Archive for category censorship

Bad words!

Posted by Shane Smith in Bigotry, censorship, Hypocrisy, People Are Nuts, Philosophy on March 30, 2012

New York City, the Big Apple, the city so nice they named it twice, the home of a new education policy that makes Arkansas look like a bunch of liberal hippies…

The NYC department of education has a list of words you can’t say on a test because it might offend someone. Very impressive list too.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Before Newt Gingrich Fades From The Scene

Posted by Larry Bergan in 4th Estate (Media), American People, Capitalism, censorship, Corruption, Hypocrisy, Lying, This Blog on March 4, 2012

You have to watch this.

Michael Moore had a series on NBC which was moved to Fox and eventually canceled for obvious reasons.

I’m not sure how Michael did this, but it was one of the best television moments ever:

37 Comments

All Your Domains Are Belong To Us

Posted by Shane Smith in Authoritarianism, censorship, Internet on February 29, 2012

Mark Jeftovic, writing on the EasyDNS blog:

But at the end of the day what has happened is that US law (in fact, Maryland state law) as been imposed on a .com domain operating outside the USA, which is the subtext we were very worried about when we commented on SOPA. Even though SOPA is currently in limbo, the reality that US law can now be asserted over all domains registered under .com, .net, org, .biz and maybe .info (Afilias is headquartered in Ireland but operates out of the US).

This is no longer a doom-and-gloom theory by some guy in a tin foil hat. It just happened.

I hope you enjoyed your victory lap there people of the Internet. The SOPA fight is just starting…

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Rick Santorum Calls For Regulating the Internet and Believes Freedom Should be Limited

Posted by Ken Bingham in censorship, Conservative Sell-Outs, Conservatives, copyright, Intellectual Property on February 10, 2012

GOP Presidential candidate Rick Santorum has a freedom problem. He says there is too much freedom on the Internet and it should be regulated. He was the only candidate that did not take a strong stand against SOPA and PIPA and called for regulating the Internet and said freedom should be limited. He called those that want limited government “radical individualism”. Rick Santorum is no conservative. Don’t be fooled by this authoritarian masquerading as a conservative.

“They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues.

That is not how traditional conservatives view the world. There is no such society that I’m aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.”

- Rick Santorum

See also Rick Santorum is tired of you people wanting the government to leave you alone on Hot Air.

Freedom is limited and Internet should be regulated

Santorum defends SOPA

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Poof – Goes The “Troubled Young” Hero

Posted by Larry Bergan in Abu Ghraib, American People, Authoritarianism, censorship, Free Speech, GLBT issues, Guantanamo, Human Rights, Veterans on February 5, 2012

ABRACADABRA

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Internet Community Can Never Again Ignore Politics.

Posted by Ken Bingham in censorship, congress, copyright, Foreign Policy, Intellectual Property, Internet on January 30, 2012

A question every politician should be asked at every opportunity is, “Do you understand the Internet and do you regularly use it?”. If the answer is no they are unfit for office period. It is no longer acceptable for Congress who seeks to regulate the Internet to not understand what they are proposing to legislate.
In turn it is no longer acceptable for the Internet community to ignore politics and allow interests such as Hollywood and the Music Industry that have admitted they do not understand or even like the Internet to set the agenda. The Internet community cannot just come out and oppose a couple of bills and say the battle is won. Those that want to control and censor the Internet will not stop and will find ways to get their agenda through. The Internet community must stop them at every turn which means we all need to stay informed of what is happening in Washington and around the world. If it isn’t bills the anti-Internet forces are pushing it is hiding rules deep inside International agreements. These are the most dangerous because they are negotiated in secret and signed quickly so there is little time to mobilize opposition.

This week in Hollywood unknown and un-elected negotiators will be horse-trading your rights under the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) that is being  held in secret. While Hollywood will be well represented, the public, Internet and Tech Industries, and civil liberties groups are shut out of talks. Hollywood will fight hard to get their agenda passed buried deep inside any agreements especially now they have lost SOPA/PIPA.

Call your Congressman and demand that all international agreements be open to public scrutiny especially on issues that effect the public so fundamentally as our free speech rights as well as our rights to access information and knowledge.

http://www.informationdiet.com/blog/read/dear-internet-its-no-longer-ok-to-not-know-how-congress-works-

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120126/03162017547/public-interest-groups-speak-out-about-next-weeks-secret-meeting-hollywood-to-negotiate-tpp-think-international-sopa.shtml

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PIPA SOPA ACTA and TPP Designed to Eliminate Safe Harbors

Posted by Ken Bingham in censorship, copyright on January 26, 2012

Back in 2000 Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. This was pre Napster. There was a provision in the DMCA called Safe Harbors that would shield providers from lawsuits if they registered with the copyright office and removed any material that copyright holders complained about. This provision was hotly contested by Hollywood, the media, newspapers and other content creators but the provision made it in just barely as a compromise. How important was that provision? If it had not passed it would have killed the Internet as we know it in its infancy. There would be no Facebook, Google, Youtube, blogs, Twitter, Flickr or any sites that allow user generated content.

Since then Hollywood, the music industry, and the media have vowed to either eliminate Safe Harbors completely or render it meaningless. Bills such as SOPA and PIPA are designed to do just that. Now we have ACTA and TPP and other international agreements that are designed to do the same thing without any input from the public, effected industries, or civil liberties groups and even sidestep Congress and government bodies around the world.

The gist of the matter is if we lose Safe Harbors we have lost the Internet.

Next week negotiations will be held in Hollywood for TPP (Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership). Negotiations will be secret with no public input. Hollywood will be well represented but no tech, internet companies, or civil liberties groups have been invited to participate.

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Senator Hatch is Lucky SOPA/PIPA Didn’t Pass. Used Image Without Permission.

Posted by Ken Bingham in censorship, copyright on January 25, 2012

Michael Jolley took a photo of Orrin Hatch and posted it on Facebook and his Flickr page with a Creative Commons Licence which allows other users to use the photo as long as they give attribution. As you know Senator Hatch has always been a crusader on copyright protection so you would think the Senator would be sensitive on copyright issues. However, Senator Hatch and/or his campaign lifted the image and placed it on both Sentor Hatch’s Flickr page and their campaign website without attribution nor permission from Jolley.


Not only did they lift it but added their own © All rights reserved to a photo they did not own with no attribution.

On Facebook’s Utah Republican Party – Official Group, Michael Jolley took Senator Hatch to task and made the observation that SOPA like laws could cause Hatch to lose his entire website for posting copyrighted materials without permission. Mr Jolly demanded a news conference where Senator Hatch would publicly apologize.  Hatch’s campaign manager, Dave Hansen, gave a terse response basically saying what Hatch did was no big deal because Jolley uploaded the photo to Facebook and tagged the Photo as if this somehow gave the Senator permission to use the photo as he saw fit even claiming “all rights reserved”.

Dave Hansen is a good man but he does not understand copyright law as passed by Senator Hatch. Everything is automatically copyrighted and the fact you put it online or on Facebook does not change that. The law makes no distinction on whether a copyright symbol is added or not.



Dave Hansen on Facebook ~ “Now let me get this straight Michael. You took a picture of the Senator, then tagged it to his facebook account in effect saying “Here is a picture I took of you, without any reference to a copyright, now months later you are whining about “copyright infringment”. You will have a long, cold wait for a press conference of apology. Get a life.”

People have been sued by Righthaven and others for doing the same thing Senator Hatch did. The penalties for copyright infringement can be up to $190,000 per infringement. These draconian laws were not just passed by the Senator but championed by him. He needs to practice what he legislates lest he find himself on the receiving end of these draconian laws.

**images sent by Michael Jolley with permission to post them**

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19 Comments

SANTORUM WINS IOWA!

Posted by Larry Bergan in 4th Estate (Media), American History, censorship, Democracy, Elections, This Blog on January 21, 2012

No really! I’m not kidding!

Hand marked, hand counted ballots or even hand marked, hand counted sticky pads work better then the billion dollar voting machine industry “solution” that Governor Gary Herbert – coupled with the ignorance of John Huntsman – thrust on us.

Simplify, Simplify, Simplify:

1) Vote on paper ballots.
2) Put the paper ballots into a translucent box on the table in front of everyone at all times.
3) When poll closes, open box, count ballots, with all parties, all citizens, all video cameras watching.
4) Post the results at the polling place before ballots move anywhere.
5) Celebrate a 100% transparent electoral democracy.

That would be the plan worked out over years of fighting harder for election integrity then anybody except for, possibly, Beverly Harris by a man named Brad Friedman.

For some reason, the Republicans in Iowa decided to hand count the votes in Iowa and allow the entire process to be observed; something they refuse to work for anywhere else to date. I think they were so worried that Ron Paul supporters were going to hack the vote that they scrapped the previous procedures, but I have no way of knowing.

Since even the GOP management in Iowa has admitted that Santorum won there, it will be interesting to see if Romney will continue to claim his victory or if the media will stick with their original reportage or FINALLY start to pound the drums of truth instead of making the voting machines look good.

Here’s the deal in Brads very appropriately named article Iowa Finally Has Definitive Winner: The Voters!

Who won in New Hampshire and South Carolina? Who the hell knows, and he ain’t talkin’

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Internet Wins!! SOPA and PIPA Shelved! For Now

Posted by Ken Bingham in censorship on January 20, 2012

INTERNET WINS!!! both houses of Congress agree to shelve PIPA and SOPA. Bills that were originally on a “fast track” for passage were stopped in their tracks by the Internet Community. Well done!

However, this is only a delay. They will rear their ugly heads again when they think no one is looking.

http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/205345-gop-chairman-postpones-piracy-legislation?utm_campaign=HilliconValley&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter#.TxmL8_fPCAR.twitter

http://democrats.senate.gov/2012/01/20/reid-statement-on-intellectual-property-bill/

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Definitive Explanation of PIPA/SOPA

Posted by Larry Bergan in 4th Estate (Media), American People, censorship, Civil liberties Infringement, Conservative, copyright, Democracy, Free Speech, Internet, Liberal, Lying on January 18, 2012

Don’t you love it when things are explained in an easy to understand way. The payed-for congress would have you believe the bills are about preventing foreigners from hurting American businesses with the usual legalese they always fall back on to confuse issues. They are adding domestic aspects to the bills and making sure we don’t know about them through the corporate media.

What the bills are really about concern taking away your rights by blocking your freedom of speech until you can prove you meant no harm. In other words; putting the burden of proof on somebody who has no resources to fight giant corporations.

I’m not saying I support people being able to make money off of other peoples hard work and talent or people disseminating material with the purpose of hurting others. There are gray areas here to be sure, but there must be due process.

This is THE bipartisan issue of our times because it involves the most important medium ever devised for free speech. This is gnawing at the last threads of democracy and treading on thin ice. Radio and television have tiny pockets broadcasting for positive social change which the majority of corporations seem to want gone. Don’t let them get their fingers into the internet.

They used to talk about “the silent generation”. What about the silent corporations? How many profit driven organizations out there care? Make me a believer.

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Go Ahead; Shut Down Commerce

Posted by Larry Bergan in Activist groups, American People, censorship, Civil liberties Infringement, Conservative, copyright, Corruption, Democracy, Disaster, Internet, Laugh, Liberal, Occupy SLC on January 14, 2012

Who needs it!

Shut down Wikipedia
Shut down Google
Shut down Facebook
Shut down Amazon
Shut down OWS
Shut down OneUtah

Shut down free speech and the internet!

Shut it all down in the name of safety.

Go ahead, but do it peacefully!

Good luck. :)

14 Comments