(no subject)

[kingandy]

BIG BUSINESS: "Dammit why can't we stop people sharing files?"
THE GOVERNMENT: "I don't know maybe we could force ISPs to ban them."
THE TIMES: "OMG INTERNETS WILL BAN USERS WHO FILE SHARE BAD WRONGMNESS"
THE ISPs: "Uh, how exactly do you expect us to do that?"

NEWS AT ELEVEN

Comments

[paulgregory.livejournal.com]

it hasnt escaped my notice that any software which is capable of monitoring some random traffic from a person, is probably capable of monitoring all random traffic from a person. I assume that the potential cost savings when the local police ask for someones internet to be monitored, probably havent escaped theirs either.

Unfortunately parts of the government have already spotted something similar. I think the anti-terror people put forward the brilliant idea "You know that system that stops people swapping child porn, we could just change it and stop people swapping bomb-making stuff". It could possibly have been the anti-paedo people making the leap the other way around.

This may now just be in a giant loop, and the stop-pirate-sharing system idea is based on the stop-child-porn-sharing which is based on the stop-bomb-recipe-sharing which itself merely an assumed possible variant of the stop-pirate-sharing system.

Or perhaps someone's decided that big record and film companies are the only people who can possibly bankroll a Chinese-style force of people to classify every byte as Good or Evil.