Comment Re:Will be interesting, but... (Score 1) 458
Goodness me... I've found an optimist on Slashdot!
Goodness me... I've found an optimist on Slashdot!
Obviously 'ban the Internet' is hyperbole, but they've already banned anonymous discussion of politics down in South Australia.
There's a lot they can do to stifle free speech without outright banning anything. For instance, content that is 'refused classification' is illegal to own or distribute, but because it's not TECHNICALLY banned, the government gets away with it.
Perhaps you can see where I'm going with this?
Fair enough, they have better things to do, but this is a human rights issue too.
Dare I say, their protests to lift censorship might even be more effective than writing polite letters to totalitarian leaders asking for the release of political prisoners.
You're right that these kinds of protests are just about useless over here. I'm a bit disillusioned myself.
That doesn't mean we should lash out at those who want to help (even if it is "for the lulz").
The fact that the only people standing up for Australians' rights are these same "script kiddies and shy exhibitionists" is notable in and of itself.
Where is the Amnesty protest? Where is the EFA protest? This is news because everyone else is conspicuously silent.
Also, you may have missed the fact that THIS ENTIRE CATEGORY is entitled "Your Rights Online", and solely devoted to posts on this subject. Are you lost?
This is a story about Australians' rights online, and what Anonymous (of all groups) is doing to try safeguard them. That's about as on-topic as you get.
No, more like getting pictures of their small-breasted wives or mistresses, and pointing out the pure hypocrisy of their proposed ban on small-breasted women pornography, while they enjoy their small-breasted women at home.
Yea, that's not going to go over well with any rational person.
... I'm sorry, what?
Putting up porn of politicians' small-titted wives is going to make them reconsider their policy on small-breasted porn?
More like, they'll ban the Internet altogether.
Every policy maker in the world is going to go into knee-jerk Ban Everything mode when they realise their own seedy private lives are in danger of being leaked by Internet vigilantes. If news stories out of the US are at all representative, it seems Senators touch more small children than just about any other demographic... do you really think they won't force through every free-speech-stifling law they can the moment they realise the threat?
Obviously, yes - but what about the kind of data day-traders use, for instance?
Companies are charging a lot of money for what is essentially access to facts about the value of stocks, commodities and currency over time.
If someone were to pay for this service, get the data, and then make these same facts freely available via his or her website... would that be legal under this ruling?
He might've been mentally ill, rather than crippled.
Plenty of people are very uncomfortable around the mentally handicapped, and lash out in fear.
In some ways, I wish you were right... but revolution is something no-one ever does until things get so bad that they can't feed their family.
Australians and Americans both will just suck it up, even as they continue to lose right after right. Particularly with political debate controlled, they likely won't even know what they've lost until they need those same rights later.
It's sad, but that's human nature.
Maybe if news outlets weren't so enamoured of all these censorship initiatives, and actually reported on the harm that the government is doing, Australians would wake up before walking like lemmings over the edge of the cliff.
From TFA - this is any group that "directly or indirectly advocates, advises, teaches or practices the duty, necessity or propriety of controlling, conducting, seizing or overthrowing the government of the United States".
Lobbyist groups are all about controlling the government (via substantial bribes). Does this mean they need to register?
What a ridiculous situation... from what the other posters are saying, it may well be that voting for the Pirate Party is the only way for voters to express their dissatisfaction with this kind of partisan politics.
As others are saying, Liberals/Nationals came up with this idea in the first place, the Greens just kick their votes to Labour, and it's the Labour party which - traditionally - is meant to prevent these kinds of abuses.
Voting for a 'pirate party' seems like a foolish notion to me, but given the alternatives it's going to look mighty appealing on election day.
It's not representational government when you blindly push your personal agenda against the objections of just about every stakeholder and expert in the system.
I wish Steven Conroy would hurry up and get caught looking at naughty pics of Miranda Kerr on the (uncensored) Internet during a newscast and fired, so the free world can stop giggling at all these Australian human rights violations and we can all get back to being the relaxed outback heroes people used to think of us as.
Oh, so ragging on Catholics and queers is nasty and evil, but casually insulting the 1.3 billion Muslims of the world is OK?
News flash: most of those 1.3 billion Muslims are actually good people, and here you are needlessly insulting them based on a media stereotype.
Until you clear your mind of bigotry, you're no better than the "Fundies" you so despise.
Sure, getting kicked off the internet is pretty bad from a rights perspective and all, but what gets me is the fines they're still able to levy in court for these things. The UK's fines are way out there, though not so much as the $2 million or so the US has fined in the past.
From this blog post, here's a list of seven crimes which, in the US, will cost you less than downloading pirated music:
1. Child abduction: the fine is only like $25000.
2. Stealing the actual CD: the fine is $2,500
3. Rob your neighbor: the fine is $375,000
4. Burn a house down: The fine is just over $375,000
5. Stalk someone: The fine is $175,000
6. Start a dogfighting ring: the fine is $50,000
7. Murder someone: The maximum penalty [for second-degree murder] is only $25,000 and 15 years in jail, and depending on your yearly salary, would probably be far slighter a penalty than $2 million.
What's going on here? Are the judges (worldwide!) just crazy? Do they get a cut?
How can anyone think these fines are reasonable, to say nothing of the further abuses discussed in the article?
I don't know that it's such a stretch to call them terrorists, really.
As I understand it, Scientologists use scare tactics to convince people that they are infected with ancient alien souls which are causing health complaints, and then take advantage of their victims' vulnerable (and gullible?) state to extort money.
That qualifies as terrorism in my book.
"If I do not want others to quote me, I do not speak." -- Phil Wayne