Andy Burnham MP to the Royal Television Society (in questions after the speech):
The time has come for perhaps a different approach to the internet. I want to even up that see-saw, even up the regulation [imbalance] between the old and the new.
[Reported by The Register]
Twice is coincidence…
In response to a letter from the UK Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), Nominet is announcing an independent review of its current corporate governance structure, to be benchmarked against established best practice corporate governance standards.
Three times is enemy action…
There will always be a role for political commentary, providing perspective, illumination and explanation. But editors need to do more to disentangle it from news reporting, and to allow elected politicians the same kind of prominent space for comment as people who have never stood for office. […]
Unless and until political blogging adds value to our political culture, by allowing new and disparate voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and despair.
I take it that “adds value” means ‘supports us’; “legitimate protest” means ‘sneering at our enemies’; and a “more responsible manner” means ‘without questioning our control of the discourse’.
It’s been a good week for evil.
The only question to consider is how do we stop the bastards?. Technicals out there–over to you–you tell me how to stuff themn and I’ll do it.
mr ecks:
Actual technical measures to implement the things they want will be VERY onerous and probably not work. The Australian Govt are up to the same thing, watch that carefully. Already ISPs down there are complaining about it. Not even the Chinese can implement net censorship properly, the firewall of China has many holes in which are easy to find if you know where to look.
The only question to consider is how do we stop the bastards?. Technicals out there–over to you–you tell me how to stuff themn and I’ll do it.
Pfff…Dream on.
They printed an extract of the Blears speech on CiF and it’s getting the stuffing it deserves. Now going to teach myself IP masking and all that other geeky stuff. Scum.
I’m struggling to see how blogs do not allow new and disparate voices. I would have thought that was precisely what they did.
Honestly, Blears is thick as shit.
Or clever enough to know what she wants and start giving excuses to achieve it.
The ‘Royal Television Society’ is a warning to us all.
We’ll have the ‘Royal Internet Society’ soon.
Eastenders anyone? No, I thought not.
From Blear’s screed:
Well, let’s stipulate that (only for argument’s sake)…
How come you don’t suggest politicians cease with the scandals, conspiracies and hypocrisy?
Swearblogger Old Holborn crashed the Blears meeting at Millbank and rendered her speechless. Dressed as Guy Fawkes/V for Vendetta.
Priceless.
Ye gods…how I hate those power-hungry manipulative bastards……….and it seems the ‘tough independent Aussie’ is a paradox. Yes, that one needs watching like a hawk, their being part of the Anglo/phone/sphere would set a very dangerous precedent.
One thing you can say for the socialist is that despite every resistance to the tyranny he continues to press his point…even to his own destruction.
Would that he were constructively employed.
The Chipmunk is a Chipskunk.
What is he saying? Are elected politicans suddenly unable to use the internet? When did this happen?
uhhhh….blogging is THE ULTIMATE ‘new and disparate voices’. I can only assume that Witch Hazel is illiterate and has never read any blogs.
Ms Blears is a perfect example of the modern poltical mouth, a case of programmable vocal chords uttering tripe. Or as the geeks put GI-Go (garbage in garbage out), which sums up the contribution of parliamentary debate to national culture.
No, Barry,
Parliamentary debate was one of the wellsprings of our culture, from which more general freedom of speech developed. Blears is a representative of the professional political cadre who have all but extirpated actual parliamentary debate (Anno Blairis III), and at the local elected level, and are now going to work getting rid of dissentient public or private discussion too.
Guy, glad to see that Mr Fleming’s rendition of the Chicago threat is used to good effect!
“You are a woman of many parts, Pussy”.
Ok, I will shut up now.
This might just be a populist kite-flying exercise as part of the snap election plan.
If they lose Glenrothes and then you hear no more about this, you will know that’s what it was.
Jonathan,
I did think the allusion appropriate, given Auric Goldfinger was an extremely short, red-headed, dishonest manipulator and control-freak.
[DWL] …the firewall of China has many holes in which are easy to find if you know where to look.
“If you know where to look” is the operative phrase. Those of us with a level of political awareness and technical nous which motivates and enables us to find those holes will always find them. It’s the great mass of people who are vaguely troubled by events, who stumble upon and are enlightened by the unexpurgated blogosphere that our Leaders are hoping to shield and distract from dissenting influences.
You guys wanna google for “internet 2” at sites you’d dismiss as conspiracy theorist like infowars.com….
“3 times is enemy action” hah! If you haven’t read this stuff a hundred times you’ve been asleep.
It’s a few years old, but this gives a more sensible discussion of the issues.
http://msl1.mit.edu/ESD10/docs/darknet5.pdf
For more up to date info, try looking up freenet, the Tor project, Psiphon, anonymous remailers, and the EFF.
You don’t need to hang out with the conspiracy theorists to find out about this stuff. There are a lot of clever people working on it. This battle has been going on for years, and will continue for years to come.
Personally, I think it will come down to whether there is a market for it. While most people aren’t seriously inconvenienced and don’t care, it will remain the preserve of computer geeks and hackers. If something should happen so that there’s a more widespread/mainstream market for it, I have faith that the Invisible Hand of Capitalism will provide something much easier to use.
Strikes me that Blears doesn’t want herself or her friends to be truly “challenged”: it’s the holders of genuinely traditional or of innovatively dissident opinions that are to be “challenged”, by being repressed, ignored, or parodied by her and her like.
Would she accept a challenge to debate with, say, a holocaust revisionist, or a member of the NF? She would probably recycle the Thatcherite “oxygen of publicity” phrase.
Two tiny points:1) local newspaper editors are being leaned on de-emphasise crimes where the perps could be identified as immigrant: this is to avoid further damage to “community relations”. This means that a lot of information that could have aroused bloggers’ comments won’t actually get as far as the net, from which much of their raw material is drawn, and
2) I can’t find any of the sites associated with “The League of the South”, or dixieNet, nor can I find any mention of what’s happened to them. Have Google closed them off? This may just be a technical glitch, but it MIGHT be designed to limit public airing of – and hence blogging about – issues that would offend and frighten Blears and her like.
Strikes me that Blears doesn’t want herself or her friends to be truly “challenged”: it’s the holders of genuinely traditional or of innovatively dissident opinions that are to be “challenged”, by being repressed, ignored, or parodied by her and her like.
Would she accept a challenge to debate with, say, a holocaust revisionist, or a member of the NF? She would probably recycle the Thatcherite “oxygen of publicity” phrase.
Two tiny points:1) local newspaper editors are being leaned on de-emphasise crimes where the perps could be identified as immigrant: this is to avoid further damage to “community relations”. This means that a lot of information that could have aroused bloggers’ comments won’t actually get as far as the net, from which much of their raw material is drawn, and
2) I can’t find any of the sites associated with “The League of the South”, or dixieNet, nor can I find any mention of what’s happened to them. Have Google closed them off? This may just be a technical glitch, but it MIGHT be designed to limit public airing of – and hence blogging about – issues that would offend and frighten Blears.
DCMS has asked some “experts” to propose new nannying measures in their Digital Britain Report:- http://www.melonfarmers.co.uk/gc08d.htm#Furthering_our_Digital_Society_5595
Interesting to see if blogs are on the menu here.