So yes, CISPA passed the House. Unsurprisingly, Anonymous isn’t happy, what when as things stand Lulzsec already is getting hammered. Greater information sharing is a threat to online anarchists, as well as foreign private and state actors.
The bill now goes to the Senate, where Jay Rockefeller may stall on an ego-driven separate bill. I think the bill’s a good idea. It’s not perfect, but not all of the criticisms floating around are correct. In particular, SOPA is a red herring, and totally unrelated. CISPA is about information sharing, not regulation.
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It’s clear that the Obama administration wants the Safe Web Act renewed, what with the big showy announcement over at ICE (though if ICE is going after “Copy Cats,” how long until Samsung gets nailed?).
I’d want to look carefully though. We don’t have to just renew it. We can examine it and change it in any ways that make sense given the Obama administration’s pervasive abuse of regulatory powers.
Given these and other fights for greater power, it’s kinda funny that the very same Obama FCC is criticizing the efforts by Russia to censor the Internet along the same lines as the administration’s PROTECT IP proposal.
That’s right, never forget: SOPA was just the House version of a Dem Senate/Obama administration idea.
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I skipped Tech at Night on Friday because I was in Austin for the Red State Gathering 2010, but I’m back now, so here we go.
We start off with what would have been the lead story on Friday, too: Net Neutrality hero and all around socialist gasbag Al Franken is now under a cloud of suspicion for ethics violations, violating Senate rules to spend money inappropriately on Net Neutrality advocacy, as well as using his role as Senator to raise money for private groups.
He’s crooked enough, he’s dishonest enough, and doggone it, people pay him.
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Good evening. A story I expect to hear more about is this a proposed subsidy for radio stations and the RIAA both of some sort of legal requirement for new cellular phones to include an FM radio receiver.
Such a requirement would raise costs on everyone, lower innovation and even basic differentiation options, and be nothing but a detriment to anyone who shops for cellular phones in America. We’d best raise awareness against this before it’s too late.
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