Tag: Internet

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First Amendment rights general freedom national politics & policies too much government

The Kill Switch for Freedom

The Egyptian government — or perhaps a mysterious inter-​dimensional vortex, we’re not sure which — has shut down some 99 percent of the Internet within Egypt as protests mount demanding that President Hosni Mubarak step down. Mubarak has ruled autocratically for three decades and the protesters are fed up. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other cyber-​tools have played a part in their protest, helping them document Egyptians’ clashes with authorities in word and image.

Declan McCullough, a veteran reporter on privacy and the Internet, observes that the Egyptian government is “conducting a high-​profile experiment in what happens when a country with a $500 billion GDP, one that’s home to the pyramids and the Suez Canal, decides that Internet access should be restricted to a trickle.”

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, U.S. pols like Senator Joseph Lieberman are again pushing a bill to give the president authority to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” in the event of a crisis and shut down major portions of the Internet. For our own good, of course. No judicial review would be necessary before the executive branch could snap the cyber-spine.

Perhaps American politicians who advocate letting the president throw a so-​called kill switch for the Internet in case of emergency would deny any tyrannical intentions. And perhaps their motives are indeed pure … in some aesthetic sense. But once you give government new authority to exercise destructive control over us, there is, of course, the temptation to use it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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free trade & free markets national politics & policies

Neutrality or Tragedy?

Everybody likes freebies. New York renters often seek apartments advertised with “utilities included.” Why? So they can run their air conditioners 24/​7.

Similarly, a lot of people are pushing for something called “Net neutrality.” We must guarantee a “free and open Internet,” they say. 

Sounds good. After all, “free” is a good deal, if you can get it. But “free” comes at a cost. “Not having to pay for it” can become “paying through the nose” pretty quickly. 

Here’s the problem: The rise of VoIP, streaming video and audio, and similar broadband luxuries has strained the Internet. Regulating the Net for “neutrality” prevents price and quality-​of-​service discrimination by owners of the Net’s infrastructure. 

Might as well require all landlords to provide all utilities “free” … distributing the costs of extra usage via basic rent charges. That would be “Apartment neutrality.” 

It would also be a big waste, and not just of electricity.

When suppliers of goods aren’t allowed to price and move product to their advantage, we get something  like the “tragedy of the commons.” The term comes from the medieval commons, a field that all villagers could use. They were, historically, overgrazed. Devastated. Hence the need to divvy up the fields into private plots, allowing trade to increase wealth, to the benefit of all.

U.S. regulators, tackling Net neutrality this month, should be wary of laying waste to the Net in the name of “openness.” Never confuse “free” of price with freedom itself.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights too much government

Leahy versus the Internet

A censor’s work is never done. So, in a civilization where everybody salutes freedom of speech, censors must be especially clever, seeking new ways to hide their goals.

The latest camel’s rump under the tent? A bill to censor entire Internet domains on the grounds of alleged violations of rights that have not been prosecuted. Pending in the Senate and sponsored by Senator Patrick Leahy, it’s called the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA).

The bill would create two blacklists in response to accusations of copyright violation or sales of counterfeit goods. One would consist of sites to which Internet service providers would be required to block access.

The second would consist of sites to which ISPs would be merely encouraged to block access.

Any chance the government might pressure ISPs to ensure the “voluntary” censorship of disapproved domains … including domains with just a few pages of dubious legality but many pages of criticism of government?

Sounding the alarm, the Electronic Frontier Foundation notes that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act already gives copyright holders a means of taking action against copyright violations. The Foundation argues that Leahy’s bill would enable the U.S. to join the ranks of the “profoundly anti-​democratic regimes that keep their citizens from seeing the whole Internet.”

The Foundation’s message: “Tell Your Senator: No Website Blacklists, No Internet Censorship!”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights national politics & policies too much government

Congress Moves to Censor the Net?

The Internet is not safe. Congress wants to regulate it. The most recent idea is to sic the Federal Elections Commission on Net freedom.

Recent hearings on something called the DISCLOSE Act disclosed that the act would “extend the FEC’s control over broadcast communications to all ‘covered communications,’ including the blogosphere.” Or so say the Center for Competitive Politics’ Bradley Smith and Jeff Patch, writing on Reason​.com.

It’s hard to imagine a worse idea. No groundswell of citizens demanded this. So of course Congress is considering it.

Would they really try to regulate the blogosphere? 

The lead “reformers” in Congress say all they want to regulate are political ads on the Internet, not bloggers. But, as Smith and Patch note, the actual language of the current bill quite clearly leaves open the blogosphere for regulation. They also doubt the good intentions of the would-​be regulators, explaining how, in the early days of McCain-​Feingold advocacy, “the ‘good government’ crowd … denounced a deregulated Internet as a ‘loophole’ in campaign finance law, a ‘poison pill,’ ‘anti-​reform’” etc.

How can respectable Americans advocate regulation of speech, as if the First Amendment did not exist? It’s as if they are baffled by plain language: “Congress shall make no law … abridging freedom of speech, or of the press.…”

How can they live with themselves? 

For me, it’s a consolation to know that at least censors in Congress can still be thrown out, peacefully, with votes.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights general freedom too much government

Googling and Snuggling No More?

After years of abetting Chinese censorship, Google may finally take a stand. The world leader in Internet search may no longer be willing to help impose the Red regime’s repressive measures. The last straw? A cyber attack on Google that originated in China and targeted email accounts of Chinese dissidents. Other companies were also attacked.

In recent decades, China has loosened controls on its economy. But it is loath to permit any significant scraps of civil liberty as well, like the right to speak out freely in criticism of the government.

China lets the Internet function within its borders. But it also erects firewalls, filters and other restrictions to block or limit access to various corners of cyberspace. For years, Google has cravenly played along, preventing phrases like “Tiananmen Square massacre” from being searched on the Chinese version of its search engine.

Google officers have long squirmed over their hypocritical willingness to “do evil.” Now a Google lawyer says the company is “no longer willing to continue censoring our results.…” They’re taking a few weeks to mull their next move. But they say they’ll leave China altogether if its government won’t agree to let Google’s search engine function freely.

China’s rulers won’t agree; so I hope Google does what it says it will do. Some things one should just not collaborate with. Tyranny is at the top of the list.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
general freedom too much government

China’s Not-​so-​Great Wall

The Chinese government has been tightening its cyber-​noose. Its officials fear  the ideas that can proliferate so easily on the Internet. So they’re making it ever harder for citizens to use the Net — even to visit nonpolitical websites.

Multiple-​choice question: The new restrictions mean that Web surfers will have a harder time a) viewing pornography; b) watching streaming TV shows; c) starting an Internet-​based business or personal web site; d) criticizing the Chinese government; or e) all of the above? 

The answer is “all of the above.”

This year, China has blocked Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and many other sites. The latest round of restrictions has resulted in the shutdown of some 700 homegrown sites. Chinese dictocrats talk about combating pornography or piracy to justify restrictions that have a much wider scope. But they also freely admit their eagerness to block the flow of ideas they call “bad,” which is to say, inconvenient to themselves. China’s public security minister complains that the Internet “has become an important avenue” for “anti-​China” forces.

Beijing can’t stamp out the Internet altogether. But it can certainly keep cooking up new ways to boil it down to an easier-​to-​control (or comprehend) size. 

Chinese citizens who are determined to keep resisting the tyrants need more and better technology to circumvent the firewalls, and to protect their own anonymity and privacy.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
general freedom

Twitter Not Always Annoying

You’ve probably heard of Twitter, now that Oprah has. It is a “micro-​blogging” tool that lets you keep in touch with people by sending messages of 140 characters or less, maybe 30 words. Senders are supposed to answer the question, “What are you doing right now?”

This sounds like a lot of people telling each other they’re hunting for a renegade sock or catching the bus. But people and imagination being what they are, savvy practitioners assure us that Twitter has been put to a very wide variety of uses, not all of them snooze-worthy.

I was sold as soon as I heard how it was used last year to help get innocent men out of jail.

James Karl Buck, an American grad student, was arrested in April 2008 while covering an anti-​government protest in Egypt. So was his translator, Mohammed Maree. Conciseness being the better part of valor, Buck sent a one-​word “tweet” to his “followers” on Twitter. To wit: “Arrested.”

Recipients knew that Buck was in Egypt covering a political demonstration. So comprehension was immediate, action swift. Soon, Buck’s college hired a lawyer to represent him. Soon thereafter he sent another message: “Released.”

His Egyptian translator, Mohammed Maree, was not so lucky. Buck worked hard to help his friend. Twitter was one of his tools. Three months later, Mohammed was free as well.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
too much government

Al Gore Reinvents the Internet

Former Vice President Al Gore wants a “purpose-​driven Web.”

See, cyberspace isn’t purpose-​driven … yet. It only helps us access all the information in the world, communicate instantly at no cost with people on the other side of the globe, find true love, shop, download books and movies and lectures, elect presidents, refute environmentalist alarmism, save lives, and other such trivia.

A New York Times article reports that in Al Gore’s view, “we” haven’t done enough to spread his vision of the imminent doom of the earth.

Gore can’t be held accountable for anybody else’s understanding of his views, of course. So let’s find a direct quote from this article about how “we” must do more with the Web than just trade party photos on Facebook.

According to Gore, speaking at an Internet conference in San Francisco, “Web 2.0 has to have a purpose.”

What purpose?

Nothing less, he declares, than “bring[ing] about a higher level of consciousness about our planet and the imminent danger and opportunity we face because of the radical transformation in the relationship between human beings and the Earth.”

Sounds quite grand, as long you don’t try to divine what the words actually mean.

In my online world, individual lives and individual purposes matter quite a lot, despite a lack of overarching purpose. Offline too.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.