I must admit I'm very pleased at how open and aboveboard the White House Administration has been lately. So I know it will come as a total shock to you--as it did to me-- to learn that a new law has just been rather surreptitiously passed which basically makes it illegal in the U.S. to annoy anyone on the internet under an assumed name.
As Declan McCullagh of C/Net News.com reported on January 9, President Bush has "signed into law a prohibition on posting annoying web messages or sending annoying e-mail messages without disclosing your true identity....Criminal penalties include stiff fines and two years in prison."
Well, I guess I'd better start packing my jammies for my stay in the Big House.
This bit of news not only annoys but disgusts, appalls, enrages, saddens, and frightens me (a little). Hope I didn't annoy anyone with that statement.
I think most would agree that "annoy" is a very loose, catch-all kind of term, open to endless interpretation. Let's just take regular old personal blogs, for example. Here are some things that annoy me:
Bloggers who never answer any comments, even--and especially--if they get very few visitors and commenters as it is.
Bloggers who make you endure that awful music they put on their site.
Bloggers (and non-bloggers) who just lurk.
Bloggers with better site meter stats than mine--and let me tell you, that's a lot of freakin' bloggers.
People who visit my site via a search for "Elvira Naked" or "crack whore confessions" or "inertia powered cracker" who don't immediately see the error of their ways, instantaneously morph into loyal visitors and frequent commenters, link to my site early and often, tell all their friends to visit too, and sin no more.
When uber-sites like Technorati or TTLB (allegedly) underestimate my number of incoming links, or devolve my Ecosystem status to something resembling a rare and malignant virus.
When my Blogcritics comments vanish in the night without rhyme or reason.
Article comments
1 - Rohan Venkat
What would've been the rationale behind making such a law?
Do people lose money,face or anything else by 'being annoyed' by something online? They might lose time, and even money because of that, but it was their choice to read whatever annoyed them.
So this means that any person running a site/blog in the US that criticizes Bush (as an example)could be sent to jail, because it annoys him? That's going to be quite a few people who're now 'outlaws'.
It's amazing what this administration has done...
Concerning the US jurisdiction over the internet, couldn't us non-Americans say the same thing about the US having an authoritative say in how the web is run?
2 - Evan
Isn't the main point of this law to reduce e-mail spamming?
3 - Elvira Black
Rohan and Evan:
Thanks to both of you for your comments. Here's my perhaps feeble attempt to expand on this bit of news:
The new law specifies intent to "annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person...". Declan McCullagh, in the link mentioned above, sites a few possible examples of who might be affected, viz: : a woman fired after complaining about being sexually harassed who wants to blog about it, or a citizen who wants to e-mail regarding local government corruption without fear of reprisals.
McCullagh also points out that former President Clinton, when "signing a massive telecommunications law,...realized that the section of the law punishing abortion-related material on the Internet was unconstitutional, and he directed the Justice Department not to enforce it."
This new law was passed through surreptitiously for a reason, no doubt. If it was just a case of quashing e-mail spamming, it would have specified as such, but the law as written is much, much broader than that and thus open to very broad interpretation. It is easy to see how various political and governmental agendas might be served by this new edict in terms of muzzling freedom of speech.
As far as the question of why the US should control the administration of the internet (as I believe we now do, in part because I am pretty sure it was an American technological innovation)j--well, not to be xenophobic, but I'm a firm fan of the Constitution and democracy. To let countries who would ban free speech get control of this international means of communication to me is a nightmare scenario, pure and simple. To me, it would be akin to saying that the power of the FCC (the Federal Communications Commission in the US) should also be shared with, say, Iran, who would then have the power to ban any "annoying" or "offensive" TV or radio programming we might be currently producing. Not a pretty thought.
Thanks again for your thoughtful and thought-provoking comments.
4 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Elvira,
I have to agree with you 100% on your analysis. Watching events in your country from a third of a world away reminds me often of accounts of how Italy slid slowly from constitutional democracy to a fascist dictatorship, and how Chancellor Hitler took all the legal steps to establish his dictatorship legally. Ghana started out as a democracy and law by law, step by step, descended into absolute rule by Kwame N'Krumah.
Anyone can point these things out from afar. It takes a discerning person to see the changes happening around them as they happen.
5 - Elvira Black
Ruvy:
Precisely! The whole "those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it" thing.
I think a lot of Americans are finally awakening from their collective coma and coming to realize what is at stake here. I have to admit that I was banefully apolitical for many years. But shortly before the re-election of Bush, I saw Fahrenheit 911 and read some terrific articles in the New Yorker dealing with our Administration's woeful foibles. By the time elections rolled around, I was naievely optimistic about Bush getting rousted out of office.
I know some take issue with Michael Moore's methods and philosophy, but all I can say is that virtually everything he pointed out in his movie has now come to light, and he documents all the facts on his site as well. He lifted the rock up, but not everyone wanted to take a peek underneath at first. Of course, there are many conservatives who are still, in my opinion, in a sorry state of denial (not to mention ulterior motives rearing their ugly heads).
This is one reason why any tinkering with the First Amendment frightens me so. It is crucial that those who criticize this Administration have an unfettered forum to speak their piece. I think the "old media" really dropped the ball on a lot of things, and now they're trying to play catch-up.
Thanks so much for your comment and sharing your viewpoint from a "third of the world away."
PS: you refer to the US as "your country (meaning mine)" Does that mean you no longer consider yourself a citizen, albeit a dual one, of the US?
6 - Rohan Venkat
True, I too would vehemently disagree with a non-free speech state having control over the internet, but the USA is not the only constitutional, democratic country in the world.
Indeed,the internet is the USA's technical innovation, based on the army's ARPANET, but these in turn were based on earlier concepts being tested in France and some other places, before that, if i remember rightly.
I don't have a problem with it's running so far, but the fact is, the US can be sometimes unilateral, and since the ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) which pretty much answers to the USA, that it can meddle with what has now become a global property, as far as i see it.
see:this
Either ways, a well written article and also, thanks for replying.
7 - Victor Lana
Great piece, Elvira. Just one question: what (or who) are bloggers "who just lurk"? Sounds ominous.
8 - Elvira Black
Rohan:
Your point is well taken, especially considering the whole raison d'etre of my post--namely, the fact that the US cannot necessariily to trusted to do the "decent thing" in regards to internet regulation. As you point out, I don't see any way the US can continue to claim "eminent domain" (if that is the right term) when it comes to such global technology anymore.
Thank you for the great comments.
9 - Elvira Black
Victor:
Funny you should ask, since another blogger just wrote that this is National Un-lurker Week (lol)--when lurkers are encouraged to emerge from the murky lurky shadows and speak out.
Lurkers are simply those who read blogs, web bulletin and message boards, etc--sometimes extensively--but never make a peep as far as commenting. It does sound ominous, doesn't it? As for me, I simply can't imagine not opening my big fat mouth whenever an opportunity presents itself, so this behavior is simply inconceievable to me, albeit probably quite common.
10 - NYLawyer
The actual text of H.R. 3402, Sec. 113 does not even contain the word "annoy".
For a more concise interpretation of the recently passed legislation you are referring to, see The Volokh Conspiracy.
Get your facts straight before you open your "big fat mouth".
11 - Elvira Black
NY Lawyer:
Here is the relevant text as reported by Mr. McCullagh:
"Whoever...utilizes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet... without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person...who receives the communications...shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than two years, or both."
If he is wrong, you can go and annnoy him.
I will check out your link, but I smell something rotten in Denmark just by the title alone.;
I always do my utmost to get my facts stgraight. No need to be gratuitously nasty, especially since you have no link so I have no idea what YOUR real motivation and views are, other than to "annoy" me.
12 - Elvira Black
NY Lawyer:
PS: My lord, man, don't you see the supreme, delicious irony in all of this?
The comment you just left is exactly the kind of thing that can theoretically land you in jail! Lighten up, would ya?
Unless, of course, NYLawyer is indeed your Christian name. In that case, annoy away.