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Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

reuters.com

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Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#101

Post by thisrod »

rayiner wrote: post #40
javert wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Freedom is not a necessary condition for economic prosperity (which undermines a lot of American rhetoric of the last 50 years) That is demonstrably false. Everywhere you look, throughout history, the more free a country is, the more economically prosperous it becomes. In fact, _every single example_ fits this pattern. There is not a single exception. China and Singapore are much more economically free than the US…

You're playing fast and loose with the word "free." Sure, no country in history has ever been a utopia of freedom, but I don't consider any country "free" in any sense of the word (even "1% free") that doesn't have meaningful democracy. Indeed, that's what "freedom" has meant for the better part of the last 300-400 years: political self-determination, not "economic freedom." I can't look at a map and conceive of livi…

Meaningful representative democracy, with majority rule, has existed for around 110 years. There wasn't a democracy anywhere in 1700, and no serious thought of starting one.

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#102

Post by dmix »

dragonwriter wrote: post #96
dmix wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed - backed by court systems. Those are basic legal regulations or established charter rights. Not economic regulation as the original commenter implied and this entire thread is debating.

> Those are basic legal regulations or established charter rights. Not economic regulation as the original commenter implied and this entire thread is debating. This distinction is artificial: there is no difference between defining the scope of property rights and enforcing rights within those boundaries, on the one hand, and generalized economic regulation, on the other: they are different words for the same thing.…

My usage of "economic regulation" in the context of this thread is pretty obvious. I'm not attempting to win a war of pedanticism with you over the definition of property rights.

The well accepted meaning of economic regulation is the use of regulation to compensate for market failures or centrally-planning economies (such as controlling money supply, subsidies, tax-breaks, import/export tariffs etc).

This is very different from the enforcement and defence of basic property/contract rights in courts as I was implying.

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#103

Post by mdda »

kmfrk wrote: post #39

Singapore is like a YouTube sketch of what the Apple App Store would be like, if it were a country.

Love the analogy. And I'm guessing that a fair proportion of the people espousing Freedom of Speech/Politics here are also carrying iPhones, and benefit from the rules-based system of the App Store.

The common justification for loving Apple is that their imposition of rules is based on a fantastic focus on making things 'just work'. And that abiding by the rules is a small price to pay.

Also, let's not forget that Singapore is a country that's smaller than New York City. Of course, NYC is not as free as many places in the US either...

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#104

Post by salem »

ValentineC wrote: post #38
frontfor wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the regulations are about blocking websites using standard Internet censorship techniques akin to the Great Firewall of China, then it is relatively easy to circumvent (provided that Singapore doesn't implement that at a scale comparable to China). VPN, SSH server in foreign country, proxy, Tor etc should do the job. But if the regulations are about monitoring, reviewing and controlling, say, local news reports be…

> And now.. THIS. Any Singaporean HNers out there, if you're up for it, as a programmer, I'm wanna build something to circumvent this. Holler if you're keen. Cheers. This might not be possible to circumvent with a 'hack'. What this is, is the digital equivalent to the Newspapers and Printing Presses Act [1] (which is part of the "regulatory framework" for traditional news platforms that is cited in the article). It's…

My initial reaction on the new regulation was "good luck with that one" but... like you point out, large organizations will likely comply to take down requests or risk getting blocked (for less tech savvy users anyway), and eventually reduce their reporting or self-censor. I-am-not-a-lawyer, but my guess is that organizations outside of Singapore that ignore the law will put their executive staff at risk of prosecution if they ever travel through Singapore (a significant hub of air travel). So the likelihood that this regulation is toothless and can be circumvented via proxies or Tor is low.

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#105

Post by lostlogin »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #52
lostlogin wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, its more free in that you canbribe people safe in the knowledge that this is how the ruling class have acted since Mao (maybe longer?). It's just a business transaction. You can also top up your milk's protein measurements by adding melamine, then use your bribing ability to shut down investigations into the dead babies. The fraud aspect is a greater freedom. Copy and steal overseas companies products and make…

You can also top up your milk's protein measurements by adding melamine, then use your bribing ability to shut down investigations into the dead babies. Yes, you can do that if your idea of a good time is a date with a firing squad. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/24/china-executes-m...

Not sure if that was punishing the crime or punishing the crime because the story broke and the world knows. How many stories are there that never got out, and no one was punished? Good find, I wasn't aware of that part of the story.

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#106

Post by TA3142 »

nubela wrote: post #2

I'm a Singaporean and I fucking hate this. In fact, I built getgom.com because our government has decided to ban porn as well. And now.. THIS. Any Singaporean HNers out there, if you're up for it, as a programmer, I'm wanna build something to circumvent this. Holler if you're keen. Cheers. -- On another note, this is why whenever people say that Singapore is a fine place to start a business, I say thats probably beca…

The porn ban is simply just for show, there are tons of other sites that are not blocked.

Same goes for this, I don't believe any internet-savvy user actually visits yahoo news or the other state medias(>stomp, hah.)

As a programmer, this ban should hardly, if at all, affect you in any way.

If you actually care about freedom, then recognize the fact that Singapore has decided to give up some freedom for the sake of peace. Not much terrorism here, is there?

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#108

Post by ValentineC »

ValentineC wrote: post #81
EliRivers wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's gradually happening. The PAP hold fewer seats now than at any time in Singaporean history.

I should add that Singapore politics is somewhat complex, and it takes months, if not years, of following Singapore news to have a grasp of what the sentiment on the ground is. Some of the points that I think are relevant to this thread: (1) Much of the older generation and many newly naturalised immigrants feel that the incumbent government brought them to where they are today, and are willing to give up some libert…

Just to follow up on point #3, one of the opposition parties in Singapore has raised some concerns over the policy:

https://www.facebook.com/nicoleseahnsp/posts/494238060647270

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#109

Post by ValentineC »

mdda wrote: post #103
kmfrk wrote: post #39

Singapore is like a YouTube sketch of what the Apple App Store would be like, if it were a country.

Love the analogy. And I'm guessing that a fair proportion of the people espousing Freedom of Speech/Politics here are also carrying iPhones, and benefit from the rules-based system of the App Store. The common justification for loving Apple is that their imposition of rules is based on a fantastic focus on making things 'just work'. And that abiding by the rules is a small price to pay. Also, let's not forget that Si…

Why do you think New York City is not as free as many places in the US? (Just curious.)

Re: Singapore to regulate high traffic websites that report on Singapore

#110

Post by dragonwriter »

dmix wrote: post #102
dragonwriter wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Those are basic legal regulations or established charter rights. Not economic regulation as the original commenter implied and this entire thread is debating. This distinction is artificial: there is no difference between defining the scope of property rights and enforcing rights within those boundaries, on the one hand, and generalized economic regulation, on the other: they are different words for the same thing.…

My usage of "economic regulation" in the context of this thread is pretty obvious. I'm not attempting to win a war of pedanticism with you over the definition of property rights. The well accepted meaning of economic regulation is the use of regulation to compensate for market failures or centrally-planning economies (such as controlling money supply, subsidies, tax-breaks, import/export tariffs etc). This is very di…

> The well accepted meaning of economic regulation is the use of regulation to compensate for market failures or centrally-planning economies (such as controlling money supply, subsidies, tax-breaks, import/export tariffs etc).

No, that's not the "well accepted definition of economic regulation". Those are two well-known, opposing philosophies of economy regulation.

But, even so, pretty central to both styles is how property rights are defined and enforced, which tends to be radically different between the "compensate for market failures" approach and the "centrally-planning economies" approach, illustrating, again, that you cannot divide "economic regulation" from "defining and enforcing property rights", even when you limit "economic regulation" to being either "compensate for market failures" or "centrally-planning economies".

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