"I'd love to see ways in which technology can bring together people from far away who are looking at the same topics often from many different angles," he said.

Currently, Zittrain said he is studying the issue of Internet privacy. He said that Internet companies like Amazon.com can charge customers different prices for the same product based on information they have collected about the customer. Zittrain said he is studying the legal and social implications of these sales techniques.

Zittrain said cyber law faces a host of challenges as it develops as a field of legal study.

"Cyber law is trying to determine its boundaries and justify its existence," he said. "We shouldn't take it for granted that cyber law should exist."

Zittrain has been interested in cyber issues since childhood. At age 15, Zittrain was the chief forum administrator for the CompuServe Information Service. At 16, he began writing a regular column for Computer Shopper magazine.

"I ran up a $200 bill on my parent's credit card [when I was 13]," Zittrain said. "I was hooked."

While in college at Yale, he created an electronic information service for members of the bar association of Pittsburgh, Penn., his hometown.

In addition to his post at HLS, Zittrain serves on the advisory board of the World Economic Forum. He has also served on the staff of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and in the State Department.