I don't know if Banksy made this, but he could have. If you don't know who Banksy is then slap yourself, hard, in the face, and then google it.

But wait, it gets worse.

Verizon blocked its users from sending SMSs about a political group that they thought was “too controversial”. AT&T censored a web broadcasted Pear Jam concert because Eddie Veder made some comments attacking Bush and Comcast blocked political ads endorsing the enemies of politicians they had given money to!

So let’s not trust “business” too far, k?

Reality Check: if companies are given ways of controlling the Internet they would be stupid not to milk those powers for every penny they could get. The amount of money the Internet can generate is effectively infinite. What would someone do to be able to control just a fraction of that? Pretty much anything.

And since the ‘Net is also the most effective way of countering corporate propaganda they have a double desire to take it over.

Why do so few artists these days actually make any art? Is it because galleries have become mere companies? Yes. Yes it is.

But won’t the politicians stop the businesses from taking over the ‘Net?
No, if anything they will help!

Every politician in the world has been stung by the freedom of speech the Internet gives us, and many of them would love to take it away. Bush’s famous statement “there oughta be limits to freedom” is just the tip of the iceberg.

Conservative politicians want to control the Internet because it would allow them to appease the media conglomerates, restrict criticism and remove the types of pornography that they claim to not like.

Liberal politicians want to control the Internet because it would allow them to appease the media conglomerates, restrict criticism and remove “hate speech” (bear in mind that many regard any criticism of Israel as “hate speech”, many others regard drawings of Mohammed as “hate speech”).

In fact Poland is currently facing an election where BOTH candidates want to censor the Internet!

So both political will and a lot of the business will is against us, and against freedom.

This is Technically Illiterate Duck, so I could make a pun about the bill. But I choose not to.

Of course it is true that there will almost certainly be ways around whatever legislation is enacted. But that doesn’t really help. The fact that hackers and network insiders will still have free access isn’t the point.

“If the Internet isn’t free for the majority of users then it is not free” – TitaniumTeddyBear

The freedom of the Internet is not a national security issue, it is a human rights issue, and the moment we think that it can’t be taken away from us is the moment we will lose it all.

It happened to radio. It happened to TV. It's going to happen to the Internet. Unless we stop it, and keep stopping it every time.

[EDIT: People are still saying that the chances of the "Killswitch" being abused are minimal because the bill contains none of the nightmare scenarios I mentioned.

But that's kinda the problem. The bill doesn't contain any specifics about what the President can or can't do. It's completely vague and open to interpretation. The place where it gets specific is when it guarantees businesses immunity from lawsuits.

Hmm...

Anyway, people would be stupid to accept a bill that is so vague. The bill needs specifics so that we can debate them. It also definitely needs more consumer protection and more protection of free speech.]

[Standard Disclaimer: this post was entirely my own opinion and was not paid for in any way, directly or otherwise, by anyone or anything that stands to gain in any way from the ideas expressed herein.]

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