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Aussie Censorship "Live Trials" Won't Be Live
Xiroth writes "In what could be the first step to backing down on the plans to censor the Australian Internet, Communication Minister Stephen Conroy has made it known that the live trials of the Government filter will not, in fact, be live, instead being downgraded to a closed network test. Given that this would provide no further information than what Government tests have already provided, this may prove to be a face-saving measure before the plan is quietly scrapped. Nonetheless, concerned Australians are encouraged to attend protests planned for this weekend to ensure that the Government gets the message."
It turns out the UK has been censoring the web all along.
I'm surprised this hasn't been on Slashdot already as it's been on the news quite a bit here.
How Things Work Everywhere Else:
1. Concept.
2. Pilot.
3. Evaluation. bad: Return to 1, or continue to 4.
4. Real world trial.
5. Evaluation. bad: Return to 1, or continue to 6.
6. Implementation
7. Fine-tuning
5. Evaluation. bad: Return to 7, or continue to 8.
8. Maintenance
How Things Work in Australia
1. Concept.
2. Real world trial.
3. Public relations debacle. bad: Return to 2, or continue to 4.
4. Implementation.
5. Drink beer.
6. Maintenance.
As you can see, everything is going according to plan. Just check your boots before you leave the server room. -_-
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Who is willing to bet that the testing is done over "carefully controlled" conditions designed to hide all the faults of the system?
No sig for the moment.
I'm certainly attending, though my efforts to rally my friends have been hampered by their SHE-DEVILS of girlfriends who all have plans for that day. Damn their icy hearts!
Seeing as these filters are so ridiculously easy to bypass, a major concern for me lately is how they'll be handling people who use these methods, especially since they have perfectly legitimate applications *besides* bypassing the filter.
Ezekiel 23:20
If the plan were only to block specified illegal content, then aside from technical issues, I would agree.
The problem is they plan to block "unwanted" content, with no definition of "unwanted" being offered. They can legally block anything they don't want. That is incredibly dangerous.
...My Sig Sucks...
Who decides what to censor? Why do they get to decide? Put 4 Aussies (or, for simplicity, 4 humans),in a room, and you'll get 6 opinions. I'm in favour of censoring you. What if I were awarded that right by whomever you have chosen gets to decide? How would you feel about censorship then? cheers,
Speaking as an Australian - I would rather this than the "freedom" the US people strive for where the most immoral things are allowed to survive in the name of individual rights.
Speaking as another Australian - I built a Time Machine, would you like to use it for getting back to 1930's Germany?
Far be it from me to be rude normally, in this instance your commentary has stirred me to it - Sir, or Madam, you are an ignorant idiot.
A Man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties -- Albert Einstein
Finally there seems to be some resistance to this stupid plan from people other than from nerds & libertarians. Major newspapers are against the filter (the scope of which the Governement altered after they were elected) and Telstra, the most corporate of corporations, are even telling them to take a running jump. The Communications Minister isn't doing his little scheme any favours by refusing to discuss it in Parliament. Maybe Australia can stop being the laughing stock of the internet, if only for a little while.
Between the falling angel and the rising ape
Why bother to implement a system that will only affect the people that it is least aimed at?
Child pornography (and the other psuedo legitimate targets of this filtering) is already illegal, this should be an enforcement issue, not a censorship one.
Whilst ISP's may be reluctant to cooperate with the MPAA/RIAA to catch "pirates", I can't imagine any of them shielding a child predator for a single second.
As an aside, yes I am Australian, yes I've lodged an official protest and YES if implemented, I intend to bypass these retarded filters.
At no time, in any document, media interview, or Parliament Question Time, has Senator Conroy EVER fully answered any question regarding "unwanted" content. There had been a vague definition offered, but there has never been any SPECIFIC definition offered. Conroy refuses to inform us any further as to his definition of "unwanted" content.
As for your other comment - There are some very good reasons for Censorship. The implementation of censorship is usually the problem. In this case, as is usually the case for censorship, it is the MINORITY that decides what the majority is allowed to see. My issue is when this minority is allowed to censor what they like, and the majority cannot intervene in anyway.
Thank you for your flame. It has allowed me to explain myself further.
...My Sig Sucks...
Censorship is never a good idea (or even "not a bad idea" ). You probably think that because you probably never lived in a country where real censorship existed (and often with "immoral" people "disappearing", after all, it's easier to silence the critics as they appear than to dismiss and censor all that they say).
If you let the government tell you what is "immoral" and what isn't , you go in a pretty slippery slope. Today you may have a "good" government; but no one knows if tomorrow the members of your government go insane and define that now you will live under a dictatorship which will allow them to filter anything they consider "immoral".
Now, what is a good idea is parents educating their children for the real world , teaching them that different opinions exist and some of them are (according to some societies, religious or political groups) immoral . Shielding children from the world will only lead to a mass of sheep that can be easily controlled by the media and the government and can't take their own decisions.
It's a good thing you don't get to speak for the rest of us.
Honestly, I am quite able to make up my own mind as to what I can read or look at. I don't need anyone making that determination for me.
As the great Frank Zappa once said, "There is no sound that you can make with your mouth, or word that will come out of your mouth, that is so powerful that it will make you go to hell", and in the same vein there is no image or word you can see or read that will 'sabotage your mind' against women and children. What you decide as content that 'leads to a depraved mind' might be classified by others as just simple harmless garbage which most people will just ignore and never seek out anyway.
It doesn't matter what kind of censorship they do, nobody can ever do a thorough job. There is simply too much garbage out there that would need to be filtered, and stuff will always slip through. Even the tests that showed they were blocking large amounts of legitimate content also showed that they were letting through some content that should have been blocked. So much of the truly abhorrent shit that they're wanting to block, child pornography, isn't even traded out in the open via the web anyway; it's traded via DCC on efnet or other IRC networks, or on private SSL secured boards that change IPs regularly.
One of the many stupid things about this is that given the above being true, the amount of money required to implement the government's plan will end up increasing our connectivity costs even more than they are today, for no discernible benefit.
So, in summary, whether or not you think censorship of the internet is a good idea or not, it's pointless because no matter what you do, you'll fail in your objectives, and end up just costing the public more money trying to force your morality on them.
If you want to censor something, having a list of censored things only makes people more curious. It's much better (for the censors) to keep the censored list secret.
This reminds me of the anecdote of the old lady who went to compliment Samuel Johnson for not putting any "bad words" on his dictionary.
-- "Why, did you look up all of them"? was the answer.
Or, as this site so admirably puts it,
The national classification system defines "illegal" content. It still does not define Conroy's "unwanted" content.
I will say it one last time. You have clearly not read the national classification legislation. Otherwise you wouldn't be consistently making incorrect statements. Stop being ignorant, go read it, or shut the fuck up. I don't think this is unfair. You don't know what you're talking about, and you have the means to educate yourself, but you choose not to.
Restriction of material is by definition censorship.
I agree.
Censorship is not inherently bad.
I disagree. Would you care to make an argument? I really am interested in hearing it. You have an open platform. Please, let us know why you think censorship is not inherently bad.
How we know is more important than what we know.
There has been a recent court decision in New South Wales (a state in Australia), where images of Bart and Lisa Simpson engaged in sex acts are considered child porn and a citizen has been fined for having such images on computer he owned. If the national filter is to prevent child porn the scale of filtering is just mind boggling. (There are various references to the court decision... here is one example http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24771973-16947,00.html )
In fact, they've already indicated that they're looking to ban illegal but morally grey information ...
Of the greatest concern is that the list of what is blocked is secret. Most Australians, myself included, would not disagree with censorship to some degree. However this is a power which in the hand of executive government (or indeed a private organisation) has a great potential for abuse. Consequently what is required is complete transperancy. The secrecy of current plan achieves the opposite of what our system of government requires.
The biggest concern, of course, is the potential censoring of political speech.
Exactly! And given the decisions of the High Court regarding the "implied right to political communication," inherent in the Constitution, it is also beyond the power of government to do so. If, however, we are to be kept in the dark as to what is being banned, how can we have any confidence a government is not indulging in such unconstitutional behaviour?
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
There is now also a protest organized for Canberra.
Garema Place, Civic from 12pm-2pm
Make SELinux enforcing again!
I've read all your comments. You have said:
There are some very good reasons for Censorship. The implementation of censorship is usually the problem. In this case, as is usually the case for censorship, it is the MINORITY that decides what the majority is allowed to see. My issue is when this minority is allowed to censor what they like, and the majority cannot intervene in anyway.
At some levels, censorship is useful. Do you want you 12yo child to be taught the Dirty Sanchez in school? I'm not saying that it should be used as a magic bullet. As I've previously stated, it's the IMPLEMENTATION of censorship that is more often than not the issue.
Censorship is not good or evil, it is a device by which we control what can bee seen. It is used everyday. It is when control over censorship is handed to a minority with an agenda that it becomes a problem. This is the problem we face with Conroy's filtering plan.
Repeating yourself and declaring your opinion to be correct does not an argument make. Why do you think censorship is "useful"? What are these "good reasons" you have for censorship? I believe that no-one has a right to decide what I can and cannot read. Convince me otherwise.
How we know is more important than what we know.
"In what could be the first step to backing down on the plans to censor the Australian Internet
You really believe that? Surely more likely is that this is being done to further remove the possiblity of yet more criticism of what is universally regarded to be a stupid idea so they can go ahead with it regardless.
Not that it really matters because we all know, as Senator Conroy has already revealed, that anyone that against this idea is in support of child porn anyway. I wish I could find the article to quote.
Where is it? Come on Rudd, where the hell is the broadband infrastructure promised during the campaign?
This is what gets to me the most of all in this debate, they have not even begun to build the infrastructure they promised to build, and here we are bogged down in this utter waste of time instead! I am dead set against the censorship plan, but what I am even more pissed off about is that the national broadband scheme has taken a back seat to this bullshit!
The one reason this government appealed to me is that they appeared to understand the importance of infrastructure to the digital economy. But it seems like they are not even close to getting it.
Taking part in the protests is the first (and very important step). Here is the list of places where protests will be held:
Melbourne:
Saturday 13 December
State Library
12pm-5pm
Sydney:
Saturday 13 December
Town Hall
11am-4pm
Brisbane:
Saturday 13 December
Brisbane Square
11am-3pm
Adelaide:
Saturday 13 December
Parliament
12pm-4pm
Hobart:
Saturday 13 December
Parliament Lawns
11am-1:30pm
Canberra:
Saturday 13 December
Garema Place, Civic
12pm-2pm
Please also consider taking the following actions:
1) Call Senator Conroy's office on 03 9650 1188. Do not be rude, do not swear, just in a very reasoned and rational voice, express your disapproval, and in a few short sentences, say why you disagree. It matters a lot.
2) Write a letter to Senator Conroy, make sure it's between half a page to one page (no more than 400 words). Again, in a polite tone (that doesn't have to be formal, and doesn't have to have letterhead, etc., just your name and address) let him know why you disagree with him. His address is:
Senator Stephen Conroy
Level 4, 4 Treasury Place
Melbourne Vic 3002
3) Write a letter to your local MP. It doesn't matter what party he/she is from, Liberals will use your letter to back up their claims in Question Time, which gives publicity to the whole issue and will bring it to mainstream media's attention. Labor members will also express their criticism, privately, to him. This specially matters if your local MP is a Minister and serves in the Cabinet. To find out who your local MP is click here.
4) Write a letter to Prime Minister Rudd. Let him know that when the Australian people voted him in office last year, they didn't know "Education Revolution" means censorship. Rudd's address is:
PO Box 6022
House of Representatives
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
5) Donate or become a member of Electronic Frontiers Australia . Right now the EFA is the sole organisation fighting this. They need all the help they can get.
6) Write a letter to your ISP. It doesn't matter if it's the Evil Telstra; on this, we're all together. They are fighting the battle for us right now, but it would help them to know that what they are doing is a good business practice, that you expect them to fight this to the end.
Don't just sit around and do nothing and then complain about how evil governments are. We, the citizens are the ones who allow governments to become evil, by our political apathy. Move! Take Action! Now!
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