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Internet Villain of the Year Stephen Conroy Resigns
An anonymous reader writes "Australian Communications Minister and [2009's] Internet Villain of the Year Stephen Conroy has resigned after his patron was booted out by her party. Conroy gained infamy through his repeated attempts to censor the internet and more recently silent web site blocking, web snooping and data retention. His national broadband network remains controversial."
A whole lot of other corrupt dishonest Aussie politicians to go... they have had their fair go at it, mate.
Just ask the UK, we discussed and debated the Snoopers Charter, and then we found out (from an American leaker no less) that we already had it. That GCHQ were intercepting most of the UK to US traffic, spying on Brits, and not just headers either. That this had been done in secret already.
Australia is part of 5 eyes, so their spy agency too will have already implement surveillance of Australia to US traffic. Capturing all the Aussies data too. It too will have been done in secret.
William Hague, our Foreign Secretary, even claims its legal. The its legal because its legal for the USA to spy on Brits, so he can sign off on GCHQ helping them spy on Brits!
Likewise there's no law in the UK, saying that UK can't spy on Americans, so we have NSA analysts here, spying on their fellow Americans. They could be in the USA doing it, but that wouldn't be legal.
So do you imagine that Australia is any different? That Conroy wasn't simply trying to make a law to legalize what his spies are already doing? Of course they are!
Who keeps working when the job is done?
His broadband plan only remains controversial to those who think that a broadband plan based on tin cans and string is a viable alternative.
Smell the flamebait.
The Uncle-Rupert article you linked to mentions an absurd claim high speed internet is a major health risk because of disturbing asbestos-laden pits in the process of replacing copper with fibre.
Quite rightly Conroy called it out as ridiculous. These same pits would need to be accessed in laying fibre-to-the-node.
If not, the Internet villain of 2013 is still in the lead for Evilest Internet Villain of the century.
The CIA showed him his porn surfing history and he suddenly remember how loyal Australia was to the USA military leadership.
It's amazing how much leverage you can get on politicians just from capturing their browser histories.
Frankly this is a bit of a loss, the NBN is not really controversial, out of all policies [of both sides] in the current debate and enjoys within the community a rather large level of bipartisan support.
The asbestos etc from the article is not really NBN Co's fault, as the pits are owned by Telstra [I hope that the liability of the asbestos was made clear in the sale of telstra by the Liberals] and they are responsible as per the lease agreement on the pits to make them fit for use before NBN fiber is even poked near the hole.
This doesn''t defend his pushing on data retention, copyright, or any of the other things he has said besides, but he was the best advocate, and probably most competent advocate of the NBN the Labor party has at this point, which is a shame because it is actually very very good policy which will be replaced by an inferior alternative that will need upgrading in the very short term, which in private enterprise isnt a big deal but in government infrastructure builds is a nightmare and will most likely ending with the overall cost being far higher than the current NBN and more expensive to the individual as far as connection costs one would expect.
Essentially if we dont get FTTH now [Liberals get in and their alternative policy is implemented] then we will not see large scale uptake for a very long time, t our own detriment.
Pure bullshit. It's always been an immensely popular policy. The supporters of it have been pretty much anyone who knows anything about computers and the current copper system. The detractors have been people lying through their teeth for political reasons.
It's the single biggest reason why Labor really should stay in for another term of government.
The biggest authoritarian nutjobs in Australian politics hail from the Catholic Right. They've historically dominated the Labor Party, although they can also be found in the conservative parties too (Tony Abbott was one of "Santa's little helpers" before he joined the Liberal Party).
I never really figured out how the Catholic Right in Australia got to be so illiberal, and how they got away with the stuff they've done in the past, and continue to do so.
And they crop up in all sorts of interesting places. You can imagine my surprise when I worked for a supermarket, and volunteered to help out with the union. That is, until I discovered that the SDA are actually a bunch of hard-Right book burning Nazis.
That said, I will not shed a single tear for Stephen Conroy.
...sad when this is more insightful news than you usually get on prime time TV
Conroy will probably be back soon as a highly-paid lobbyist, working for corporations and governments who will benefit from a locked-down internet.
Shitstains take care of their own.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy !!!
Yippeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee !!!
Wooooooooooooooooooot !!!
Now I'm doing a one-man conga dance, with imaginary maracas.
Ok, Off-Topic, and I feel awful for that.
Julia Gillard looks a lot like Jodie Foster in the picture on her Wikipedia page, IMHO.
That really is all I had to say.
It is far far too obvious that you are a shill.
The article you linked is from March 2010.
Construction of even the Tasmania trial of the NBN only started in July 2010.
Those alleged higher prices completely contradict what is available on iiNet's website.
The NBN is funded by government backed debt, and will actually make give the government a 7% return.
Need I go on? Really, it's like you're not even trying.
Stephen Conroy is an embarrassing idiot and as an Australian can hold my head a little bit higher as a result. Luckily his ineptitude protected the Australian public from his role a media industry stooge. His strategy in relation to the internet was as follows, get a magic filter in place under the guise of "protecting against bad stuff" and then block and stop people from downloading media content. In return provide me with a bit of positive spin in the traditional media space.
Unfortunately (for him) he misjudged this Internet thing which unfortunately didn't have a point of ownership.
Also as the minister for the Australian Broadband Network he has managed to completely cock this thing up so that the rollout is already far behind schedule, great idea appalling execution. It's a bit like expecting your florist to be able to sideline as a bridge engineer, a bit funny on the surface but underneath deeply tragic for all involved.
The simple fact is that some people STILL believe The Earth Is Flat. Just like some people believe that a Fibre-to-the-home National Broadband Network is A Bad Thing.
Sure it's a huge bucket of money.
Sure there needs to be oversight, to ensure the money is well spent not just pork-barrelled.
Sure, you *could* achieve some (but only a little) of that by being (slightly) cheaper.
The bottom line is that the VAST overwhelming MAJORITY of backlash against the NBN has been spearheaded by The Opposition - People who (as in America) OPPOSE things for no reason other than it was somebody elses idea, therefore Ahm Agin' it!
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.