5 Comments

• Krz 9th Feb '10 - 12:27pm

  Excellent reporting here Mark, quoting a BBC story entitled “Digital Economy Bill bill could ‘breach rights'”. For those who don’t just believe what they read in the media, here’s the report :

  http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt200910/jtselect/jtrights/44/44.pdf

  To quote the report directly : “We consider that it is unlikely that these proposals alone will lead to a significant risk of a breach of individual internet users’ right to respect for privacy, their right to freedom of expression or their right to respect for their property rights”.

• Mark Pack 9th Feb '10 - 1:04pm

  Krz: I guess you’ve misread the report as the quote you’ve given is actually about a different part of the Bill.

  Both the BBC report and my post quoting part of it refer to the “technical measures” section. The quote you give is from a part of the report that is about a different part of the Digital Economy Bill – “copyright infringement reports”.

  On technical measures the report says, “We do not believe that such a skeletal approach to powers which engage human rights is appropriate. There is potential for these powers to be applied in a disproportionate manner which could lead to a breach of internet users’ rights to respect for correspondence and freedom of expression.”

  In other words, on the technical measures part of the Bill – which the BBC quote/headline is about – the Parliamentary report does indeed say human rights could be breached.

• Krz 10th Feb '10 - 2:49pm

  Mark,

  That was regarding Copyright Infringement reports, but let’s move on to the next sentence after your quote, that you omitted :

  “We set out a list of points that the Government should clarify in order to reduce the risk that these proposals could operate in a manner which may be incompatible with the Convention.”

  …so these are actually suggestions to improve the report, not a condemnation of it. These are proposals to make the bill better, and to reduce the risk of human-rights abuse. Either way, when people read the report, rather than reading your copypasta of the BBC’s poor interpretation of it, they’ll see that on the whole it is supportive and helpful toward the legislation.

  If the measures in the bill were addressed as the report suggest, would you then be supportive? Or do you actually disagree with the report that you’re referencing? If you look on page 14 you’ll find notes on submissions against the “Technical Measures”, which boils down to insufficient detail and the promise of vague “secondary legislation”. I completely agree with this, I’d like to see these details in concrete before the bill gets passed. I don’t think the bill’s perfect by any means, but as Nick Clegg once said “the roads may have potholes, but you still drive on them”, and I welcome these efforts to improve on it.

  The report basically makes suggestions to make the bill more human-rights friendly, it doesn’t in any way say that it’s a bad thing, it just seeks to improve the proposals and you’ve zoomed in on a little bit of it, and ignored the body. I agree nearly completely with the report and its findings, do you? Or was this a post to try to justify your position with a document that largely contradicts it?

  1.41
  “In so far as it is possible, we recommend that the Bill should be amended to provide additional details on the minimum criteria for the imposition of technical measures, including the standard of proof which must be applied; the “trigger” for the imposition of such measures; and any relevant defences for service users who have taken all reasonable measures to protect their service from unauthorised use and who have not knowingly facilitated the use of their service for the purposes of infringing copyright.”

  …seems fair enough to me. These are people trying to find a solution, I’ve yet to hear a better one from you Mark. We know what you don’t believe in, but your biggest problem is that you’re playing the classic LD card of “I know what I don’t want but not what I want”, that makes us look 3rd party. It’s a poor message to send out in an election year, if you have a belief, state it, but just being the copyright naysayer is a meaningless position without discussing an alternative, which you’ve consistently failed to do.

  As I’ve said before, if you’ve got some sort of Communist revolution planned, I’m fully behind you (and most musicians will join us), but it would seem to me that you have no plan and no vision of the future. I know you don’t think music is important or valuable, but it’s not just about music, it’s about our growing digital economy, and wishing it all to be free will not make this a country that you’d want to live in. Tell us what you think should happen for once.

• Mark Pack 10th Feb '10 - 6:00pm

  Krz: the overall tone of the report is, for the sort of language usually used by that committee, very critical of the Bill. The committee doesn’t go for the “this would be a disaster if…” style of reports, so you’ve got to judge the wording by their usual very polite tone.

  Far from having zoomed in on one little bit of the report, both the BBC report and my post accurately reflect its overall tone, which is one of highlighting several ways in which the Bill as currently drafted could endanger human rights. That’s a concern that is expressed several times through the report, with the result that they recommended several significant changes. The only zooming in really is in your original comment that took one quote about one part of the Bill and presented it as if that was what the whole report was saying.

  As for the report overall, if all the changes are made which it suggests the Bill will be a much better one. I would have thought though that you’d be opposed to many of them, given that they echo criticisms of the Bill I’ve made previously – and which you’ve attacked me for making. Seems odd that you now say you agree with so many criticisms of the Bill when you’ve previously vehemently attacked me – even bringing paedophiles in to it – for making similar criticisms of the Bill.

  By the way, your comment on the previous thread where you suggested that my criticisms of the Bill were akin to supporting paedophiles is nonsense (and frankly, pretty offensive nonsense).

  It’s nonsense because the Government’s plans had a much lower standard of proof required for internet piracy than is required to convict someone of child porn offences. Saying those standards re internet piracy are too low is therefore not at all the same as saying it should be harder to convict someone for child porn offences.

  Throwing round offensive suggestions about paedophiles; sorry, if that’s the way you want to debate issues you’ll have to find someone else to debate with.

• Krz 13th Feb '10 - 2:31pm

  Hi Mark,

  I’m afraid your consistent polemic causes me to want to add an anti-thesis, I know that’s not terribly helpful, but you could simply try a more balanced approach to this subject. You only post negatively regarding the bill and any attempts to counter piracy, you could try giving a more reasonable view, so I don’t have to weigh so heavily against it to counter.

  Before I visit this site, I usually hit the BBC and can immediately identify a story on this subject you might post. You choose fear, uncertainty, doubt above genuine attempts to resolve an issue, and in this sense, you’re pretty tabloid. For example, this morning you could have posted this story from the BBC :

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8512263.stm

  But you didn’t, because it doesn’t suit your narrative. Had it of been a story negatively aimed at the bill, you would have posted it. So, to understand why I argue as I do, examine the nature of your original posts, this is just classic polemics, these kind of arguments always wind up like this. Look at the articles I’m responding to, look at the titles alone :

  Digital Economy Bill may breach human rights laws
  Don Foster on the Digital Economy Bill: carrot, pause and then stick
  Piracy letter campaign ‘nets innocents’

  So, the direction of such postings is immediately apparent on face-value – you seldom come with a positive message or concept, preferring to say no without offering an alternative. That’s what reading the Daily Mail is like, and your headlines on this topic would suit such a publication. If you don’t like polemicised debate, don’t do it, otherwise, it’s all nazis, paedophiles and whatever other sensationalist nonsense is laying around at the time. At the very least, it must increase hits – people love polarised debate.