HAX

Here we go, again. More totalitarian gestures from the British Government.

The Guardian reports…

Government plans that mean computer users deemed to have damaged national security, human welfare, the economy or the environment will face a life sentence have been criticised by experts who warn that the new law could be used to target legitimate whistleblowers.

Politicians claim that this is all about cyberterrorism. But it is obvious that such a legal framework easily can be used against whistleblowers.

And–as usual–it’s all about how you define things.

What is “national security” anyway? It can be almost anything. “Human welfare” is a very broad description. Computer users “damaging” the economy or the environment? (Sounds more like something the Government is doing.)

And notice the word “deemed”.

Well, the definition will be made by… the Government. How convenient.

UK politicians are just about to give themselves yet another legal tool that can be used to curb opposition. This is becoming a pattern.

I cannot understand how they are thinking. OK, politicians see themselves as fair and decent people. That might go for the bureaucracy as well. But you know nothing about how things will be tomorrow. And politics is a volatile business.

To put it in simple words: Never create legal tools that you wouldn’t be prepared to trust in the hands of your worst enemy.

The Guardian: Computer users who damage national security could face jail »

/ HAX

A US federal agency (The National Science Foundation) has been granted close to a million USD of taxpayers money to study “social pollution”.

Ajit Pai in the Washington Post…

The project is being developed by researchers at Indiana University, and its purported aim is to detect what they deem “social pollution” and to study what they call “social epidemics,” including how memes — ideas that spread throughout pop culture — propagate. What types of social pollution are they targeting? “Political smears,” so-called “astroturfing” and other forms of “misinformation.”

And it gets worse…

The Truthy team says this research could be used to “mitigate the diffusion of false and misleading ideas, detect hate speech and subversive propaganda, and assist in the preservation of open debate.”

So, the US Government is trying to get on top of what’s going on in social media, such as Twitter?

If you are to act on misinformation and propaganda–you first will have to decide what the truth is. And that’s not always all that obvious.

To do that you will have to side with one party in ongoing public debate. And in this case truth is to be defined by a government agency…

That’s scary. For real.

Ajit Pai in the Washington Post: The government wants to study ‘social pollution’ on Twitter »

/ HAX

Music, film, games, e-books… In default mode that piece of entertainment or culture you just bought comes with built in copy protection, DRM (Digital Rights Management).

DRM takes away your control and actual ownership. (You know, those Amazon e-books that your Kindle app wrongfully claims “is not licensed for this unit”.) It prevents fair use. Normally DRM comes with special software for your gadget, out of your control. Sometimes such software has been proven harmful–and it is likely that it will spy on you and your habits.

In most places it is illegal to break DRM or even to provide information on how to get round it. (This puts some information about consumer electronics, software and content outside the realm of free speech.)

DRM is a menace. And it seems like we are stuck with it. (It is not only protected by national laws. Often it’s included in new trade agreements like the TPP and the TTIP.)

But DRM can also present a possibility–for startups, self publishers, independent filmmakers, new artists, disruptive ventures and brave entrepreneurs.

The possibility it opens up is not to have it. To use open formats and standards instead.

This is marketing judo. Making a point of not harassing fans and customers. Not demanding special software to play or read something. Not to tamper with peoples gadgets and not to spy on them.

The main sales points would be usability and being friendly to fans and customers. I also believe that most people would catch the “moral” aspect of supporting artists, publishers, record labels and film producers who trust them.

Providing Open Content could become some sort of coveted “moral quality label”. (This is, to some extent, already the case with content under Creative Commons licenses.)

OK, but… Will such content not be pirated? To some extent, yes it will be.

But for most content producers, being unknown is a worse problem than file sharing. There are lots and lots of examples of content taking off just because it has found a loyal following on the file sharing scene. Today, there are even bands and artists promoting their work by putting it on The Pirate Bay.

(To dig deeper into all of this, read Chris Andersons well known and easily digestible book Free: The future of a radical price.)

My point is that Big Business (with help from lawmakers and Big Government) is trying to strengthen its grip over the content industry by beefing up copyright / IP-law–and by technical means, such as DRM.

These dinosaurs are so totally focused on saving their outdated business models that they don’t manage to see, understand or adopt to the ever changing market. That will make them vulnerable to disruptive ideas–to concepts that are more in line with an online society, with the market and with popular demand.

Open Content can be such a disruptive business model.

/ HAX

Good and interesting news…

“Twitter just sued the federal government over restrictions the government places on how much the company can disclose about surveillance requests it receives.”

“Twitter’s ability to respond to government statements about national security surveillance activities and to discuss the actual surveillance of Twitter users is being unconstitutionally restricted by statutes that prohibit and even criminalize a service provider’s disclosure of the number of national security letters (“NSLs”) and court orders issued pursuant to FISA that it has received, if any.”

Wired: Twitter Sues the Government for Violating Its First Amendment Rights »