About a year ago I wrote a piece entitled Australia Online, in which I suggested that public discourse has failed to consider the economic impact of Internet policy, and has instead been distracted by the fears and philosophical questions that the medium has raised. At the time, I had assumed that the Australian Labor Party's policy to implement a mandatory Internet filtering system - to be enforced by Internet service providers - was merely a ploy. After all, despite the obvious economic need to increase bandwidth, there are still a few crazies out there who are scared of new technology.
As it turned out, however, this is a real policy that the Rudd government is committed to. In fact, they are actually pushing for technical trials despite a massive public backlash. Get Up! Australia - a non-affiliated collection of activists - have come out against the filter on both the economic and civil liberties front, so far gathering at least 86,000 online signatures. On Facebook, more than 5,400 people have registered their intent to join this weekend's national street protest in the state capitals, with a further 7,400 maybe responses. And, after Stephen Conroy, the Minister for Broadband and the Digital Economy, launched his department's shiny new blog, there has been a non-stop flood of comments against the proposal. Here's a taste:
- The proposed filter is flawed for reasons both technical and social. Its up to parents to police their children's Internet exposure, not some governing body. As a voter and ICT professional for may years, I vehemently oppose such a useless attempt at pandering to the ignorant an uninformed.
--"Adam"
- Ridiculous. This is like 1984 meets China. Whatever happened to the free world?
--"Davesquirrel"
In an attempt to counter the arguments of civil libertarians and people who actually know how technology works, advocates of the scheme have been arguing from a secular moral high ground, and a close look at this story on the 7:30 Report epitomizes how the debate is being framed - with protecting children on one side and supporting Internet stakeholders on the other.
Article comments
1 - Dr Dreadful
Of course... and if there's one thing guaranteed to speed up the sluggish internet you have over there, it's slapping a filter on the damn thing!
2 - Doug Hunter
Thanks for bringing attention to this foolishness. I hope freedom continues it's reign online although I feel (like in every other aspect of life) it's only a matter of time until government moves in to protect me from myself, for my own good of course.
3 - STM
Johnno, I know they appear to be pursuing it, but I don't think it's going to happen. Too many people are blowing up. And let's face it, the government has too many other concerns at the moment.
The studies will go on endlessly. One thing Rudd's good at is seeing how an idea is received, and then acting accordingly.
Ultimately, because of all the hoo-ha it will create, I believe it will be challenged in the High Court and I think the Prime Minister is still dipping his toe in the water first as this plan has been around for a while.
The implied rights in the constitution and the court's past rulings on free speech - the most recent of these was to overturn legislation passed in the New South Wales parliament aimed at stopping protestors "annoying" World Youth Day pilgirms in Sydney earlier this year because it wasn't in the spirit of free speech - may very well make this decision unconstitutional.
I'm not sure that flirting with the constitution is a path the government wants to go down right now. This is no longer a legal grey area since the rulings on implied rights.
It's also got to get through the Senate.
The ALP won't want to be compared to China, nor 1984, even if that's a gross oversimplification of what they're proposing.
The one thing that really does worry me about the proposal is not that kids will be protected from porn, it's that to have unfiltered access, you have to request it through a government agency, which, although it can't say no, then has your name on its list.
I'm sick of the nanny state too. That's always one of the dangers of voting Labor in.
Still, better than having the divisive politics we had with the Liberals.