Group items tagged

Don't penalise innovation in mobile telecoms

These innovations require modernising and extending current networks, however. Despite the government's wishes, more than half of French territory, for example, remains to be covered by a broadband mobile network. In June 2008, only 12% of subscribers had gone over to third-generation (3G) mobile phones, twice as few as in Sweden, Norway or Italy. Improving this situation will inevitably require substantial investments. These risk being delayed by the public authorities' regulatory appetite and by ill-advised French tax policy.

The list of new regulations that encumber the activities of mobile operators keeps getting longer and, unfortunately, will consume a growing share of their resources.

Live Web-casts of political rallies and street protests, like those this summer against U.S. beef imports, are common. And “netizens” are vigilant in their monitoring of politicians and the press.

But there is a downside. Internet bullying is a major problem. In 2005, netizens so harassed a girl who had not cleaned up after her dog that one newspaper called it “a kind of nationwide cyber lynching.” Today, many Koreans believe that Internet bullying caused the recent suicide of the famous actress, Choe Jin Sil

new legislation to increase Internet regulation