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A Comparative Study of Internet Censorship
An anonymous reader suggests we visit the home of the watchdog group Global Integrity for a breakdown of online censorship: "Using data from the Global Integrity Index, we put a US court's recent order to block access to anti-corruption site Wikileaks.org into context. In summary: This is unheard of in the West, and has only been seen in a handful of the most repressive regimes. Good thing it doesn't work very well... The whole event seems to encapsulate the constant criticism of governance in the United States: that the government has been captured by corporate interests, and that the world-leading rule of law and technocratic mechanisms in place can be hijacked to serve as tools for narrow, wealthy interests."
WikiLeaks is available at it's IP address: http://88.80.13.160/ also a mirror site: http://wikileaks.be/ For the docs at the centre of the controversy, you can get them at http://cryptome.org/wikileaks-bjb.htm
Barbara Felden claims prior art on the flip phone, sues Motorola, Nokia.
Because they are? Hell, I'm Canadian, I love my country, and even I have to admit that the USA does an immense number of things extremely well. Technology, for one - there is a reason that the majority of the world's tech R&D occurs in the USA, or is funded by the USA. The Americans have a strong history of "stealing" the best and brightest from all the countries of the world, and making them work for Uncle Sam. With promises of a better quality of life, freedom from persecution, and a culture where performance is rewarded, the US *is* the world leader in these things.
Of course, that is all changing somewhat suddenly now. Recent administrations have sabotaged scientific research funding for religious and partisan purposes, skilled immigrants are now the target of hatred, instead of being welcomed with open arms. Millions of Muslims are being socially ostracized and targeted for doing absolutely nothing except being non-Christian.
Don't get me wrong, America still does a lot right. But if you guys want to maintain your position as the grand superpower of the world, you need to seriously turn some of that shit around. It's already going to take DECADES to fix your foreign policy disaster, your economic fuckups, and restore scientific and technological integrity to your academia... so get started.
Oh, and more to the point, the USA *is* still among the best in freedom of speech. You know, they're the country where displaying Confederate flags is legal, KKK rallies are legal... whereas in, say, Germany, displaying any sort of Nazi symbolism is a good way to get hauled off to jail. This isn't a value judgment, just an observation that one land is clearly more free than the other, for better or for worse.
"The whole event seems to encapsulate the constant criticism of governance in the United States: that the government has been captured by corporate interests, and that the world-leading rule of law and technocratic mechanisms in place can be hijacked to serve as tools for narrow, wealthy interests."
People always spout this kind of nonsense when they're trying to argue for more government controls. The government is corruptible. The problem is not that the people in charge are corrupt, this can/will/has be/been true for any entity with any kind of authority that has ever existed, does currently exist , or ever will exist. If you don't want a corrupt government, you're out of luck. The best you can do is to give the government as little authority as possible.
In the US, anyone can sue anyone for anything. This is the best possible arrangement of affairs, but it invariably means that you will end up with rulings like this one. If you read up on the case, you will see that the bank is claming that their ex-CEO is trying to use the website to influence the outcome of a separate legal case. So whose right would be more important, the right of the ex-CEO to leak confidential documents, of the right of the bank to have a fair court case in Sweden? People like to make these things seem cut and dry, but they're not.
First, a "lowly" court judge in the United States CAN "make" law. If his/her decision is accepted as precedent (as it MUST, unless reason is later demonstrated to overturn it), then even a municipal judge can "change law". Further, it does not even have to be a judge. A jury can change law, and that decision too would have to be overturned by a higher court in order for that change to be invalidated. [http://www.fija.org/]
Second, the US *does* have laws regarding "hate speech" and other "hate crimes". They might typically be state laws rather than federal, but that does not negate the fact that they exist in much if not most of the United States. Having said that, I will add that I personally believe "hate crime" to be among the most ridiculous legal concepts so far devised by man.
Third, the United States has very strong libel laws. The difference is that unlike in many nations, libel must generally be proven before it can be punished. Also, libel against "public figures" is much harder to prove... but that is by design, and for very good reason. (In many other places, speech against politicians or other "public figures" is punished much more harshly than speech against other citizens. But that does not mean that libel laws do not exist in the US. They do... they are just fairer than most.)
And finally, the fact that it is worse elsewhere does NOT mean that it is good here. That is like saying to one man in line, "Look, you only got a broken finger! The next guy in line has a broken leg!"... and then using that to justify breaking fingers. Sorry, but it is not a valid argument.
This is not going well for Bank Julius Baer.
Press reaction is very favorable to Wikileaks. The New York Times even published the IP address of Wikileaks. There's favorable coverage in The Associated Press, the British press, the Australian press, etc. Since it's on the AP feed, it's going to be in papers across the US tomorrow. Not much TV coverage yet.
Bank Julius Baer is trying to take their US business public. Their proposed billion dollar IPO could be derailed by these disclosures.
God I hate this debate. Are we as a nation arrogant. Probably, yes. Are we as individuals, arrogant. Nope. Most of us have long ago learned we've lost our edge in several areas, if we ever had an edge to begin with in those areas is still under debate. But if we aren't world leading... why is so much of the world bound and determined to follow our lead? Iraq? Guess who Europe followed there. Afganastan. Guess who Europe followed there, again. Patent laws? Well, the rest of the world seems hell bent on adopting American versions there of. Copyright? Same thing. If you want us to stop thinking we are world leaders, simply stop following. Its that simple. Our research base may not be what it was, our education system may be in the crapper, and our manufacturing may as not well exist. But if the rest of the world keeps following us into our doom... Then like as not, we are world leading. You got a couple choices, China and India have the potential to be, hell, for that matter Russia still has the potential to be.. But you keep choosing America. Its your own damn fault.
Posted anonymously for legal analysis. The following is my opinion and my opinion only.
Every lay discussion of the orders in this case have gotten it wrong about what happened. The judge did not have second thoughts about granting the injunction. There are two orders, and they are directed at separate parties, even though they are part of the same case.
The first order is the settlement with the registrar. The registrar Dynadot settled with Bank Julius Bear to dismiss any claims BJB may have against it, in return for the permanent injunction that you see there. Dynadot agreed to do, among other things, lock the domain, disable it, preserve all DNS data, and produce all information it has about who registered the hostname and who had access to it.
This permanent injunction, between BJB and Dynadot, is not binding on Wikileaks, because Wikileaks was not a party to it. I think this is the big story here. Essentially Dynadot rolled over and settled with BJB without letting Wikileaks participate in the process or have any say whatsoever. Depending on the terms of its registration agreement, Wikileaks could very well file a complaint against Dynadot for unjustly terminating its service. Be wary of your registrars and internet service providers, because if this stands, they can agree to terminate your service without your involvement.
The second order is a temporary restraining order against Wikileaks, prohibiting them from publishing the documents at issue. They are listed at the end of the order. Unfortunately for BJB, due to the the way Wikileaks is architected, the operators of Wikileaks do not host the documents themselves, nor can they order their removal. Is Wikileaks concerned about any legal consequences? The answer is no. "We design the software, and promote its human rights agenda, but the servers are run by anonymous volunteers." That's why those who run the company have nothing to do in response to the injunction and why the documents are still online. Wikileak's response is due tomorrow Feburary 20th at noon, and the hearing will be on Friday February 29th at 9:00am at 450 Golden Gate Ave., San Francisco, California 94102 at the US Courthouse, so be sure to show up!
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org