Australia Joins China In Censoring The Internet

[onedomino]

One of the first acts of the Socialists that the Aussies recently voted into power (when they ousted Howard) is to censor the internet. I assume they will not be censoring the NYT like China does. But how thoughtful of the ALP Socialists, who know what's good for all the citizens of Australia, to filter the net.

Australia Joins China In Censoring The Internet

completed article: http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/12/30/australia-joins-china-in-censoring-the-internet/

The Australian Government has announced that they will be joining China as one of the few countries globally that broadly censor the internet.

The Labor Party’s policy was announced prior to the Australian Election in November (release here) and was justified on the basis that the previous Government’s policy of providing free copies of NetNanny to all Australian households who wanted it didn’t adequately protect children.

As recently as the week prior to the election, Labor Party candidates were telling those concerned about the proposed law that the censorship wouldn’t be compulsory, and that the “clean feed” would be opt-in, not opt-out. Today’s announcement by Telecommunications Minister Stephen Conroy states that the censorship regime will be mandatory, although people will be able to opt-out of it. The problem of course then becomes if you opt-out questions will be asked as to why you want out, which in itself may lead to Government monitoring.

Nanny Rudd Censors Net

complete article: http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,22990520-27197,00.html

Kevin Rudd's fledgling government has just made its first major policy blunder. And it's a doozy.

This is a piece of political lunacy that will intrude into all our lives whether we like it or not – somewhat like a blunt instrument used to bash down your bedroom door.

What's more astounding is that for a Prime Minister who campaigned on his relative youth, and the value of new technology and the information age, is that this is a policy that flies in the face of any such alleged revolution, education or otherwise.

What the Rudd Government is proposing is compulsory censorship of the internet in Australia.

Sure, they'll spin it with words like "filtering" and "optional" and "protecting children" but ultimately it is censorship at a government level, nothing less.

In a nutshell, every internet user in the country will have their web content automatically censored by some faceless mandarins to block anything that is deemed "inappropriate material" – which will be an interesting definition in itself.

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[akiboy]

nice article. Really surprised a country like Australia would censor the net.

Here in dubai they have blocked lots of social networking sites like Orkut and Hi5 though popular ones like Facbeook and Myspace are still in use.

 

[watermark]

One of the first acts of the Socialists that the Aussies recently voted into power (when they ousted Howard) is to censor the internet. I assume they will not be censoring the NYT like China does. But how thoughtful of the ALP Socialists, who know what's good for all the citizens of Australia, to filter the net.




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Do the Australians not have a constitution or something? How can they justify this?

They don't have one of those constitutions that says that the government can infringe on speech if it's for the "common good" do they? There are a lot of countries like that. What's the point of even having a free speech ammendment? Of course if the government wants to regulate speech it thinks what it is doing is for the "common good".