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Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

savetheinternet.eu

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Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#11

Post by higherpurpose »

I'm disappointed that this site for such an important issue doesn't even seem to work very well when trying to contact your MEP. It doesn't even recognize my country, and then it picks MEPs at random from multiple countries. If they didn't have something very reliable, they could've just showed you a list of countries to select your own, and then pick the MEPs which you want to e-mail (or all at once).

Also, these EU organizations don't seem nearly as organized as the US ones (although the US ones aren't that great at this either). I found out about this the same day the EU Parliament had to vote on this like a month ago. Fortunately, they canceled the vote back then. Then I heard absolutely nothing about it until yesterday, again a day before the vote.

These organizations need to do a better job at keeping the public updated on these Internet issues. We need an EFF of Europe.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#12

Post by atmosx »

nyrina wrote: post #7
bad_user wrote: post #3

This sounds terrible. On the other hand I'd like to know what's the status quo right now in Europe. For example, are ISPs required to not block or restrict access to online services?

I know the Danish courts has ordered Danish ISPs to block The Pirate Bay, so I doubt the status quo is that ISPs are required not to block online services.

If this passes by and enters to action, you'll notice the difference (HN not loading, or loading extremely fast while your FB connection will go as fast as ever).

If you don't have a facebook account, the you don't have internets ;-).

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#13

Post by higherpurpose »

motters wrote: post #10

The main problem here is ISPs as a bottleneck. Longer term we need to figure out how to bypass the bottlenecks, which seem to be increasingly acting as points of political control and surveillance. Such a project would need to have a legal and technical side to it. On the legal side there would need to be an area of radio bandwidth reserved for public internet. On the technical side you need mesh networking software…

To bypass ISPs we need to democratize the ISPs and decentralize them some more. Perhaps in the future, I could get Internet in France from a German ISP that has solar-powered drones or balloons over France, or a satellite.

The longer term goal should be to create meshnets, so we can give Internet to each other.

Direct censorship of stuff might not even be the biggest threat, though, but traffic shaping. We could avoid direct censorship if we build more P2P systems, which can't be "taken down". However, they probably could be throttled to a crawl, if the ISP is allowed to shape traffic and discriminate against the type of traffic they choose. Bitcoin for example can't be censored, but it can be made unusable.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#14

Post by kolme »

spindritf wrote: post #9

Is it about net neutrality ("all packets were created equal") or is it about censorship (by which I mean government actions like court orders to block sites and filters)? Or is it somehow about both? Why is it the DEATH OF THE INTERNET AS WE KNOW IT when it's a new regulation that doesn't go as far as they want in the net neutrality direction? And all they want are some adjustments? The idea of banning specialised se…

I think you're taking this too lightly, to be honest.

That's exactly the point of the Internet: it offers arbitrary services. Banning stuff because it could compete with other services you offer is opening the door to the internet being crippled on all ISPs.

That's seriously terrifying.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#15

Post by TausAmmer »

spindritf wrote: post #9

Is it about net neutrality ("all packets were created equal") or is it about censorship (by which I mean government actions like court orders to block sites and filters)? Or is it somehow about both? Why is it the DEATH OF THE INTERNET AS WE KNOW IT when it's a new regulation that doesn't go as far as they want in the net neutrality direction? And all they want are some adjustments? The idea of banning specialised se…

Profit dictates what you can and can not do. And profit it nr.1 priority.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#16

Post by spindritf »

kolme wrote: post #14
spindritf wrote: post #9

Is it about net neutrality ("all packets were created equal") or is it about censorship (by which I mean government actions like court orders to block sites and filters)? Or is it somehow about both? Why is it the DEATH OF THE INTERNET AS WE KNOW IT when it's a new regulation that doesn't go as far as they want in the net neutrality direction? And all they want are some adjustments? The idea of banning specialised se…

I think you're taking this too lightly, to be honest. That's exactly the point of the Internet: it offers arbitrary services. Banning stuff because it could compete with other services you offer is opening the door to the internet being crippled on all ISPs. That's seriously terrifying.

That's my complaint about this site: who's banning what? I just checked, VoIP works on the same coax that my ISP uses to provide telephone services.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#17

Post by Ihmahr »

bad_user wrote: post #3

This sounds terrible. On the other hand I'd like to know what's the status quo right now in Europe. For example, are ISPs required to not block or restrict access to online services?

Here in the Netherlands we already have net neutrality, which Europe might be taking away now.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#19

Post by scribu »

higherpurpose wrote: post #11

I'm disappointed that this site for such an important issue doesn't even seem to work very well when trying to contact your MEP. It doesn't even recognize my country, and then it picks MEPs at random from multiple countries. If they didn't have something very reliable, they could've just showed you a list of countries to select your own, and then pick the MEPs which you want to e-mail (or all at once). Also, these EU…

Yeah, I also got random MEPs. Resorted to clicking "choose another" until I found someone from my home country. A simple list with email address and country of origin would have been more usable.

Re: Your freedom online is threatened by an EU proposal.

#20

Post by ronaldx »

TausAmmer wrote: post #15
spindritf wrote: post #9

Is it about net neutrality ("all packets were created equal") or is it about censorship (by which I mean government actions like court orders to block sites and filters)? Or is it somehow about both? Why is it the DEATH OF THE INTERNET AS WE KNOW IT when it's a new regulation that doesn't go as far as they want in the net neutrality direction? And all they want are some adjustments? The idea of banning specialised se…

Profit dictates what you can and can not do. And profit it nr.1 priority.

And therefore you should vote also with your money.

Avoid companies that threaten net neutrality.

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