Quebec Plans To Require Website Blocking, Studies New Internet Access Tax

An anonymous reader writes: Michael Geist reports that the Government of Quebec released its budget (PDF) yesterday featuring two Internet-related measures that are sure to attract attention and possible litigation. First, it is moving forward with plans to study a new tax on residential Internet services in order to provide support for the cultural sector. Second, the government says it will be introducing a new law requiring ISPs to block access to online gambling sites. The list of blocked sites will be developed by Loto-Quebec, a government agency. The government views this as a revenue enhancing measure because it wants to channel gamblers to its own Espacejeux, the government's own online gaming site.

Comments

I hate not being culture

[jader3rd]

I hate it how everything I create, enjoy doing, or enjoy consuming isn't considered culture, and policies need to be put in place to defend so call culture. Just let the free market decide what we want self sustaining art to be.

Re:I hate not being culture

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to the New Puritanism. It's like the old puritanism but without God.

Re:I hate not being culture

[c]

This is one thing I wish the US could import from France. Over there, all radio stations, newspapers, and other places have to have a percentage of their artists be local to that country.

Canada has that sort of system, too, to protect local "culture" from the US marketing behemoth.

When it works, it seems to work pretty well.

The main issue with that sort of system is that it's based on a minimum quantity of local content. Yes, you do get some good local talent which you might not hear about otherwise. Unfortunately, most of the time you just get Nickelback.

I think the majority of Canadians would prefer to just drop the CanCon requirements entirely.

"to provide support for the cultural sector"

[NotDrWho]

Anytime you hear the word "culture" in Quebec, watch out. It has a much more ominous overtone there than in most of the rest of the world.

Re:"to provide support for the cultural sector"

[Anonymous Coward]

Essentially, yes.

In Quebec they choose to actively suppress English and promote French ... the the extent you can't have English signage unless it's smaller than French, and they've ever tried to get companies like Best Buy and Home Depot to change to French names,

Basically they've been told to piss up a rope by those companies, and that they'd rather leave than to undermine their own existing brands.

Quebec are a bunch of whiny assholes, who increasingly are trying to pass laws which actively discriminate against anybody who isn't white, French, and Catholic -- to the extent that they want to ban religious symbols, unless of course it's a cross, and then it's OK.

That and they don't even realize they're barely capable of speaking in French -- they're illiterate in both offficial languages. I've known people from France who have to speak to people from Quebec in English because Quebecoise is such a mongrel of a language.

They think they're preserving their culture ... when their "culture" is bigotry, a ruined version of the language, and a sense of entitlement mixed in with being whiny cunts.

Re:"to provide support for the cultural sector"

[tlhIngan]

And remember, when you're a Quebecer and want to participate in a contest, you're excluded, just like Iranians and North Koreans. Banana Republic of Quebec.

Quebec is an oddity because they have a ton of things that no one else does - they are ... special.

So if you want to hold a contest Canada-wide, you follow basic legislation that applies federally (generally easy) and maybe have to make adjustments for each province (again, easy). But if you want to add QC, you suddenly are beholden to a TON more regulations. Most companies simply choose to avoid it because the benefit of adding QC is very small compared to the burden.

It's also why in Canada you often run into things like "Not for sale in Quebec". Electronic toys are even more fascinating because you often have "Quebec edition" and "Not for Quebec edition" (usually marked as "Not for sale in Quebec").

It's really an independent nation of its own - they just happen to use the Canadian dollar and passport.

Re:"to provide support for the cultural sector"

[Grishnakh]

This is why both Canada and the US should be abolished as nations, and new (smaller) nations should be formed in their places. Quebec should be an independent country, the west coast should have its own country, the US northeast should be a country (perhaps combined with Canada's maritime provinces) the US southeast should be a separate country, etc. Then these new countries can form a trade union much like the EU, with a shared currency (maybe) and free trade between them, but still having a huge amount of autonomy so that each region can do its own thing, such as legalizing pot (as the PacNW wants to do), or banning pot and abortion (as the Dixie states want to do).

Re:"to provide support for the cultural sector"

[dbsnstuf]

What you describe is (mostly) what our federal system of government in the US was supposed to accomplish. Independent states bound together only by common commerce, money, and security. If the federal government hadn't grown to the size/scope it is today, we wouldn't bat an eye when one state enacted a particular law and the next did not.

Dangerous Precedent

[timrod]

This sets a dangerous precedent that it is perfectly okay for the government to block websites in order to generate more revenue. If this passes, expect states in the US to try the same thing, especially if they have casinos that aren't doing well.

Tax Bullshit

[Nemyst]

As a resident of Quebec, let me laugh at that statement. Help culture? The Liberals don't give a toss about culture, they're just completely fixed on the notion of having a zero-deficit budget by any means necessary. They'll slash health and education funding, they'll add hidden taxes while claiming none are added, they'll do whatever it takes to reach this, because they're considered to be the "economically focused" party. To give context, when a journalist asked them if they could promise that the significant cuts in healthcare funding would not affect services, they straight up said that they can't say that because there might be "obstruction" or "slow uptake" of their new magical plan which makes more with less.

If culture sees a single cent of that tax, I'll be impressed. This is strictly a way of balancing their budget without raising the tax rates, which would've caused furor. This internet tax sailed past all major news organizations as far as I can tell.

Re:Cher gouvernement

[Eloking]

Allez chier ma gang d'osti de calisse de lèche-cul de tabarnaks.

Christ de modérateur, mon commentaire est 100% on-topic.

Dear Anonymous Coward,

I'm also a Quebecer (and french) and I understand your frustration toward the government (even if I don't share it). But I completely miss the purpose behind the idea of writing a hateful post (not to mention in Quebecer french) about the government in a English and worldwide news website. Did you expect sympathy from this community? Did it make you fell better?

I find this not only useless, it's plain stupid.

Re: Cher gouvernement

[Anonymous Coward]

Please rewrite your comment so the French part is conspicuously larger.

What makes you unique

[sjbe]

Quebec is an island of francophone culture off a continent that is dominated by the U.S. Either you embrace protectionism or risk losing all that makes you unique.

That is a nonsense argument. If one needs to resort to protectionist measures to "preserve" your culture from a peaceful (to you) neighbor, then your people don't really support said measures even if they claim to. Actions speak louder than words. People claim to hate McDonalds and yet they sell millions of burgers every year to many of those same people. If the people of Quebec really want to speak French or engage in Francophile activities then they will do so. If they don't then they shouldn't be forced to. Cultural norms shift over time and there is nothing fundamentally bad about that.

I spend a fair bit of time in Canada. I was married in Alberta and regularly vacation in Ontario. Canada is a wonderful country. Most of Canada has little difficulty maintaining what makes them unique because what makes them truly unique isn't stuff the government needs to pass laws to protect.

Re: Cher gouvernement

[Applehu Akbar]

English as spoken in, say, the southern US had its origin in Elizabethan times. But no law has ever prevented the dialect from changing from its original form or required that visitors use a specific set of words and expressions. Meanwhile in France and every other part of Europe, stop signs say STOP. In Montréal, they have to say ARRÊT.

Blocking gambling sites

[substance2003]

Having heard too many stories of gambling addicts loosing everything in Casinos and even seeing it happen to my own father. I might have gotten behind the idea of blocking gambling websites if they blocked all of them period. But since Loto-Quebec will be making it so that people go to their online site instead it's not a move to help reduce the risk. Just making sure our own provincially hungry fox guards the hen house. People will still loose their shirts in the end and we'll still have these establishment who end up putting people in poverty which I find is only a short term boost to the provincial revenue for a long term lost.

I'm not even certain it's a good thing for Loto-Quebec since it would open the door to other provinces and countries blocking access to Quebec gambling sites. Who knows where this could end up? Once you start blocking one group of sites, you could start blocking other groups too.

In the end, I don't think it will be seen as legal. Someone will surely challenge this all the way to the supreme court.

No risk of homogeneity

[sjbe]

I don't think most people would disagree with you, but I think it'd be an enormous loss if every country ended up being just like every other country.

Never going to happen. Heck there are pretty substantial regional differences even within single countries. Go visit the Louisiana Bayou and then go to NYC and tell me America is homogenous.

But if you get to some other location and it's the same language, same restaurants, same shops, same recreational activities, what a waste.

"Waste"? Not at all. Shared cultural experiences have huge benefits, not the least of which are increased commerce and reduced conflict. It's hard to think of someone as the Other if they look, talk and act like you. Many people very much like familiarity even when in a foreign place. And it doesn't take a lot to feel displaced. Even something like moving from the US to Canada (or vice-versa) results in some pretty significant cultural adjustments even though the two countries are very similar in a lot of ways.

I'm not at all arguing that everyplace should be the same (quite the opposite in fact) but there is nothing wrong with having some, or even a lot of similarity.

In the end, I think a lot of places that want to be Americanized (or whatever you want to call it) will end up so, and then they'll soon come to regret it.

I could say the exact reverse and it has the same potential of being true. There is nothing wrong with adopting bits of a different culture if they appeal to you. The US has adopted cultural practices and language from around the globe. There is no reason why it should be bad for other cultures to take bits of American culture and language they like (or not if they don't). Different merely for the sake of being different is every bit as bad as everyone being the same.