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Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

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Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#82
post #43

Hmm, what would it take for the major "Internet companies"(which are primarily American) to "cut the cord" to Britain rather than complying with this kind of outrageous overreach? Genuinely curious. EDIT: Also, > The laws would also force technology companies to delete anything that a person posted when they were under 18. sounds quite literally insane, censoring the speech of people just because they are minors?

> > The laws would also force technology companies to delete anything that a person posted when they were under 18.

> sounds quite literally insane, censoring the speech of people just because they are minors?

No, how I understood it, it means that you can decide to have stuff deleted if you wrote it when you were a minor.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#83
It's good to see May's government is really focused on those all-encompassing Brexit talks it needs to do.

> "We will put a responsibility on industry not to direct users – even unintentionally – to hate speech, pornography, or other sources of harm," the Conservatives write.

Because they've done such a bang-up job with folks like UKIP and things like Page 3 girls? Is there any other English-speaking nation that has had such open pornography in a daily newspaper?

As for hate speech, the English make a sport of deriding the Scots, Irish, Welsh, French, Spanish, Polish, Pakistanis, Americans, and who knows how many others. Getting rid of hate speech properly would take out a core part of the national character.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#84
post #55

As much as I expect nanny-state behaviour from the Tory's this has blown me away. I thought the author may be exaggerating so I went and actually read the manifesto. It's only about one page near the end but it reads like something you'd expect from a dictatorial regime. It seems like after cutting us off from Europe via Brexit the government now wants to cut us off from the rest of the world. I just hope internet co…

"I just hope internet companies stand up the UK and refuse to do business here." I wouldn't bet my money on it, since UK ISP companies were quite happy following government's agenda (see porn filter and Internet history collection).

UK ISP's don't have much of a choice. There business would be over. US tech companies do (especially ones that aren't publicly traded) as they have a huge market outside the UK. Think the SOPA action but on a more impactful scale.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it prevents 99% of the people who don't know how or don't bother setting up VPN from accessing prohibited content, that's the intended effect. So I would say it's working well.

According to stats I found, it prevents https://www.statista.com/statistics/301204/top-markets-vpn-p... Edit: another one is pretty close as well: http://insight.globalwebindex.net/chart-of-the-day-90-millio... And that's just people who explicitly use it. With that kind of market penetration basically everyone knows what to do, or who to ask if they want to access some geoblocked service in the future.

According to my observations now here in China, your stats are wrong.

Edit: Just to substantiate, many people I spoke to vaguely know what they would see if they get unfiltered internet, so there's not really much motivation to bypass GFW.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#86
post #43

Hmm, what would it take for the major "Internet companies"(which are primarily American) to "cut the cord" to Britain rather than complying with this kind of outrageous overreach? Genuinely curious. EDIT: Also, > The laws would also force technology companies to delete anything that a person posted when they were under 18. sounds quite literally insane, censoring the speech of people just because they are minors?

"We will give people new rights to ensure they are in control of their own data, including the ability to require major social media platforms to delete information held about them at the age of 18"

Doesn't this mean that it is a choice, not a requirement to censor?

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#87
post #62

As much as I expect nanny-state behaviour from the Tory's this has blown me away. I thought the author may be exaggerating so I went and actually read the manifesto. It's only about one page near the end but it reads like something you'd expect from a dictatorial regime. It seems like after cutting us off from Europe via Brexit the government now wants to cut us off from the rest of the world. I just hope internet co…

Which page are you referring to? I'd like to read but don't have time for the whole manifesto right now and I couldn't find it!

Page 82 of the document (the 2 pages before the conclusion paragraph).

PDF link: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/manifesto2017/Manifesto20...

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, both can be right. Censorship can be ineffective, but circumventing it may still put your name on some list. And once you do get charged with something, that fact can easily come up. Also, VPNs are usually leaky. You can trivially identify many protocols, even under encryption. There was some researcher recently (sorry, can't find the link) identifying which movie is being streamed over encrypted link. Some netwo…

So basically you are arguing that censorship is still effective in the sense that it serves as a deterrence and the base for other forms of tracking. And that would certainly harm freedom of speech in certain ways. So you are still supporting the idea that censorship is effective.

> in the sense that it serves as a deterrence

Absolutely not. I argue it's effective, as in, it provides an extra tool for the government to go against you if you cross some gov. defined line. I think it provides little deterrence. Same as the law against murder is more for definition of the crime and punishment than for deterring people from killing each other.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#89

As much as I expect nanny-state behaviour from the Tory's this has blown me away. I thought the author may be exaggerating so I went and actually read the manifesto. It's only about one page near the end but it reads like something you'd expect from a dictatorial regime. It seems like after cutting us off from Europe via Brexit the government now wants to cut us off from the rest of the world. I just hope internet co…

> I just hope internet companies stand up the UK and refuse to do business here Honestly, as a techie my impulse is to go "fine, have your shitty internet" to legislators who repay the advances the tech revolution has given them this way, but - The reality is that tech companies are all still businesses hungry for bigger marketshare and willing to follow the money. The "internet giants" have all bent over backwards f…

While I agree this would also put a burden on tech companies to police their platforms more and, likely to build backdoors which could put their companies in jeopardy. It might be more financially viable long-term to fight.

Re: Theresa May Wants To Regulate The Internet

#90
I am as left wing and anti-authoritarian as they come. I read the digital bit in their manifesto and I don't see what all the fuss is about. It's simply stating the laws of the land should be respected and reflected in the online landscape. What's wrong with that?

Britain is a deeply divided, but pluralist country, where the majority are conservative. This is broadly in line with what I would expect that majority to suggest or want.

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