Jaco Aizenman, an XDI.ORG trustee, has helped found the Virtual Rights Institute (VRI). As he writes me:

VRI is inviting everyone that wants a metasystem become a reality in a way that the individual is empowered. “Everyone” includes people from different protocols, technology providers, legislators, service providers, researchers, legal people, activist, media representatives, etc.

Jaco, who’s based in Costa Rica, is one of the visionaries plowing the ground to connect digital identity with real-world legal identity and governance. His work is even more fascinating because he also bridges a linguistic gap – he works extensively with Costa Rican legislative documents about digital identity in Spanish (his native language) and then translates the key concepts into English to help the Identity Gang, XDI.ORG, and others understand the key concepts (which, for an Internet-wide identity metasystem, must by definition be universal.)

For example, in Spanish the concept of “digital identity” most closely translates into the concept of having a “virtual personality”. So, as Jaco enumerates the VRI goals:

Virtual Rights Institute Goals:

1. Research and promote technical and legal developments related to digital identity/virtual personality that give more power and control to the individual.
2. Foster international cooperation on the new fundamental right of having a virtual personality, through high quality dialogue and deliberation between legislators, researchers and service and technology providers.
3. Foster international cooperation on the development of the new virtual personality legal entity through high quality dialogue and deliberation between legislators, researchers, technology vendors, and service providers.

Of particular interest is the new Costa Rican constitutional amendment to have a new fundamental right of “having or not having a virtual personality”. Here’s a link to the full Spanish version, and (also in Spanish) details of the virtual personality legal entity.

The first VRI activity with be a symposium November 17 and 18 in Costa Rica. Jaco and other VRI founders are inviting legislators, digital identity specialists, researchers, and service providers from all over the world. I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it in person but I’m sure going to try (you can also participate virtually.)