I'm surprised more 'noise' is not being made over this, especially since the First Ammendment seems to be a much valued part of the American psyche. Many if not most countries have no such laws.
One factor I see as having a part in the erosion of free speech is the increasing governance/regulation of our society. Laws designed to give cohesion/guideance to society often start as very simple broad statements, but as lawmakers try to 'expand' the definitions to cover all possible aspects it will naturally restrict freedoms. So you get the constitution giving wide freedoms, but over the years you get more laws like the DMCA erroding that freedom. Its allmost as if the lawmakers have lost confidence in the intelligence and commonsense of the people and so make laws telling you what you can and can't do. Also many lawmakers are greatly influenced by corporations, whose interests and desires can conflict with those of the people (as hinted at by the woman from the EFF in the article).
Another thing to stike me after reading the article is how common it is becoming to 'shoot the messenger'. Large bodies such as the SDMI seem to spend more effort on harassing people who point out flaws in their systems rather than improving their technology. And look at how full disclosure of security flaws is now being frowned upon in some areas after the code red incidents.
Is it better for people to go on in ignorance using a flawed system that they think works, or to correct those systems? Should the people trying to correct those flaws be praised or punished? And does society in the large really care about these restrictions unless it directly affects them? After all not many people vote, or complain to their elected representatives. If you don't try and tackle these things from the start you may find by the time you do it is too late.
That raises an interesting point, which I find is often overlooked - documentation.
I'm not talking about man pages/how-tos etc (which I personally find are usually of a much greater standard in terms of usability in an open source arena), but outlining:
* the exact steps taken to build the environment in the first place,
* maintenance steps (the where/why and how of upgrades, bugfixes, sec pathces etc)
* new user tasks - from both the admin and user perspectives
* general usability guidelines
If these tasks are done at the beginning, and tailored for whatever particular business environment you are in then I've found it is much easier to get it accepted by management and perhaps even spread to other departments.
One common stumbling block I've come across in trying to build these types of office environments is management fear that if I (or the admins with experience with open source setups) were to leave then they'd be stuck - after all it is much easier from a corporate view to find someone familiar with setting up/running a wintel / nt backend environ than linux.
Providing detailed outlines covering conception through to delivery/expansion really helps make a choice like this seem much less risky from the management view. After all if you are the only open source 'evangelist' in the company it is going to be a tough sell no matter how convincing your arguement.
When it is time to move on the steps you leave behind can help less experienced admins really get a grasp on not only the how, but the why of 'open offices'. Its how I really started, and I've now left many converts in my wake.
The Act itself is fairly wide ranging, it covers things like price collusion, misleading advertising,anti-competitiveness, warranties etc. It basically is designed to protect the consumers rights over other entities. Here is a link to the ACCC summary of the act. I think the main objection is that the region system artifically reduces choice for the consumer, and gives a competitive advantage to the major publishers/distributors.
Actually it is not illegal (in Australia) to modify a DVD player to make it multi region, it is only illegal if you modify it so that it will play pirated discs. This is similar to the situation with chipping Playstations.
The Australian IT has a more in depth article on this issue and also takes a look at DVD regions from the publishers side.
Many countries have allready tackled the issue of privacy from a legislative point of view. Back in 1988 Australia passed the Commonwealth Privacy Act, which currently regulates the Commonwealth and ACT public sectors and private sector organisations that handle tax file numbers and credit information files.
This act basically states that personal information shall not be collected unless the information is (a) collected for a purpose that is a lawful purpose directly related to a function or activity of the collector, and (b) the collection of the information is necessary for or directly related to that purpose.
The information collected is generally not allow to be used for any other means. Also, the individual must also be made aware of the purpose for which the information is being collected, to which external parties that information may be disclosed to, and should be allowed access to the records.
(http://www.privacy.gov.au/publications/ipps.htm l gives more detail on the 11 principles of the Act).
Ealier this year an ammendment was introduced to expand the reach of the act to cover private sector organisations, and to include more types of private information (health in particular). In drafting the ammendment the government considered the "global information economy" as well as existing privacy laws worldwide (particularly Europe). Take a look at http://www.law.gov.au/privacy/InformationPaper.htm l for more details on it.
Of course this only applies to Australian organisations, at this stage it offers no real protection of data provided to say a company in the US. Increasingly if you are concerned about your own privacy you not only have to consider what goes on in your own country, but what laws/protections exist worldwide. Like so many other current issues you really need to take a global view.
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I'm surprised more 'noise' is not being made over this, especially since the First Ammendment seems to be a much valued part of the American psyche. Many if not most countries have no such laws.
One factor I see as having a part in the erosion of free speech is the increasing governance/regulation of our society. Laws designed to give cohesion/guideance to society often start as very simple broad statements, but as lawmakers try to 'expand' the definitions to cover all possible aspects it will naturally restrict freedoms. So you get the constitution giving wide freedoms, but over the years you get more laws like the DMCA erroding that freedom. Its allmost as if the lawmakers have lost confidence in the intelligence and commonsense of the people and so make laws telling you what you can and can't do. Also many lawmakers are greatly influenced by corporations, whose interests and desires can conflict with those of the people (as hinted at by the woman from the EFF in the article).
Another thing to stike me after reading the article is how common it is becoming to 'shoot the messenger'. Large bodies such as the SDMI seem to spend more effort on harassing people who point out flaws in their systems rather than improving their technology. And look at how full disclosure of security flaws is now being frowned upon in some areas after the code red incidents.
Is it better for people to go on in ignorance using a flawed system that they think works, or to correct those systems? Should the people trying to correct those flaws be praised or punished? And does society in the large really care about these restrictions unless it directly affects them? After all not many people vote, or complain to their elected representatives. If you don't try and tackle these things from the start you may find by the time you do it is too late.
That raises an interesting point, which I find is often overlooked - documentation.
I'm not talking about man pages/how-tos etc (which I personally find are usually of a much greater standard in terms of usability in an open source arena), but outlining:
* the exact steps taken to build the environment in the first place,
* maintenance steps (the where/why and how of upgrades, bugfixes, sec pathces etc)
* new user tasks - from both the admin and user perspectives
* general usability guidelines
If these tasks are done at the beginning, and tailored for whatever particular business environment you are in then I've found it is much easier to get it accepted by management and perhaps even spread to other departments.
One common stumbling block I've come across in trying to build these types of office environments is management fear that if I (or the admins with experience with open source setups) were to leave then they'd be stuck - after all it is much easier from a corporate view to find someone familiar with setting up/running a wintel / nt backend environ than linux.
Providing detailed outlines covering conception through to delivery/expansion really helps make a choice like this seem much less risky from the management view. After all if you are the only open source 'evangelist' in the company it is going to be a tough sell no matter how convincing your arguement.
When it is time to move on the steps you leave behind can help less experienced admins really get a grasp on not only the how, but the why of 'open offices'. Its how I really started, and I've now left many converts in my wake.
The Act itself is fairly wide ranging, it covers things like price collusion, misleading advertising,anti-competitiveness, warranties etc. It basically is designed to protect the consumers rights over other entities. Here is a link to the ACCC summary of the act. I think the main objection is that the region system artifically reduces choice for the consumer, and gives a competitive advantage to the major publishers/distributors.
Actually it is not illegal (in Australia) to modify a DVD player to make it multi region, it is only illegal if you modify it so that it will play pirated discs. This is similar to the situation with chipping Playstations. The Australian IT has a more in depth article on this issue and also takes a look at DVD regions from the publishers side.
Many countries have allready tackled the issue of privacy from a legislative point of view. Back in 1988 Australia passed the Commonwealth Privacy Act, which currently regulates the Commonwealth and ACT public sectors and private sector organisations that handle tax file numbers and credit information files.
m l gives more detail on the 11 principles of the Act).
m l for more details on it.
This act basically states that personal information shall not be collected unless the information is (a) collected for a purpose that is a lawful purpose directly related to a function or activity of the collector, and (b) the collection of the information is necessary for or directly related to that purpose.
The information collected is generally not allow to be used for any other means. Also, the individual must also be made aware of the purpose for which the information is being collected, to which external parties that information may be disclosed to, and should be allowed access to the records.
(http://www.privacy.gov.au/publications/ipps.ht
Ealier this year an ammendment was introduced to expand the reach of the act to cover private sector organisations, and to include more types of private information (health in particular). In drafting the ammendment the government considered the "global information economy" as well as existing privacy laws worldwide (particularly Europe). Take a look at http://www.law.gov.au/privacy/InformationPaper.ht
Of course this only applies to Australian organisations, at this stage it offers no real protection of data provided to say a company in the US. Increasingly if you are concerned about your own privacy you not only have to consider what goes on in your own country, but what laws/protections exist worldwide. Like so many other current issues you really need to take a global view.