conference, which has been dubbed the e-G8, will be presented later in the week to heads of government at the summit of the Group of Eight leading industrial nations in Deauville, France.