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Internet Filtering Lobby Forms
mbone writes "Wired's David Kravets reports on a new lobbying effort to support the filtering of internet traffic called Arts & Labs. Coverage is available at PC World as well. The lobby's members include AT&T, Cisco Systems, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Viacom and the Songwriters Guild of America. Their web site says, 'network operators must have the flexibility to manage and expand their networks to defend against net pollution and illegal file-trafficking which threatens to congest and delay the network for all consumers.' Does it seem that this is an attempt to categorize P2P with spam and malware, or is it just me?"
I'm suspicious of this. I concede that illegal filesharing is a problem, but it sounds more like an attempt to turn the internet into a tightly controlled broadcase medium, like television.
No more freerepublic and no more dailykos.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
I like that, "think of the children."
ISP's need to be able to filter whatever they want because of the children...or because they could then charge content providers extra if they want. Once you do away with net neutrality, we can rely on big businesses to help themselves. But don't worry, the robber barons will donate some money to the poor unfortunates that will no longer be able to compete. Or maybe they'll donate condoms to Africa with some of that money. Sorry, but I'm not feeling overly optimistic about the ability of most big businesses to play fairly, without getting laws passed that favor them.
Maybe some year when I'm not being asked to bail out slimeball businessmen with my taxes, I'll feel differently. BTW, 700 billion isn't much. Just take the net worth of the richest man in the world, multiply it by 13 or 14, and you're in the neighborhood. I was looking at figures and comments about social security, and it's called the largest government giveaway program. I think it'll be surpassed shortly.
Well aren't they all in it for the money? AT&T, Cisco and MS for the products and services that will be used for this, and NBC, Viacom and the music industry for the "stolen" revenues that this is trying to prevent. How is it not obvious this is all about money?
Click on People
2 Politicians
1 President of the Songwriters Guild of America
1 Lawyer
need I say more?
if you visit the forums of popular gaming sites like IGN or Gamespot, you've probably seen moderators crack down on discussions of modding, emulation, CFW, or homebrew development.
i can understand if they don't allow users to discuss warez/piracy or other illegal activites because of potential liability issues. but the problem is they also try to lump console modding, custom firmware, and homebrew development together with piracy & illegal file sharing.
i found this out when i posted to a discussion about a PSX game and mentioned that i was running it on my PSP via PopStation. my post was immediately censored and i was given a warning about my TOS violation.
all i'd written in the post was that i wished this title were available on the PSN store so that i didn't have to convert it into a POPS file myself. there was no mention of any illegal activity or even file sharing, so i decided to check out the IGN message board's TOS. however, the TOS simply forbids the discussion of criminal activities and copyright infringement--though the IGN TOS considers ROMs and emulators a form of copyright infringement.
i had to explain to the mods that using PopStation to play a PSX game is not illegal and the PopStation i referred to was the PSX emulator Sony included in newer versions of the official PSP firmware. furthermore, there is nothing illegal about ripping a PSX disc and converting it to a POPS eboot file. that is fully within my fair use rights, just as ripping a music CD into MP3s or movie DVD into XviD vidoes is considered fair use. it's only the illegal distribution of MP3s, that is forbidden. so long as i don't share those files with others, i am not breaking the law.
but this kind of deliberate corporate posturing has been going on for so long, and is so prevalent, that the public has started to buy into the attitude that any kind of fair use outside of what's sanctioned by corporate industries is illegal or taboo, and must be discussed in secrecy. that's why these days you even get members of the public sticking up for corporate interests and equivocating MP3, P2P, file sharing, homebrew, modding/CFW, etc. with piracy.
i guess if we're conditioned to think that way then it'll be much easier to lobby for legislation that tosses out fair use altogether--or legislation to allow ISPs to filter internet traffic to combat P2P filesharing.
Ummm.....Actually,the child pr0n thing is kinda a red herring. I have a buddy at the state crime lab that specializes in computer forensics. He says it is actually quite rare to catch anyone getting their pervo fix through P2P anymore. They have set up invitation only darknets hosted from forums in countries that don't give a sh*t as long as your money is good and trade the smaller files through the darknets and the larger ones they actually ship to each other through the mail as encrypted DVDs. So while I'm sure that you get a few really stupid pervs if you banned P2P tomorrow,the majority probably wouldn't even be slowed down.
And I know this will probably be modded flamebait,but what the hell,it has always bugged me about the "war" on kiddy pr0n. Why in the hell are we spending so damned much time and money going after the sick perv wanking off in his basement instead of,oh I don't know,actually rescuing the horribly abused kids from the monsters that are f*cking them on camera? According to my friend these guys are making so much money off this sh*t they even have child pr0n "studios" like you have regular porn studios. Shouldn't we be concentrating our efforts there? These "wars" just strike me more and more as bullsh*t,like trying to stop drugs by busting the junkie on the corner while the big boys are bringing semi loads in across the border. Surely there has to be a money trail that can be followed. It has just always bugged me that we seem to worry about the perv in the basement more than the kid being raped on the screen.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.