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Australian PM Has Parody Site Shut Down
babbling writes "The Australian Government has shut down a parody website that mocked Australian Prime Minister John Howard. The website featured a satirical speech that 'apologised' for the Iraq war. The site was down for two days before a phone call from Melbourne IT advised the owner that it had been shut down 'on the advice from the Australian Government'. A mirrored PDF copy of the "apology speech" is available."
MelbourneIT representative: "To us it looks like a phishing site."
Not bloody likely.
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
For example, some time ago there was a similar issue (reported here) about the UK Gov's "Preparing for Emergencies" site (the real one is here, the parody one here). There was some fuss about it at the time, but basically the UK Gov cocked up by not registering the .co.uk domain along with the .gov.uk, and there was no case to answer in law, because of the "fair use" clause.
Similarly, whitehouse.org and whitehouse.gov coexist. Indeed, there are probably hundreds of parody sites that work in a similar way.
Now, when I read the story, the quote from Bruce Tonkin at Melbourne IT set off my BS alarm. His claim that Melbourne IT reacts quickly to issues like this is simply not true. If you're involved in the anti-spam or anti-scam business, you'll know that Melbourne IT are one of the domain registrars of choice for phishers and spammers. In fact, Melbourne IT's procedures are so slack that they infamously transferred the panix.com domain to a third party without authorisation last year. The site was offline for several days because Melbourne IT don't work weekends. You'll see that Bruce Tonkin offered another bullshit excuse there too.
So, don't just blame the "Australian government" for this, as it's unclear who exactly intervened. A large part of the blame for this has to fall on Melbourne IT and their pisspoor procedures.. I bet they'd believe ANYBODY who rang up and claimed to be from the government. Shucks, perhaps I should give 'em a call and pretend to be John Howard.. although my English accent might give me away, though probably not.
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
looks like this was not Minitrue approved!
And there I was thinking parodical works were protected
Google cached the site http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:cQX3U8xCBCgJ:w ww.johnhowardpm.org/+&hl=en&gl=uk&ct=clnk&cd=1
Politicians are in the public eye, and should expect satire and public attention. No one forced them to be politicians. Danish cartoons causing bloodshed, and now this. Does the Australian government think its people so dumb that they can't distinguish parody from sincerity?
What a miserable miserable world we live in.
Politicians should grow some thicker skin in Oz. Hard to imagine a more thin skinned bunch, what next, censorship, oh, wait, that's exactly what it is.
50 years ago, March 17th, 1956, Fred Allen, born May 31, 1894 in Cambridge MA to irish catholic parents, famed comedy writer and radio comedian, died of a heart attack while walking his dog.
I'll toast him with a pint of Guinness. Thanks Fred, for all the laughs.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Of course, I'm not Australian, and I may not be catching their humor.
However, the PDF document looks "offical" enough to possibly be the "real thing".
If this is satire, it's not translating well. It's no surprise the government wanted it taken down.
I'm glad to see that Australia now has the same level of freedoms as Iran, North Korea, and China.
I love the Austrailian people and I hope that the US will liberate them from their repressive government sometime soon.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
He said that after two days of silence, a customer service representative from Melbourne IT today informed him by telephone that the site had "been closed on the advice from the Australian Government"
People know censorship when they see it.
People do not like being censored.
I suggest if you are an Aussie and this bothers you, vote John Howard and his friends out of office.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Don't they have free speech in Austrailia?
This wouldn't happen in the USA because we have free speech. Except if a lesbian is offended, then it's sexual harrassment. Or on campuses with a speech code. Or it you want to advertise cigarettes. Or alcohol. Or if you want to run political ads, then it might violate campaign finance reform, even if it's exactly like this John Howard web site.
So this wouldn't happen in the USA in the early 80s. We sort-of had free speech back then.
Well, I've looked at the PDF of the satire website, comparing it with the real deal, and I have to say that the two are extremely similar....virtually identical with the exception of content. In this light, the reason offered by Bruce Tonkin, the chief technology officer of Melbourne IT, holds a bit of water: Upon closer observation, however, this reason leaks like a sieve. The parody websise is not a direct copy...far from it, since the content is radically different. This reason also conveniently glosses over the rather important fact that the Melbourne IT was ordered to yank the website by the Australian Government.
Mr.Tonkin goes on to say: Phishing??? Phishing for what??? This claim is patently ridiculous.
The reason Melbourne IT yanked the website is pure and simple: they were told to by the Government.
Our fundamental human rights are being slowly whittled away...not only in America, but around the world. There is no save harbor. There is nowhere to hide from the oppression. Concerned citizens have to make a stand now...not because it is the right thing to do, but because they have no other option, finding themselves with their backs against the wall.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Well at last he's doing something about sedition instead of just talking about it. I'd better stop thinking freely.
Any Australian would know this is a fake speech because the Mr Howard is pathologically unable to apologise for anything.
I’m old enough to remember 16K of memory being described as “whopping”
We would, but there's nobody to vote into office. All we can chose from is a bunch of near-identical lying pricks.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
This is one of those tricky intersections of "rights" and "law." Note that "rights" are things we have whether the law recognizes it or not. That's the classic liberal "natural law" version, and it's what most modernized democracies found their legal system on. Among those rights are speech, especially the right to speech of a political nature. The law protects IP because such laws ultimately benefit everybody (in theory), but this guy MIGHT be breaking IP laws to make a political statement. My take would be that his political statement isn't being silenced, just this particular method of making it. The guy could probably re-package or re-do the web site to make it more clearly a parody and get around the IP laws on this. What pisses me off is that it was just SHUT DOWN rather than trying this very reasonable intermediate step.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Parody isn't the only "fair use." "Fair Use" is a legal standard established in title 17 of the US code. Basically it says that reproducing a copyrighted work without authorization is permissible if it is considered to be for "fair use." To determine whether a usage is fair or not, there are four tests that can be applied:
Works of parody are usually given pretty broad latitude as being permissible under the first category.
However, pretty much none of this is applicable to the Australian issue, since, to my knowledge, Australia doesn't have a fair use doctrine. In fact, according to Wikipedia, the only countries that do are the US and the Phillipines. In Australia, I think the legal test would be "fair dealing". If the wiki is correct, parody does not appear to be a provision of that doctrine.
Australians have no legal guarantee of free speech and we've never demanded one. All Western Governments have been clamping down on human rights since 9/11 and people keep voting them back in.
We'd all do better off without such hateful speech.
Betterment through censorship is a one step forward-two steps backwards maneuver.
damaged by dogma
In the U.S. we're supposed to be a beacon of freedom and tolerance. When we don't meet these ideals, they should be pointed out. In fact, people are doing us a favor for pointing out our flaws because it's possible we don't see them ourselves.
Let me use an analogy... If I have some food on the corner of mouth after I eat, I hope my friends will tell me about it, and not just ignore it because some guy down the hall spilled his entire meal on his tie.
People from around the world point out our flaws because we're disappointing them. After we did so much to liberate the world from tyranny in the 20th century, they want us to continue in the 21st. And if we don't meet that benchmark, then they want to tell us to get better.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Historically, free societies have been controlled very easily because the means of mass producing propoganda were easily centered in the hands of a few elites. Basically, the same people who sold you your thoughts every day were the ones who bought your government every day. The internet has blown the hinges off this system. Now, you have small fries all over the world projecting power and strength well beyond what the system has determined is their right. One blog, backed by a good mind, can destroy a politician. And the bastards are scared. This sort of arbitrary exercise of authority is exactly what people do when they're scared. The system is trying to get a handle on the internet, before the internet becomes big enough and strong to end their control of the means of production of propoganda. Unfortunately, that boat has already sailed. It's hard being a pol.
I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
The Oz Government requested that the site be taken down on the grounds of a potential copyright infringement. It's unclear from the article how the request was made, but they usually come in the form of a "take-down" issued by the Australian Communications and Media Authority under the Broadcasting Services Act (Google 'em, I'm lazy) which goes to the orgainsation hosting the site and says that there's a website which uses copyrighted material without the authority of the copyright holder, please take it down within 48 hours (IIRC). Process open to abuse? Absolutely.
Take Down notices don't turn up as often as you'd think but even if one wasn't issued, when the Government called Melbourne IT, you can bet that they said "how high"..
Fair use. Yes, Australia has Fair Use exceptions within their copyright regime and they extend to the use of copyrighted material for the purposes of satire. This site clearly falls within the exception.
Further, Australians have an "implied right" of "freedom of political communication". Basically, the Australian Consitution "implies" that Australians have the right of free speech insofar as that speech relates to politicians and the political process (ie because your speech relates to the election of government and by extension politicians, you are free to say what you want - approximately accurate nutshell). It's actually quite restricted and has failed as a defence (it's not a positive right like the US right, only a defence) on a number of occasions, most notably when a satirical song was created about an Australian politician called Pauline Hanson by a satirist called Pauline Pantsdown. It was an hilarious satire using Pauline Hanson's own words but mixed up & rephrased (definitely worth googling).
I gues that the end story here is that the Australian Govt. have done themselves NO favours. Requesting the site be taken down was always going to make the press and was always going to go against the Govt. End result is better publicity for his piece.
And it's not bad - gets the tone right and doesn't resort to the usual "nah-nah-nah" that passes for political satire in Australia.
Pretty much spot on, content included.
And could someone do the guy a favour & mirror the PDF?
Go and read the PDF. Now assume that its been sent to you, as-is. Nothing whatsoever on that indicates in any way, shape, or form that it was a work of Satire, that those words did not come from John Howard. Its not as if it was posted on The Onion, or another similar site, that clearly indicates it is not official.
Now look down at the bottom. There's a copyright link which, like a lot of other links on the site, actually leads to the official website's copyright page. By doing that, and by not having anything anywhere on the page that identifies the authors in any other way, they may well have actually assigned copyright (I'm not familiar with the intracies of Australian copyright law). In that case, as the copyright owners (if not the authods), they were completly within their rights to insist that the piece be removed.
There's satire, and then there's impersonation. To me, for something to be protected even if satirical there would have to be some way, other than a personal evaluation of the content of the attributed text, for them to be able to tell that they're not looking at a "true" website. It can be evocative of the original, but should not be too easily mistaken for it. In the same way that, in the 'States, Saturday Night Live can use the presidential trappings for a "Press Conference" but if they were to broadcast a) without a laugh track, and b) using a body double instead of a "regular" actor, and c) react accordingly - they'd get in trouble too.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
You're just not getting it (no disrespect). As an Aussie, yo uonly really need to read the firsst couple of lines to know that this is satire. The content of the thing is SO radically removed from John Howard's stance as to be an obvious satire. Australia has quite a history (bit like the British with The Office) of doing satire that *looks* like it could be/should be real. If you're American, imagine that this purported to come straight from GW... I imagine you'd look at it and *know* that it was a joke. Same story here.