ARIN6902 Internet Cultures and Governance

Scroll down and read the discussion forum paper, "Child Protection and Freedom of Expression Online". The report aims to open discussion and reframe the debate surrounding child protection by bringing together, rather than isolating, advocates of online child protection and those of freedom of expression. It rejects the current moral panics that dominate the debate, particularly in the media, which over-represents the likelihood of harm to children online. It highlights the unproductive nature of framing online protection as a moral panic because it obscures and undermines the work of both freedom of expression and child protection advocates. Rather than keeping these two parties as diametrically opposed the discussion laid the first steps in finding common ground between the two. From here they can work together to advance both of their agendas and therefore achieving a more desirable balance between defending the rights of children and maintaining freedom of expression.

Should California based company, facebook, follow the rules in Australia? Should they respond? After the teeageer killed from meeting with her facebook friend, this issue has become a back fire for facebook and australian authority.

Interesting article applicable to the issues with the digital divide. Most notable is the way that many developing countries are 'skipping' over technology-steps: ie, going straight to mobiles without any landline infrastructure or going straight to tablet computers without ever having desktops.

Blog posts

#5

blog post on reputation

And I thought the 'Fusion Powerplant" in Sim City 2000 being a peak accomplishment of the game was enough of a green message. Choose your industry and try to be a 'good' CEO. It seems like a kind of layman's e-learning on social responsibility for managers, or perhaps is the ideal way to train us MTV-generation managers of the future.

Also "Directors of the UK's biggest 350 listed companies should also stand for re-election every year, instead of at least every three years, to increase accountability under recommendations in the revised code." Frequent re-election should keep directors more or their toes, or will it make them spend more time trying to defend their positions instead of doing their jobs? Time will tell.

In almost an exact mirror of the situation in Pakistan, Bangladeshi authorities have banned Facebook and thousands have taken to the streets to protest. This is in response to the "Everyone Draw Mohammed Day" page that was set up on Facebook. One man has been arrested by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) over the images. Images of Bangladeshi leaders were also posted to the site.

Survey shows that majority of adult internet users in the US Google themselves. Just shows that more people are becoming aware of how it may be difficult to detach their online selves from their offline lives.

Most hacking activities are not reported by the websites that are victim to it, most probably so as not to scare the public. In this article, filmmaker Phillip Mora looks at the activities of hackers and cyber terrorists, likening the potentialities to the Holocaust and 9/11.

The Digital economy Act in all its glory. There was a LOT of debate over this Act. It was introduced by Lord Mandelson of the Labour party, tossed back and forth between houses with amendments that were argued to the minutest detail, then finally spat out for the public to revile. All ISPs are now required to monitor their subscibers use of listed sites and warn them when they enter a site that enables pirating. They must then record every such warning, giving every subscriber a number, then make the list available to the government when they get a warrant to look for excessive downloaders. Only the government like this idea, because it makes their job easier. I wandered onto one of the listed sites recently in my quest to find Dr Who episodes before they aired in Australia. The message was like driving down the highway and suddenly seeing a police car parked on the side of the road. You might know you haven't done anything wrong (yet) but you still get a scare ...

The manifesto, further discussion and information regarding the Pirate Party in the UK

Copyright is big news over there right now. This party sprang up during the election, in direct response to the new copyright laws. Given the UK's voting system, they never really had a chance, and managed just over 1000 votes nationally. Still, the important thing is that they tried - yes?

So, The UK legislated, before the election, to make ISPs monitor subscribers using illegal downloading sites. As you see in the article. The Lib Dems don't like it much. But since they are just the whiney younger sibling in the New Coalition, their opinion doesn't matter that much and the Conservatives decided to keep it for the moment to 'see how it goes'. Watch this space ...

Looks at the recent proposed amendments by the federal government to the 25-year-old Sex Discrimination Act which aim to give greater legal protection to victims under 16 of online sexual harassment and cyber-bullying. Critics say the proposed changes are "too little to late."

"The government plans to enroll its officials in a range of courses, from stress-busting to the art of speaking persuasively." It seems that Russia is realising that a such clips as their president falling down due to drunkenness is no longer a quick news byte. Rather it is a viral video that will circulate the web for years to come. As a reaction, it seems Russia is becoming more self-conscious.

The emergence of nanotechnology and cascading media nowadays have resulted to clash of two newly found realms. New discoveries of Nanotechnology and shifts on how people define intellectual properties had imposed legal and non-legal questions like how to classify and who should benefit from the technology.

Oz Federal Courst has released its decision on not to take charge on ISPs for their subscriber's infringements & misdeeds. Roadshow Films accused iiNet of authorizing its users of distributing copyrighted movies. The issue gets even worse when it involved the BitTorrent network.

A dispute between two letting agencies "Mantra Group Pty Ltd (Mantra) VS Tailly Pty Ltd (Tailly)" over a domain name of an apartment complex at Surfers Paradise. Mantra had alleged Tailly of breaching its registered domain in gaining commercial advantage since Mantra is a letting company that run on a bigger scale. The court is till in the midst of deliberation.

A lad from washington dc, aged 22 was sentenced to jail for 29 months for selling copyrighted movies over the INTERNET. He has been managing USAWAREZ.COM since 2006. This is a sign where of the pathway that we are paving for Copyright policies.