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Reps Introduce Bipartisan Bill To Legalize Mobile Device Unlocking
New submitter tomservo84 writes "It seems some people in the House of Reps have their heads screwed on straight. A bill would 'make it permanently legal for consumers to unlock their mobile devices, and consumers would not be required to obtain permission from their carrier before switching to a new carrier.' 'This bill reflects the way we use this technology in our everyday lives,' Rep. Lofgren said. 'Americans should not be subject to fines and criminal liability for merely unlocking devices and media they legally purchased. If consumers are not violating copyright or some other law, there's little reason to hold back the benefits of unlocking so people can continue using their devices.' Now, what chance does this have of actually passing?"
And how many things have they changed? The bottom line here is that as long as people like you repeat that tired line, we'll never have any sort of meaningful change as there's no incentive to. The President discontinued the torture policy and hasn't started any new wars of the scale that the previous one did.
There was meaningful reform to the health care situation which the previous President would never have approved of.
Perhaps if the GOP would put forward their own ideas or at least stop obstructing, we could see GITMO closed, as it is, the President is pretty much limited to maintaining the status quo and just opening up the gates. Neither of which is particularly tenable, but you've got the GOP morons continuing to stir up fear about it, rather than having civilized trials.
I think there's a good chance this administration will sign it and take credit for it: it's popular, yet it's largely a meaningless gesture in the US markets (people are still locked into contracts, and most phones are still incompatible between carriers). That's the kind ot stuff the Obama administration loves to do.