Slashdot Mirror
UK Culture Secretary Wants Website Ratings, Censorship
kaufmanmoore writes "UK culture secretary Andy Burnham calls for a website rating system similar to the one used for movies in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. He also calls for censorship of the internet, saying, 'There is content that should just not be available to be viewed.' Other proposals he mentions in his wide-ranging calls for internet regulation are 'family-friendly' services from ISPs, and requiring takedown notices to be enforced within a specific time for sites that host content. Mr. Burnham wants to extend his proposals across the pond and seeks meetings with the Obama administration."
*cringes in agony* Please, please, please don't bring censorship into UK. It will certainly be used in the way that the Chinese censorship is used. Why the hell does someone in every country think "Let's censor internet!"? Internet is not something to be censored, it's composed of the work of people who want to communicate. The government shouldn't choose what people can communicate to each other and what they can't.
No ascii art.
There is content that should just not be available to be viewed.
Don't tell me they can do that? I'm pretty sure that would be completely unconstitutional here in Belgium. And why do these idiots keep messing with our internet. You don't like, don't visit it.
I friggin' hate Modern Art and that's why I stay away from museums.
As long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields.
I think I speak for everyone here when I say: "Good luck with that".
In practice, of course, this is not really a serious proposal - it's merely a way of seeing (from the reaction) who amenable the public would be to being censored.
Sadly, most people have such a degree of scorn for this and other governments, that they won't take this seriously - or make any comments about it. The consequence being that the "public opinion" - whichever way it comes out - will be decided by a small, ignorant, but vocal minority who have their own agenda or fears.
Whatever happens, it won't represent the opinions of the people - but that's "democracy" for you.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Virgins were killed.,
Also, Wikipedia censors by calling things "not notable" or "unreliable sources". And this will be censored too.
Burnham is a moron. This is another great example of a minor politician grasping at something to make him-/herself seem more important, and resulting in him appearing more stupid than dirt.
If something in the region of 90% of all websites are outside the UK, how on earth can this be implemented and enforced? The US has strict laws on censorship, so this cannot work there, so I can't see why he's wasting his time trying to get the US involved, unless he's simply posturing and trying to boost his ego.
Andy - wake up, you'll end up being a laughing stock, not a hero.
I unreservedly apologise for our stupid politicians. Unfortunately, many of them don't reveal themselves as barking until after they get elected and then get given a Government job. I believe that you in the US have had similar problems in the past.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
so myspace and msn gets blocked from under 18s I take it? brilliant, bring it on!
The Internet Watch Foundation, protectors of the British citizenry against uncceptable material on teh intarweb, have declared Wikipedia illegal in the UK.
Several police forces had advised the IWF concerning the site, swearing their actions had nothing to do with anything in the site about senior policemen or their behaviour.
"The fourth most popular website in the world is an encyclopedia," said IWF Obersturmgruppenwhitehouse Myra Hindley. "What sort of message does that send about the youth of today? They should be using mobile phones, dealing drugs, smoking cracks to 'jazz' music in discos and knifing each other in the streets. God help us if they see record covers!"
Police across the country used sophisticated hammer-detecting equipment to swoop on the homes of rumoured Wikipedophiles. All computers, mobile phones, televisions and any technology more sophisticated than scissors will be confiscated for investigation, and will be returned in due process in twelve to eighteen months when the filthy fucking nonces have been brought to trial, assuming they survive multiple beatings in jail.
"Fuck these filthy fucking fuckers," said Zoe fucking Hilton of the NSPCC. "And give us money, or you're a filthy fucking kiddie fucker yourself. Turd."
"We absolutely won't be adapting the system to discussion of ID cards," said Home Secretary Jacqui Smith. "Nor will MPs raising the issue have their offices or homes raided. Probably."
Virgin Media users had failed to notice any difference, assuming the connection problems were service as normal, and went back to watching the football except for the last ten minutes of the game.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
There is nothing in principle wrong with "movie style ratings" for sites. The question is two fold:
- How will it be enforced?
- Who will [pay] to enforce it?
If the answer to the first question is "software that users put onto their systems" then I am fine with that. Parents should have the power to control what their own kids view. We're always talking about parents taking parental responsibility so let's give them TOOLS to do so.
The second question is who will enforce these movie style ratings? Now that is really the hard part as you have 90% of the internet outside of the control of the US and UK governments unless they wish to put up some kind of firewall (bad plan).
I think everyone should get together, Governments, ISPs, and internet standards bodies and come up with a cheap, and simple way to mark all sites.
Then the UK and US should mandate it within their own borders and put international pressure on other countries to do the same.
That way we will give parents control, make the parental software really work, and give governments less ammo to firewall the Internet for us adults.
. . . but the year of Internet Censorship!
To all you former UK citizens, I would like to say a hearty, "Welcome to Vietnam!"
Try the Pho.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Run it through the English->American translator. Yes, they said the word "censorship". However, you will find that you do indeed have censorship the other side of the pond too. You just have a taboo against calling it censorship. Is kiddy porn illegal? Yes? That's censorship. The only difference here is that people in the UK actually call it censorship instead of tiptoeing around it to double-think ourselves into maintaining the belief that the First Amendment is absolute. Nowhere is free from censorship. Every nation on earth has agreed that it is a good thing in specific circumstances. Even Sealand, the data-haven that was against censorship, had two laws. Both censorship. No spam, no kiddy porn.
So please, let's everybody get past the word "censorship", and move on to the actual proposals, shall we?
The rating system. That can be implemented in a benign manner. We already have technological solutions such as PICS that allow websites to self-rate. The family-friendly services from ISPs? Just disallow unrated content and let the parents set the permitted PICS content labels or analogue. Takedown notices within a timeframe? That's a tricky one. Obviously it can be accomplished for the cases where something is obviously against the sites terms of service, however in some cases, especially in cases of dishonest complaints, it can require effort to establish if something should be there or not, and mandatory takedown notices are going to push providers into just taking everything down upon a complain to be sure.
Virtually everything in the article can be implemented in a benign way. The important thing is not to rage against the machine, but to ensure the government actually goes about this in the right way, instead of being dumb and just trying to get the BBFC to classify things.
Content ain't "content" unless you're able to view it. This guy's attitude makes me cringe. You can't have freedom of speech unless you're willing to stand up and support your most vocal opponent's right to say the most offensive things. No one on the planet should tolerate groupthink attitudes like those of Culture Secretary Andy Burnham. Care to engage in a lively debate with him about the subject? Well, not without the necessary oversight, because, well, your statements might be harmful to Mr. Burnham's reputation or to the Office of the Collective Culture Ministry, and we can't have that, now can we?
Do you remember the TV commercials where they desperately plead with you that "This isn't your father's Oldsmobile."? Why would they do that? Because it *is* your father's Oldsmobile, and they know it.
Oh yes it is.
I'm sick of politicians limiting freedom to "protect" us. There is no need to have some mandatory rating of websites, movies, or music. It's all just political BS. Society gets along just fine without these ratings. The whole "protect the children" thing is a sham.
We have a Minister for Culture? WTF?
More snouts in the bloody trough. Bah.
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
Mr. Burnham wants to extend his proposals across the pond and seeks meetings with the Obama administration.
Same with Osama bin Laden, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other notable world leaders. Let's hope peer pressure doesn't sway anybody to think that censorship is a good idea.
When I was younger (late 90s), "South Park" was in its biggest craze, despite the fact that the Videos were rated "15" they were almost universally watched by younger children.
Also thanks to "pirates", any kid smart enough to use "piracy software" can download films without "verifying" their "age".
Age is just a number, I am now an "adult" according to the "law", and I can fucking do anything and you can't stop me. And I am not afraid of "Jail", you "jailed" me as a "child".
I spank monkeys at the zoo by the way.
Proxies are only useful if the government can't control them. Things aren't looking good now that democracies are taking the example of dictatorships and clamping down on the Internet. Having a proxy chain composed of different government regulated servers (and honey pots) isn't security.
This notion simply disgusts me and is a dangerous development, which clearly sets dangerous precedents which may be used to supress certain political dissent and create a saudi arabia like totalitarian state where everything from perfectly harmless pornography of consenting adults for consenting adults, to certain kinds of music and political views are illegal. this creeping vicious totalitarian trend is quite disturbing to me and creepy. As a supporter of free speech and liberty, I strongly oppose this idea, and that to protect our freedoms and human rights, this horrible idea which threatens the rights of the people should be totally defeated. It is quite clear that many countries are degenerating into a totalitarian police state where powerful elites may decide what you are allowed to see and hear. People did not fight and die in vain so that we would give up the freedoms we fought for. I am surprised that a country like the UK, which had a near death experience from the Nazis and was nearly invaded, and barely escaped having a totalitarian Nazi regime imposed on it, and fought hard to defend their rights and freedoms, will now willingly give up those rights and freedoms it worked so hard to protect.It seems, the mentality is, they saved their rights and freedoms from the Nazis just in time for them to willingly give themselves up themselves and turn their country into a big brother totalitarian police state of horrific proportions from within. The UK seems to be especially degenerationg into a police state very quickly, with more cameras per capita in London than any other city in a western country, and with police state tactics including mass surveillance and ID cars (nazi phrase: your papers please!).
I strongly hope that the citizens of the UK do not tolerate this gross abuse of power and erosion of their rights and liberties. Government should not be in a position to determine what people are allowed and not allowed to look at, and what they are allowed to say and publish and not allowed to say and publish. Government is clearly treating people like children, by creating a nanny state, a big brother state, which endangers the well being and safety of all people. Privacy is an essential part of freedom, and so is free speech and both are being totally violated by the UK government, through net surveillance and now censorship. The surveillance is an enabling factor which further allows establishment of a police state tyrannical order and destroys basic privacy expections at the cornerstone of any free society. This power can very easily be abused by governments seeking to create dossiers of views and opinions of its people,. this is the first step that allows them to be singled out and attacked by a government. And even if i am just e-mailing my grocery list, its not really any of the governments godd*#% business if I prefer to drink 2% lowfat organic milk. Just the concept of government of prying into our daily lives and personal communications and preferences, should outrage us and should be completely intolerable to us.
The censorship aspect should be completely defeated. The only thing which even remotely one could say it might be justified to censor is child pornography, but I am concerned that even that system could be abused, it would be too easy to add websites which might be politically unpopular by some to such a filter, "accidentilly", such as socialist or communist websites or ones critical of the prime minister or the queen. So for that reason i am opposed to the idea of any filter at all since it is a far greater danger to our freedom and is not warranted. Child pornography should be combatted by going after producers of it.
As far as a self ratings system which would encourage websites to self label themselves with a PICS label in the HTML code, for instance for violence and such,and thus allowing the consumer to choose whether or not to allow such content, this might be acceptable, as long as the consumer is control and will decide if any filtering will be applied. I do support putting the consumer in control and being able to opt-in by installing a filter on their computer. I am against any forced filtering which would be in direct violation of basic human and civil liberties.
I don't like the man. he was previously in charge of identity card legislation and was also a big supporter of the right of the state to detain 'terrorist suspects' for 42 days without any evidence of wrongdoing whatsoever.
While like everybody else here I'm absolutely opposed to anybody censoring my internet connection, I wonder if the politicians have ever thought that this could maybe be a public service that people could opt in to?
A decent content rating system that's made available by any ISP to customers who want to use it, with an independent body doing the ratings could be very useful to people who actually do want their content filtered. I can see it being useful to parents, some old folk would certainly use it, as would a few religious types.
Done as an opt in system (maybe even opt out at a push) it could achieve pretty much the same results, without antagonising all of us who feel we're old enough and mature enough to decide what we want to see.
This is something I've wondered whenever this topic comes up. Suppose I have a home server, and I've helped several friends build their own web sites on it. One friend has registered JoesKiddieSite.org and the name points to my IP address. Another friend has registered SuziesPornSite.com and that name also points to my IP address Yet another friend just uses my example.com domain, and I've set up SamsPetPics.example.com and SamsNudeMidgets.example.com domain names for him.
Are there one, three or four "sites" on my machine? Would a rating system give them all the same rating (presumably X), because they all have the same IP address and are thus the same "site"? Or would it give each of them a different rating, because they all have different domain names and are independent "sites"? Or would all pages owned by the same owner would be a single site, even if Sam keeps his two "virtual sites" strictly independent?
So far, I've never heard a coherent answer to such questions.
I have a curious case on my real machine, and on a remote account where all my stuff is mirrored in a guest account. Over 10 years ago, I got tired of the claim that if you put something online, any child can find it. So I put a naughty picture on my web site, an "artsy" picture of a naked woman, and challenged visitors to find it. So far, according to the server log and "ls -lu", nobody but me has ever accessed the photo. It's hidden by the most trivial method I know: the directory has an index.html file and there are no links to the image. So you can only find it if you type the bizarre random-looking name that I gave it. The question is: Because I state openly that the image exists, would my site get an X rating? Would a court subpoena the image's URL, and would I have to tell the judge how to find the picture?
It's pretty easy to come up with absurdities about such site ratings. As long as it's only search sites that are doing the rating, it doesn't much matter if they are occasionally nonsensical. But if written into law without dealing sensibly with questions like the above, it seems fairly clear that a legal rating system for web sites would be simply wrong much of the time. It might give JoesKiddieSite the same rating as SuziesPornSite the same rating due to a common address, or might give Sam's two "sites" the same rating due to a common owner.
Or perhaps someone has worked out a scheme to reasonably define "site" for legal purposes in a way that solves such problems. Anyone have a link to such a scheme?
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
That's all there is to say on the issue.
Although I would be interested in suggestions regarding how to best protect children from the Andy Burnhams of the world.
Hooray! More kneejerk legislation by people who quite evidently have far too much time on their hands. If Burnham is worried about what his kids might encounter online, there are such things as net filtering services to take care of this for him, though I suppose it is a little too much to hope for that the witless dingbats infesting the current Labour government could ever be aware of such things.
What happened to that plan to encrypt the entire internet? We need it ASAP! I think TPB came up with that: The Pirate Bay Wants to Encrypt the Entire Internet ... but the project seems to by dying out:-(
An open standard voluntary system would be fine, where webmasters can add some accepted code into the meta tags of their site so search engines can be trained to recognise and filter it. That way you could have user profiles on PC's as options like the movie ratings. You could then apply that age rating, which would then apply the filters to the search results. I know dansgardian is supposed to be good.
This solution would be more aimed at keeping inappropriate material away from minors. It also assumes a completely unfiltered output for adults who don't want filtered, which I don't think our esteemed Minister has in mind when he talks of censorship. It would also rely on webmasters knowing about, then deciding to apply the ratings system agreed on. It since it would be self applied. it also relies on webmasters all having a similar view of the guidelines of what is suitable for 13+ etc which I believe is all but impossible. This would bring in all sorts of legal issues. The web is worldwide, so enforcing anything will be difficult and very expensive (if at all possible).
New Labour are well known for throwing all sorts of red herring policies to the media to distract from some other Government business they need to get through. They tend to pick controversial topics they know will get the attention of the public. It's the Government equivalent of shaking a shiny bauble in front of a pram, while the other hand feels about inside the handbag hanging from it for the purse and any other valuables. These red herrings are never meant to be serious, they exist to distract the media and the public. When the frenzy has built enough they can back down and claim that they've "listened to the people". As has been said though....if the reaction is muted, they may just decide they can get away with actually doing it.
The best way to filter is for the parents to start getting clued about PC's, and for OS vendors to provide a preset profile mode which includes basic (easily GUI editable) filtering as a starting point. The parents need to set up profiles for their kids which match their age range. This of course relies on a hellavalota things that are not likely to happen, when that's more hassle that screaming at the government to "think of the children!". Besides, learning means "taking responsibility", and we can't have that can we?
the creepy bit is this line imo
We have got to get better at defining where the public interest lies and being clear about it.
does anyone else read this as
We have got to define where we think the public interest ought to lie and be clear about what content we are going to block
anyway, the net works round stupidity, so good luck with that.
SAVE THE CHILDREN!
I don't know what everyone is surprised about. The UK already has lists of banned books and movies. About 120 movies currently.
If they can ban anything, they can ban internet sites.
Unfortunately for him, the US government can't even ban a book. Nothing's going to come of it here.
... will it be before the average politician has the slightest clue about how the internet actually works, and is savvy enough to simply laugh off hopelessly stupid ideas like the one presented in this story?
I don't mean "technically", I just mean at least as good as the average 10 year old.
Do we really have to wait until the current crop is dead?
We live, as we dream -- alone....
I am not sure that our health service would cover them in the UK.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
His idea seems to be (although he is being vague about it, probably on purpose) to have ISPs only allow access to sites (in context presumably meaning IP addresses) that have a certificate - one we can only assume has to be applied for.
If this is indeed what he is suggesting, its horrific. For crying out loud, Iran only operates blacklists. We would officially have worse Internet censorship than a nation that executes women for being victims of rape.
The reason totalitarian nations haven't tried a whitelist by the way, is the amount of work it requires. Of course, that may work to the advantage of the UK government. A slow process of being allowed to publish controversial material on the web would prevent non-government groups being able to react quickly to government abuse. By the time your web page got through the government approval (after your personal details have been lost a few times) the controversy has died down, government wins.
I don't want to live in a society where you need to apply to the government for permission to speak.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
That Orwell was an optimist...
We have a very elegant in-house rating system for our 8 year old son and 4 year old daughter: I look at the sites they wish to visit and determine if the material is appropriate. My son is not yet technically sophisticated enough that I need to enforce a whitelist or anything like that; my hope is that by the time they're 12 they'll be mentally prepared for most things he would encounter in the real world, or at least prepared enough to seek my or my wife's guidance on things.
I'm pretty sure that the sight of a bare breast will not permanently warp them. Hate-oriented material is of more concern, but it's always going to be out there so all I can do is try to teach them how to see through its fallacies and make good judgments for himself.
Or is that approach passe these days?
Not to be melodramatic, but computers and the Internet are probably the single-most important human acheivement in the past 1,000 years. Free communication has the power to transform our society from warring tribes to a true global civilization, concentrating efforts to better our lives. It's the first truly accessible bidirectional network (or "peer-to-peer" as corporate/government drones like to say).
It has the power to dislodge those who seek to position themselves between productive people (for tax or ideological control). These are people who don't produce anything useful; they are simply parasites on the system. Thus, the loss of a global communication network is of little negative consequence to them.
And these are their opening shots; thousands of petty little dictators from all walks of life (government, religion, busybodies, corporate) have zeroed in their guns and are beginning to fire. If they are not stopped, the end result will be disasterous. I did not spend the last 20 years of my life building another glorified cable TV entertainment network.
We, the technically inclined... the engineers who conceptualized, and then actualized this network... we hold the cards. We build and install the equipment, we write the software, and we understand what's at stake. We need to organize, and we need to do it now.
Perhaps a worldwide RBL that completely deletes a hostile force from the Internet, based on a vote. Australian government implementing a censorship plan? No packets to any subnet associated with the Australian government until those responsible are found and punished. New bill to restrict anonymity on the Internet, forcing people to use identifying information? Let's see how well that senator does without email. After all, if he gets his way - to damage our ability to communicate - should we not get ours?
Perhaps a worldwide union of engineers for a collective maintenance; all member engineer will refuse to cooporate with unethical requests (routing to censorship hardware, violating principles of net neutrality, etc), and the union will pay their salary, and assist in finding a new position, if they are terminated for insubordination. In any case, firing an engineer is expensive. Let's make these companies hurt.
The net routes around damage... yes. But nothing is invincible. If we fail to defend it, we lose everything. If a critical mass of governments succeed in inserting themselves as gatekeepers, we have lost. Not because secure communication will be impossible... nothing can stop the individual. But because it will stop the masses. And that's all they want.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
"The dark night of fascism is always descending in the United States and yet lands only in Europe."
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
We're switching from one which likes maiming people (screw small animals, [and maybe screwing small animals, {we're going to miss the fun "hunting with Dick Cheney" stories}]) to, uh, "change".
We see what THAT brings...
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
a couple of doors down the street and have a word with the local MP to explain just how fucking stupid this is, perhaps if he gets it he can explain to others.
All this anti-Terrorism and Child-Porn stuff is just ignorant nonsense;
First: The essential information is, and will always be out there eg the 1930's patent on RDX explosive to grainey black-white 6-year-old-boy-fuck-films made in India in the 60's, you can not un-make information (content in the modern jargon)
Second: If you want to become expert in irregular (special-) military operations and techniques find an older Delta/Seal/SAS operator who can tell you all you need to know, purchase of material is trivial, but practice is hard;
porn/under-age sex is also easy: if NATO/UN cannot stop piracy in Somalia, or now almost all east Africa, do you think the boys who catch the eye of gay/bi-sexual war-lords stay virgins? or that they are afraid of arrest warrents,
war, sex, rape is endemic in Africa, Asia and South America, and nobody is going to do anything about it, and no 1st world government cares or will do anything.
The two nonsense pratijs are:
(a) if the buying stops the killing/porn-making will stop. [No it wont, you have to catch them, they like eating, everyone wants to fsck].
(b) you can regulate this in the 1st world [No, you cant assume that your nationals are fools, without false Id, who don't know the SAT timetable, or how to bribe parents/police].
In general this is a huge waste of time/effort/tax dollars which I do not wish to pay/waste my time on. If I want to buy an AK74 or plastic I can do so, cheaply, anywhere in Western Europe, colleagues who are gay say they can find secure under-age sex anywhere in Europe/Asia/South America in under two hours.
I guess what I am trying to say is that you cant legislate against the determined or evil and it is increasingly stupid to try.
The bottom line is that pols fear their electrorate and that will make the facts-of-real-life clear. Especially in the economic collapse of 2009.
If it was easy to get rid of the pricks, we'd already be rid of Blagojevich.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Yes, because the Bolsheviks were such a force for free speech weren't they? Perhaps if you could offer something new and original that hadn't historically failed, people wouldn't roll their eyes when they came to your post.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Is he trying to censor it from everyone, or just suggest adding a meta tag which allows browsers to block it client side?
Why is it that the larger a nation grows (in terms of population), the more oppressive its laws become ?
Statistically speaking, more people should mean more diversity. More diversity would then imply a place for everyone and everything, without the need for some ruling dictatorship to impose draconian restrictions on the freedoms of life.
The only thing that will come out of censorship is more and better ways to circumvent it. The UK has 60 million people, you don't think one or two of them have the smarts to set up proxies ?
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Citizens? What a quaint little concept. We are, and always have been, Subjects.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
UK culture secretary Andy Burnham misunderstands the car analogy of the internet and wants to now require all websites to have stickers advertising their content and pricing options. News at 11.
Once you accept that internet regulation is not possible, you have three possibilities:
ban it - cheap and simple
keep your children off it; also cheap and simple
The third choice (as always) is to do nothing: also cheap and simple.
Of course, few parents seem to be willing these days, to accept responsibility for their childrens' well-being and will therefore demand that the government "do something". In which case option #1 seems like the simplest path.
The moral is that unless the people who should be responsible are prepared to do the right thing and regulate their own and their children's access to what is effectively an adult medium, the alternative harms us all.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
if there is one thing that should be left totally uninfluenced by government, this is media, because media are necessary for the function of democracy as they directly influence the minds of voters. Therefore whoever controls the media can control what people are going to vote. When media are not owned by the people, someone other than the people infuences the elections.
Your current shit's not looking too hot either is it. How long's it been since the last economic bust? 15 years? And now we've got another. Woo hoo.
And freedom? Well take a look at the UK. That's your capitalist freedom right there.
It's capitalism whose history is riddled with spectacular failure. In these failures, people end up homeless and dying of exposure on the streets. Middle-class people living out of their cars in all-night parking lots. And these failures have occurred all by themselves, not aided by any external enemy as in the case of the USSR et cetera. Indeed, Cuba is still alive and kicking, as are several south-east asian countries.
In my opinion, this free market stuff is just handwaving and faith in the Invisible Hand that's indistinguishable from the religious sort. It's best suited for ignorant people who don't want to think about how things should work, people who'd rather leave it to the Almighty... and now that it has been, everything is going in the shitter.
Economic planning works. Take a look at any Fortune 500 company: all of those implement a system of economic planning inside them. That nearly a century-old state-level (and a freaking huge state it was, geographically) version failed to last eternally despite bringing Russia out of agrarian society and into the industrial era says absolutely nothing about communism's overall workability!
Criticising capitalism won't get any protest from me, but if you are proposing an alternative make sure it isn't one that is clearly worse.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
Well looks like 1984 was put on hold until 2008 or 2009
"The Brady Bunch is back...working homicide"
Enjoy your Threat Level ORANGE.
I seriously do not understand all the over sensationalized reaction to this proposal.
It is just an attempt for parents to be able to monitor their own children, that is what parents have a right to do. Or will someone else, or you, take that responsibility from them?
It is just like a library file system. Do they carry every kind of book in the libraries, no they do not. Its a file system just like the database that controls these message boards. If the real world can have dwellings for children to have a safe controlled environment then why not be able to categorize our creations online to help us control what is truly harmful verses what is truly helpful for the parents of the children, who are on the internet.
The internet is here to stay, no one is going to take it away from you. There is nothing wrong with categorization or file systems, its is a basic foundation of how we learn. Wow you guys really need to wake up.
This is really the same debate that's been going on since the Greeks, only now in a much more uninformed way. It reminds me of CNN's 1986 Crossfire show where the lyrics of a rock song was accused of promoting incest and Frank Zappa was invited as a representative musician. Zappa is not defending the Prince's "Incest is a good thing" statement in the lyrics in question, but he is defending the right of the artist to say it.
Some telling and relevant in context quotes from the exchange are:
Robert Novak: "Mr Zappa, let me see if I can get your position straight. Are you saying there is no filth, no pornography, no obscenity, that should not be permitted to be sold and distributed freely in this country in the form of music videos and rock videos? ... Is there no filth, no obscenity you consider qualified to be suppressed?"
John Lofton (of the Washington Times): "I agree with you that the first line of responsibility is the family [Zappa has not mentioned neither "responsibility" of "family"] to stop the kind of garbage we're talking about here today; but good grief, can't we call upon our government to help us in this fight, Frank? Are you an Anarchist, is it the government's role to do nothing in this? ... Incest in America didn't use to be this kind of problem, it has come about in the last 20 years or so [implicating "pop music"] ... You should get out more! ... Would you look in the camera and tell them that the trash you sing and write was when the Founding Fathers had in mind when they drafted the First Amendment?! ... to defend songs that glorify Satanism, and incest, and suicide?!"
Zappa: "Absolutely!"
Chorus: "You're an idiot, then!"
Tom Braden: "What would you suggest, Mr Lofton, as a means of censorship? ... What government censor is going to decide for you?"
Lefton, to Zappa: "What is the government's role, Mr Zappa?" ... ("national defence") ... "Well, I consider this national defence, pal! Our families are under attack from people like you"
Zappa: "The biggest threat today is not communism, it is moving America toward a fascist theocracy, and everything that's happened during the Reagan administration is steering us down that pipe."
Panel laughs, "oh really, Mr Zappa" etc etc
It is really an extremely interesting (not to say entertaining!) episode, and I recommend it if you haven't laready seen it. The full video is available here:
http://www.spike.com/video/zappa-on-crossfire/2658805
As someone who runs a potentially offensive but legal website, I will certainly be looking for ways to subvert website ratings if they are ever introduced.
"To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free" ~ Nineteen Eighty-Four
The plan so far, as I see it, is something like this.
First, we should make participation in the market economy voluntary so that its ebb and flow does not put people into destitution or worse. Proposals to do this in countries with effective social security generally involve deconstructing the old and clunky "for those who deserve it" structure and replacing it with a universal citizen's wage, two or three of which (say in a communal setting) permits one to live in reasonable minimal comfort without being employed. This makes workers far more competitive in the job market, insofar as they choose to become involved in it: being ruthlessly exploited as a call-center servitor would no longer be a life-or-death question.
The money for citizen's wage comes from the dismantled social security systems, which are invariably far more expensive than the benefit they provide to their users... often due to market inefficiencies (chiefly profit and dividends) leading to prices going up whenever funding is increased, thus killing any progress before the sperm it would've been born of has exited it's father's dick. Obviously this would require price controls (either through legislation, or more likely state competition) on basic things such as rent, food, water, heating, etc modern infrastructure -- otherwise the proprietors would simply increase their prices to gouge whatever they can take.
Second, cut all subsidies to the market economy. They want to play free market? Let them play free market. The chickens will come back when the ground freezes over. No more socialized costs and privatized profits: if the market is so efficient then it can bloody well take care of itself. If it can.
Third, make the economic system subservient to the political system rather than the other way around (as it is today). Otherwise the will of the people, as communicated through a (future ideal of, or a near-term approximation of) decentralized system of planning combined with effective democracy, cannot be effectively implemented if it goes against what Capital wants. For examples of effective democracy, look at Switzerland's citizen proposal mechanism where anyone who collects 50k verified signatures can put a piece of their own legislation to popular vote.
The central bit here is that the market aspect of society isn't eliminated outright. That'd represent a harsh transition and most people wouldn't be able to go along with it. Rather, it's cut down piece by piece so that it becomes less critical in the everyday lives of John Smith and Janine Random.
Having a market aspect should also be useful in that it is quite efficient at exploring new and unforeseen things, even if in the long run it tends to abusive monopolies (such as in the case of AT&T Bell, Microsoft and so forth). The market's natural boom-bust cycle, once the people are shielded from it, will also provide great opportunities for the state to jump in and purchase, as an equal player in the marketplace, the resources and business of tanked companies and put them to use in serving interests other than private profit.
Communism today works via small, well-defined steps rather than Grand, Ill-Defined Revolutions that everyone supports but no one understands. This way, if we know where we are, where we're going (a reasonably small distance away, but in the right direction nonetheless) and above all how to determine if we've got there, we can make larger changes using a series of smaller changes.
It's not unlike iterative models of software or systems development, really. Of course this model of communism isn't at all popular with the old guard stalinist types... but they'll grow old and die eventually, even if they do not accept that it's the current younger generations' turn to define what Communism means now.
Having seen his interview on BBC news, I think he is cowtowing to the media industry by the backdoor. What he said was he wants to work with the industry and get ISPs to filter content that is "unsuitable" for children ... oh and content that may be hosted illegally and breach copyright.
He wants to get ISPs in this country used to filtering content then do the media industry's dirty work...
UK culture secretary Andy Burnham calls...
A nobody in government wanted to see his name printed in the paper, so he makes an outrageous demand. News at 11.
Free Manning, jail Obama.
I think someone in Government had put a heavy paw on his shoulder in the interim because there was a interview on BBC Radio Four a few minutes ago in which he was much more reasonable - the word "voluntary" was used repeatedly and "censorship" was omitted - and, in any case, there was a counter-interview (didn't catch the interviewee's name or affiliation) which tore the whole thing to shreds - the probability of 100 per cent international cooperation on this issue was zero and, in the end, "policing" would best be done by parents taking responsibility rather than some half-baked State attempt which would be full of holes even before it was switched on.
In passing:
1. The Telegraph is a Tory newspaper and Burnham is Labour, so I can be sure that the most negative spin possible was put on the interview;
2. The notion of the British government negotiating with the US government on this issue is risible - the President-elect, as a former professor of constitutional law, would presumably tell it to retreat across the Atlantic with all possible haste.
Really? I wonder why my passport says 'Citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland' then.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Burnham will probably decide, after an expensive and extended study by a firm of private consultants who just happen to be major donors to New Labour, that the idea is inefficient. It will then be replaced by a scheme where anyone falsely accused of copyright violation will be ruthlessly gunned down by armed police at Stockwell tube station.
What a horrible idea, suddenly parents will go, ooh we've got a safe internet connection provided by our ISP with support from the government... so it's OK to give our kids a PC in there bedroom and not check up on what there doing, disavowing any parental responsibility.
We should be involving parents more, rather than providing easy solutions for them to get out of actually parenting.
More help for parents in modern parenting, not a nanny government, in both senses of the word.
Internet Content Rating Association
ICRA ratings have been around for 10 years, and IE even supports it. But nobody uses it, and I've never even met a web developer who has heard of it.
this all started in France (the 3 strikes thing going on with the RIAA also came from France)
http://kruhm.org/2008/11/french-party-proposes-to-filter-and-tax-websites/
"Slashdot reader Caitifty calls for a politician rating system similar to the one used on Slashdot in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. He also calls for censorship of politicians, saying, 'There are stupid ideas that should just not be available to be voted on.' Other proposals he mentions in his wide-ranging calls for politician regulation are 'sanity-friendly' services from parliament, and requiring takedown notices to be enforced within a specific time for politicians that come up with stupid ideas. Mr. Caitifty wants to extend his proposals across the pond and seeks meetings with the Obama administration."
Caitifty also wants a jetpack for Christmas, although that goes without saying.
to the news in france they'd know whats coming to them
check out kruhm.org for the latest dirt in france
This guy mentions the way that the Internet democratizes content, but he doesn't really understand it. If anybody can post on a web site, then there's naturally going to be a lot of material that would offend him. You could maybe partially filter the Internet in 1997, back when there were fewer web sites and they changed less often, but now it's just implausible. How can you ever call a blog PG-rated when it could have a new post talking in detail about the author's BDSM fetish at any moment? How can you decide that a discussion forum is child-friendly when it may suddenly get a thread about eugenics or penis bisection? Hell, even Wikipedia has a lot of stuff that would make Family Values wankers blanch, and it's one of the most useful web sites out there. Censorship is incompatible with the modern Internet.
However, Mr Burnham said: "If you look back at the people who created the internet they talked very deliberately about creating a space that Governments could't reach. I think we are having to revisit that stuff seriously now. It's true across the board in terms of content, harmful content, and copyright. Libel is [also] an emerging issue" Bloody typical of the Labour government, they can't stand the fact that they can't control everything. Most sensible people would regard a "space that Governments couldn't reach" as a good thing.
British passports are EU passports. You are an EU citizen, but a British subject. Considering our de jure head of state is unelected and our de facto head of state is normally elected by a single consituency, its silly to consider us citizens.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
There is nothing in principle wrong with "movie style ratings" for sites.
Absolutely and completely incorrect.
To begin, look at the premise of movie style ratings and what's wrong there:
1. Pre-code movies are more realistic w.r.t. interpersonal and social interactions and - for me - more interesting and entertaining.
2. The movie code led to nothing more nor less than political oversight of Hollywood.
3. The modern movie ratings system (an outgrowth of the code) has destroyed many a good indie film's chances of recouping costs - there have been a number of decent shows on the IFC (Independent Film Channel) detailing this.
4. The ratings themselves are set by people whose values and reasoning make me wretch (again, I refer to interviews with them in the aforementioned shows on the IFC). I would urge you to really think about who will set these ratings of which you speak - and to further think about the criteria.
5. Anecdotally, I watched the original Jurassic Park sitting next to someone else's 5 year-old kids while they were being mentally numbed by the raptors ripping living human limb from limb - raised to be as slack-jawed as their parents.
Movie ratings don't work at all - therefore, there is no principle for you to apply.
When theory and data disagree, you validate the data and when proven valid, you throw out the theory and start over.
You're taking what appears to be a measured argument on this subject, but your premise is completely screwed up - that the ratings themselves will be fair (whatever that means!!!!) or fairly applied (whatever that means!!!!) or will be rational in the first place.
All that your support will accomplish is a dilution of quality and a growth area for narrowly-focused political interests to become the middle layer in yet another immoral currency exchange.
History has proven this with the movie ratings - and they got away with it because the back-end arguments **sound reasonable**.
When the front end is drek, the back end is, too.
All I'd have to do to kill a competitor's website with a G rating - and a comment space - is to constantly hound the comment space with X-rated remarks and report the site to the "authorities." Think it wouldn't work? Sure it would. The door is then open to regulate all blogs with higher "standands" than non-interactive sites.
The whole idea for rating web sites is just so wrong on so many levels that I don't know where to begin - or stop - so I stop here.
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
Fuck the Aussies, fuck the English, fuck the Chinese, fuck everyone and anyone who spouts this kind of bullshit. Fuck parents, too, *IF* they want this sort of thing; you don't want your goddamn Precious Little Snowflakes seeing porn by mistake (or on purpose!)? THEN WATCH WHAT THE FUCK THEY'RE DOING, DON'T FUKCING CHILDPROOF THE REST OF THE WORLD, DAMNIT! I'm an ADULT, I should be able to see and hear ANYTHING I WANT, I should NOT be limited by inane censorship because some fuckwits "want to protect children". Screw you and the horse you rode in on!
If its voluntary self certification that he is suggesting, then he is over a decade late. I was adding ICRA content ratings to my websites back as early at 1997. It's the end users choice then if they want to set their filtering software to block it or not.
in addition, only the paper (not Burnham) mentioned the word censorship.....
Like many career politicians, Andrew Burnham has never had a proper job in his life. He followed the traditional career path of a labour appartchick university, nob-end admin of some union front organisation and then Parliament.
So it should come as no surprise that his understanding of the internet is a bit like my gran's - it's a big phone -
Let's all bask in the glowing trail of ignorance that this brief political meteor provides us with as he burns up in the atmosphere of public ridicule.
Posts, MyBio or Sig, may contain satire, sarcasm, bolded nouns be sardonic or even witty & be Church of SD
When will people (and by extension) the government learn that our children are OUR responsibility. If you have kids and aren't spending time with them to teach them what is proper to look at then you are doing it wrong. Spending all your money for the SUV and 10 room house while they learn how to live life from chat room and little naughty Johnny Smith down the street. Is making that extra $15K a year worth losing your child to the maelstrom of modern society? So fuck censorship from the government, do your job as parents; and I hope this guy gets some sense in his head and realize he is no internet messiah come to save us. Whether Britain or the USA. I hope Obama's team laughs in his face.
We have article one of the Human Rights Act as enshrined in UK law. It's actually stronger than the US first amendment because it guarantees a positive right to free speech whereas the US First Amendment simply stops the government from restricting speech. This means your right to say what you feel is protected at work whereas in the US companies are free to fire you for disagreeing with them, as long as it's applied consistently.
Silence in court is not evidence of guilt. There is a right to silence. The new caution is "you have the right to remain silent, if you fail to mention something which you later rely on in court then this may harm your defence". This was to stop people from saying absolutely nothing and then coming up with alibis at trial and then getting the case thrown out by default because the CPS didn't have any evidence against you.
If you just remain totally silent and the police can't come up with enough evidence against you you will walk.
Nick
How can somebody sneer at something that doesn't exist?
At least half of the things you mention apply equally to Australia. Let's just take one - racism - well if I know enough about Austjailia to know who Pauline Hanson is. Not to mention the forced adoption of Aboriginal children. The ones that are left, after you hunted them for sport. You drove them to extinction in Tasmania.
Did I say the bad things apply equally? Probably more so. But anyway, we have Shakespeare, Whittle, Lister, Brunel, Watt, Hobbes, Jenner, Stevenson, Wilde, Darwin, The Beatles. You have whoever invented the rotary clothesline plus Kylie. And Mel Gibson.
On top of that, you make beer that Americans find bland.
Now get that chip off your shoulder, nobody holds what your grandad did against you.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Am I the only one who thinks that all these recent doings---Australia's plans, plus this and this, and now this story---are part of a coordinated effort to finally take control of the Internet?
Liberty in your lifetime
The head of government doesn't have to be elected by any constituency - members of the cabinet need only be members of one of the houses. By tradition (for about the last 150 years) the Prime Minister has been a member of the Commons, (Wellington was Prime Minister whilst being a member of the Lords), the real requirement for a functioning government is that the Prime Minister have the support of a majority in the commons, who would have to have been elected by a majority of the constituencies.
It's not a very good system, but it's not the dictatorship you make it out to be. The real weakness is the party-whip system which allows legislation without actual majority support to be forced through anyway.
FGD 135
Within 6 years of passing the second amendment it was used to attempt to throw of domestic oppression unsuccessfully.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiskey_Rebellion ...
The Whiskey Rebellion, less commonly known as the Whiskey Insurrection, was a popular uprising that had its beginnings in 1791 and culminated in an insurrection in 1794
The hated whiskey tax was repealed in 1803, having been largely unenforceable outside of Western Pennsylvania, and even there never having been collected with much success.
If you define success as overthrowing the government, then yes, they were unsuccessful. If you define success as achieving their goal of selling their whiskey without paying the whiskey tax then they were completely successful.
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
I can just see Chancellor Sutler frothing "gentleman, I want this 'internet' found!"
Mr. Creedy: "My black-bag squad will handle the terrorist internet."
Fingermen: "Oh, dear, oh, dear, looks like we found the internet out after curfew!"
Prothero: "You wanna know what I think? Well, you're podcasting me, so I assume that you do."
You might want to look at the old Social Credit system, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_credit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Censorship is also becoming America's favorite past-time. The US gov't (and their corporate friends), already place protesters in fenced-in cages, ban books like "America Deceived" from Wikipedia, Amazon and Facebook, and shut down Ron Paul. Free Speech forever.
Last link (before Google Books caves to pressure and drops the title):
America Deceived (book)
Why the fuck is there a culture secretary?
fuckin opinion. Who cares what a brit has to say with regard to my 1st amendment rights. Oh that's right, British subject have privileges as citizens, not legal rights, except through common law. This is the problem with their system - and why disposed of their federal monarchy centuries ago.
what is it with those people? is think it's some kind of backlash from the 70's when everything was possible, now those relics get some kind of twisted conscience telling them to protect the young? Let's hope there will be no big wars anymore, cos' we're training a generation of cuddly toys and barbinos instead of real people. Closest thing to fighting they will ever get is grammar nazism i'm afrehd...
beware he who denies you access to information for in his mind, he already deems himself to be your master (SMAC-ish)