3 strikes an you are out. And out means: out of net access. Just let some lobby-infested politicos go wild in Brussles, and this is what you get.
I spare you the details, but in a nutshell, it goes like this. After having been blasted out of legislation, the lobbyists of Grand Old Media sneaked their hardliner ideas into some amendements of a telecom’s bill. To be sure, Grand Old Media has quite some problems with the not anymore so new but still very digital and increasingly networked media world.
Their solution is coming straight from the Orwellian textbook. We have to monitor everything. So that naughty consumer cannot do naughty things like copying naughty music videos. The emphasis is of course on everything. Which fuels this unholy alliance of “all consumers are thieves – if you don’t stop them”-media mavens and the “all citizens are terrorists – until proven innocent”-faction of right wing hardliners.
Yes, stealing is bad (please do remember: stealing from artists is bad, too). But the 3 strikes-law are populist rubbish. Excuse me. Are convicted shoplifters banned from shopping? Of course not.
But if somebody accuses me of infringing a copyright, I should be exiled from the net? Some Eurocrats do think so.
But so it happened: Pangloss’ take on the affair:
http://blogscript.blogspot.com/2008/07/result-of-imco-vote.html
It’s not about 3 strikes anymore. Just about xraying all digital citizens.
gert.is 