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Politech is the oldest Internet resource devoted to politics and technology. Launched in 1994 by Declan McCullagh, the mailing list has chronicled the growing intersection of culture, technology, politics, and law. Since 2000, so has the Politech web site.
An Estonian socialist, apparently speaking for much of Europe, wants the U.S. to ban websites, mailing lists, and Usenet newsgroups that someone, somewhere in the world, finds offensive or hateful? This isn't absurd; it's simply surreal. It's interesting to speculate about the shape of the final treaty language: Could it be used to shut down "hateful" anti-capitalist sites? "Hateful" anti-communist, anti-black, anti-white flamewars? Censor the David Horowitz ad? (http://www.politechbot.com/p-01929.html) Background: http://www.politechbot.com/p-01496.html http://www.politechbot.com/p-01533.html http://www.politechbot.com/p-01141.html http://stars.coe.fr/WebDev/ASP/APList/APListFiche.asp?MPID=2404&Language=E -Declan ******** http://www.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/europe/04/25/cybercrime.treaty/index.html STRASBOURG, France -- Supporters of a proposed cyber crime treaty are pressing for it to include passages making it illegal to spread racist propaganda and hate messages over the Internet. ... Deputies debating the treaty on Wednesday spoke of their "disappointment that the draft convention contains no specific provision for combating the dissemination of racist and xenophobic propaganda via the Internet." Speaking for the Parliamentary Assembly deputies, Socialist Ivar Tallo from Estonia urged the council to add a protocol that would outlaw "racist propaganda, abusive storage of hateful messages and use of the Internet for trafficking in human beings." ... http://cbc.ca/cgi-bin/templates/view.cgi?/news/2001/04/26/Consumers/Internettreaty_jc_010426 STRASBOURG, FRANCE - The Council of Europe, a human rights watchdog, is attempting to draft the world's first Internet crime treaty. The Council's goal is to make it illegal to hack, defraud, launch computer viruses and spread hate messages. ... The Council is getting support from the public to outlaw racist propaganda, fired up by a recent French court decision. Last fall, a Paris judge ordered Yahoo, based in the United States, to block the sale of Nazi memorabilia from its auction pages. ... ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if it remains intact. To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------