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Australia To Block BitTorrent
Kevin 7Kbps writes "Censorship Minister Stephen Conroy announced today that the Australian Internet Filters will be extended to block peer-to-peer traffic, saying, 'Technology that filters peer-to-peer and BitTorrent traffic does exist and it is anticipated that the effectiveness of this will be tested in the live pilot trial.' This dashes hopes that Conroy's Labor party had realised filtering could be politically costly at the next election and were about to back down. The filters were supposed to begin live trials on Christmas Eve, but two ISPs who volunteered have still not been contacted by Conroy's office, who advised, 'The department is still evaluating applications that were put forward for participation in that pilot.' Three days hardly seems enough time to reconfigure a national network."
I was in Australia about three years ago, and I was struck by a sense that it really does appear to be a nanny state. As for examples, unless I gave them all it would seem they were individually petty, but as a whole I got that impression and it has stuck with me since (this is no reflection on the people or the place itself) - I'm sure I didn't imagine it. For years we have been fed the image that Australians are laid back and chilled out but it really didn't seem the case to me, and this seems to be a further example.