301–310 of 318 posts
These UK laws might boost Tor usage.. let's hope something good will come from the full censorship political tyranny in Europe.
The UK is not in Europe, which would otherwise impose human rights legal constraints on UK government legislation.
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If enough people switch to Tor, then Tor will get banned. Technical solutions don’t fix bad policies.
Tor is pretty hard to block. I think that some sort of mixnet is pretty much the solution to all ISP/Government spying and censorship on the web as they make the law de-facto unenforcable
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> The only way this works is to have a list of banned talking points from a government agency. How so? The "obvious" solution to me, from the perspective of a politician, would be to 1. require online identity verification for signup to any forum hosted in your country, and then 2. using that information, only allow people who are citizens of your country to register. (You know, like in China.)
That won't stop foreign disinformation. They'll just pay some local to say it. And China's system doesn't stop disinformation; it promotes disinformation. It it designed to make sure that only China-sponsored disinformation is available. If you want a system for that it is a solved problem; it just isn't a good idea.
And to be clear, "making sure that only [legislative jurisdiction]-sponsored disinformation is available" is almost always the whole point of laws like this — and what I was assuming the UK was going for here. No state wants to prevent the spread of their own propaganda; they want state propaganda to be the only legal propaganda.
Remember that your phrasing I was responding to here is "the only way this works is[...]". I think what the UK is doing here can work very well indeed to achieve their goals — it's just a question of what those goals are. Which, I think, is where we differ; I may have a far more cynical view of those goals than you.
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> that is a genuine contribution to the conversation, it points out the opposing argument doesn't make any sense and that the rules are just applied arbitrarily That post only works if you use an absolutely ridiculous definition of hate speech. It does not show a flaw in the opposing argument. It's not an example of a rule being applied arbitrarily. It's an example of falsely claiming a rule applies when it objective…
Nope, it makes sense and you're the only one here whose lacking an example. Any definition of hate speech is ridiculous because grown adults who try to control the speech of others are all ridiculous.
That's a very different argument from the one I was critiquing.
> you're the only one here whose lacking an example.
It's not about whether I can come up with an example myself, it's that the specific example used by Asooka was a troll argument.
What is the meaning of "illegal content" given in the OSA? What will social media platforms be forced to censor (, remove, ..) ... let's take a look: Table 1.1: Priority offences by category ( https://www.ofcom.org.uk/siteassets/resources/documents/onli... ) Disucssion of offenses related to: prostitution, drugs, abuse & insults, suicide, "stiring up of racial/religious hatred", fraud and "foreign interference". So o…
We grew up with the internet being a fun place where fun things happen and you don't need to take it so seriously. It was the symbol of freedom. Then internet evolved into a business center, where everything is taken extremely seriously, don't you dare break the etiquette. It's a sad change to witness, but it is what it is.
Maybe the future will be places guarded by real life trust.
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Iirc UC Berkeley(?) did exactly that to their YouTube library of recorded lectures due to an accessibility lawsuit.
I still remember some of the Berkeley genetics lectures as some of the best learning materials I could find for my upper-level courses. Later I tried to refer to them and found they were all gone. I wish there was any other option vs. just taking them down.
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No, the proposal is that there is a power of entry where the police have reasonable grounds to believe stolen property is on the premises and that this is supported by tracking data and that authority to enter is provided and recorded by a police inspector. This is analogous to s18 PACE post-arrest powers, grafted onto s17 PACE. The alternative is that we continue to require police to try and get a fast-time warrant…
I find it terrifying that you consider this to be legitimate grounds for a search, and a reasonable procedure for obtaining permission to do so. They should get in line and get permission from proper legal authorities, like all other law enforcement.
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In the linked PDF, where does it say you can't discuss using drugs?
Table 1.1: Priority offences by category
• The unlawful supply, offer to supply, of controlled drugs
• The unlawful supply, or offer to supply, of articles for administering or preparing controlled drugs
• The supply, or offer to supply, of psychoactive substances
• Inciting any offence under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971
Related post with a large discussion from someone who said: " Lfgss shutting down 16th March 2025 (day before Online Safety Act is enforced) [...] I run just over 300 forums, for a monthly audience of 275k active users. most of this is on Linode instances and Hetzner instances, a couple of the larger fora go via Cloudflare, but the rest just hits the server. and it's all being shut down [...] " For the same reasons.…
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Yes, death threats are not protected by your free speech, that was my entire point that you completely missed. Why then not allow them but allow flurries of racial slurs? Or harassment? Or foreign propaganda? The line is never "anything goes", we have to draw it somewhere . So, why act like anything other than "anything goes" is "literally 1984". In Europe, it's "La liberté des uns s'arrête là où commence celle des a…
No that’s just nonsense. The line is drawn at actual death threats. Anything else does lead to 1984.