[LINK] The Age: anti-Net-censorship editorial & article on ISPs filtering with the blacklist

[Robin Whittle]

I was encouraged by the editorial in yesterday's Age:

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/editorial/lost-in-cyberspace-the-governments-internet-filter-plan-20100711-105kn.html

    If implemented, it would give Australia the dubious
    distinction of being the only democracy to introduce
    mandatory internet filtering.  Fears the proposal
    would give the government extensive powers of
    censorship are, in the event, justifiable.  Other
    countries, including Britain and Canada, have
    successfully blocked access to child sexual abuse
    websites through voluntary rather than compulsory
    measures.  The United States ambassador to Australia,
    Jeffrey Bleich, recently said his government believed
    the internet should be free, and he had concerns with
    any attempt to limit that freedom.

    Without the involvement of the very people who
    provide and use the internet, the risks of alienation
    are higher.  It is hoped the plans for mandatory
    filtering have been shot to the furthest corner of
    cyberspace.


In today's:

"Child porn filter hits snag" - the voluntary filtering by
several major ISPs, apparently according to the government's
secret blacklist.

http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/child-porn-filter-move-hits-snag-20100712-107w3.html


Internode is not going to do this, and iiNet is still deciding.


This includes a poll:

  Would you vote for a political party that supports the
  internet filter?

  Yes          4%     454
  No          94%  10,059
  Don't care   2%     235

But then, you can't believe everything you see on the Internet!


Also, there was a story yesterday in The Age about Google reaching
a compromise with the Chinese government.  There's plenty about
this on the Net.  Here is one:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China_Business/LG14Cb03.html

  Google.cn at present has a link to Google.com.hk to provide
  search services without a content filter, and also provides
  three local services - music, shopping and translation -
  which do not relate to content filtering.

Looking at http://www.google.cn there is a search entry bar, and below
it a prominent link "google.com.hk" to:

  http://www.google.com.hk/webhp?hl=zh-CN&sourceid=cnhpto

but clicking on any part of the page caused my browser to load this
Hong Kong page.  From there, searching for "Tiananmen Square" brings
up results much the same as from http://www.google.com .


 - Robin