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Irish Legislator Proposes Law That Would Make Annoying People Online a Crime
An anonymous reader sends this report from TechDirt: Is Ireland looking to pass a law that would "outlaw ebooks and jail people for annoying others?" Well, no, not really, but that's the sort of unintended consequences that follow when laws are updated for the 21st century using little more than a word swap. Ireland has had long-standing laws against harassment via snail mail, telephones and (as of 2007) SMS messages. A 2014 report by the government's somewhat troublingly-named "Internet Content Governance Advisory Group" recommended updating this section of the law to cover email, social media and other internet-related transmissions. ... The broad language -- if read literally -- could make emailing an ebook to someone a criminal offense. Works of fiction are, by definition, false. ... It's the vestigial language from previous iterations of the law -- words meant to target scam artists and aggressive telemarketers -- that is problematic. Simply appending the words "electronic communications" to an old law doesn't address the perceived problem (cyberbullying is cited in the governance group's report). It just creates new problems.
Aye, as long as I can still get piss drunk at the pub, beat me bitch wife, and spit on an Englishman, then I'm alright with it!
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
It's funny he's breaking his own law already!!!
This is an excellent point and I'd like to extend it a little further. The law doesn't even say what the summary or linked article says it does. If it did, sending a paperback through the mail would have already been against the low. First, notice that the part about sending false messages isn't by itself, but a sub section of the part about "for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to another". So just sending a work of fiction doesn't count. If I send you a story about how your wife is cheating on you with me when she actually isn't, then I could be fined. Or if I send you hundreds ebooks to annoy you and fill up your inbox, then I could be fined.