For those who are interested, the official position of the US Government on garage labs can be found in The National Strategy for Countering Biological Threats (PDF), signed by the President. Paraphrasing, the report says 'Garage biology is good and necessary for the future physical and economic security of the United States.' Also, in a shameless plug, here is a link to the book mentioned in the article, Biology is Technology.

Region blocking or other barriers to access are the equivalent of infinite price. I can't tell whether Mr. Newell is mincing words or just doesn't get this. Barriers to access tend to incentivize the very behavior they are supposed to stop, namely black markets, and are therefore often counterproductive. This is true for games, for books, for drugs (legal and otherwise). See Adrian Johns' "Piracy" (http://www.amazon.com/Piracy-Intellectual-Property-Gutenberg-Gates/dp/0226401197/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322280844&sr=8-1).

This story should be filed under sciencefiction.slashdot.org.