I’m joining the Internet blackout today, and not just for my New Zealand friends who are combating this draconian copyright fundamentalism… I’m joining it because if this kind of legislation succeeds in New Zealand — who have a pretty good history of sticking it to The Man — it could succeed anywhere.
Here’s a great cartoon about the problematic legislation from Scoop which very neatly explains the issue:
Update: New Zealand Prime Minister John Key has announced that S92A will go on hold until March 27, apparently hoping that an agreement will be reached on a voluntary code of practice. The legislation isn’t dead, but this is more than “just a flesh wound”.
Congratulations to the Creative Freedom Foundation for a well-organised, multi-facted and effective campaign against S92A… thanks also to Brenda and Nat, who worked tirelessly to hyper-connect Kiwis and their friends around the world.
7 Comments
I don’t think this law is likely to remain long, now that it’s actually being brought to people’s attention. It was brought in fairly quietly by the previous government shortly before the elections, and I don’t think the current government is particularly attached to it. I think it’ll be gone fairly quickly once it becomes clear to them just how big a deal people think this is.
Afterall, no government likes seeing protests in the street, and this is early enough in their term that they can easily write it off as bad legislation by the previous administration.
You’ll be pleased to know that we (temporarily) won. The law has been delayed a month pending further consultation.
@Daniel - that, and the PM has raised the possibility of scrapping it entirely. It’s like I said yesterday - nobody currently in power has any attachment to this bill, and one thing I think they’ve learned (for now, at least) from their predecessors is to pay attention to which way public opinion is leaning.
The law has been delayed, not written off the books. The reason for the delays is that the ISP and the copyright holders have nearly reached agreement, so the Government is giving them a chance to reach agreement before the law is implemented, and a 5 minute sop to users complaints.
No one is that conversation is looking out for the users rights, to not be summarily disconnected without notice.
Rather, summarily disconnected without any right to address the complainant
Thanks Jeff, the only way we were able to delay this was because everyone was working together…
This is a message to everyone involved
http://creativefreedom.org.nz/story.html?id=170
Matthew Holloway,
http://CreativeFreedom.org.nz
Jeff, even if our Kiwi friends are (temporarly) saved, you can join the French mobilisation anyway:
http://www.laquadrature.net/en/french-net-blackout-against-graduated-response