Truth is for losers-UPI

Bangkok’s first casualty of political war
Awzar Thi, Rules of Lords
United Press International: April 16, 2009

http://www.upiasia.com/Human_Rights/2009/04/16/bangkoks_first_casualty_of_political_war/8748/

As troops and antigovernment protestors clashed on Bangkok’s streets again this week, a furious battle also played out in the media over casualties. Government spokespersons and army officers insisted that bullets had not been fired into the crowds. Their opponents said the opposite.

Soldiers had at times pointed their weapons at people, and some of the red-shirted demonstrators had been shot, but there were few reliable details of who was hurt, how, where and why.

Staff at the prime minister’s office blamed Red Shirts on motorbikes for a melee with local residents that left two dead. Other sources were less certain about the identities of the protagonists, but doubtful voices were drowned out as local outlets obligingly reported the official version. Meanwhile, emailed narratives of battles around the city had it that the Red Shirts’ rivals were in some areas backing up the army, but there was no immediate evidence to support this claim either.

What all this goes to show is not which side is to blame for the street blockades and bloodshed of the last few days, but how difficult it has become to believe Thailand’s media. Since 2006, when domestic news agencies and many overseas ones fell over each other to enthuse about the army’s latest power grab, the biases of newspapers, magazines and broadcasters have become more pronounced, their coverage more partisan, and their opinion-makers seemingly more sure of themselves even as things get less certain.

In normal times, the impoverished domestic journalism which has become a hallmark of Bangkok has made following current affairs there difficult; with the city under siege and a state of emergency declared, it has made following them all but impossible.

Blinded by seething hatred of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, many journalists have transformed him from the authoritarian bully that he is into a superhuman bogeyman on whom everything and anything can be blamed.

Thaksin obviously provoked his supporters to violence this week, as he has done in the past. There is no need for the point to be made repeatedly. What is needed is to situate what has happened in a meaningful trajectory with which to make sense of it and to figure out what might occur next.

But instead of offering useful analysis, most newspaper space has been taken up with headlines jeering at the Red Shirts’ failed putsch accompanied by content-free commentary that has at best been infantile and at worst shameful.

A columnist for the Bangkok Post shrilled that Thaksin was responsible for turning the city into a war zone and for the death of a young man whose brother she heard speak on television. “Does Thaksin have a soul?” she cried out theatrically. The paper’s main editorial was little better, branding the former prime minister’s crimes “heinous” and heaping praise on the incumbent, Abhisit Vejjajiva, who came to power on the back of more prolonged violence of the same type last year.

By the time the Post was published, the government had closed the satellite station that the protest organizers were using for increasingly vociferous broadcasts. Whether or not the shutdown can be justified, the same has not been done to the Yellow Shirts’ mouthpiece. It continues to churn out propaganda even as the leaders of last year’s Government House and airport takeovers run around on bail, while a number of their red-shirted counterparts have either been locked up or are in hiding. Perhaps the yellow-shirted bosses have not felt the need to go on the run because no one is actually chasing them.

And while the authorities have moved against their adversaries’ use of modern technology, they have also been working overtime against sources of news that might have filled some of the gaps, corrected some of the errors, and exposed some of the lies in the big media and authorized accounts.

The Prachatai website has been on the back foot since its director was hit last month with a volley of ambiguous charges over supposedly unlawful comments that readers – not the service itself – had posted. It continues to put out news and views that cannot be found elsewhere, such as a recent careful critique of the prejudiced and simplistic television coverage of the newest battles in Bangkok. But its weekly radio feature has fallen silent.

Many bloggers have been trying their best to keep abreast of things, but they can’t make up for the paucity of trustworthy periodicals and professional broadcasters. The bureaucracy has been fighting a war against them too, blocking the domestic audience from reading thousands of web pages since the start of this year alone on spurious grounds relating to the monarchy or national security.

A few foreign correspondents who have worked on and in Thailand for some years have filed informed and critical stories of what has been going on, but they are in the minority, and their reporting does not have much reach back inside the country where it would count the most.

During Thaksin’s time as prime minister, police and bureaucrats routinely harassed journalists and media advocates: searching premises, issuing warrants and making threats. He and his government rightly attracted censure for their efforts to intimidate and silence critics, and for their misuse of state agencies toward these ends.

But in Thaksin’s time there was at least a struggle for freedom of opinion and expression that extended across different parts of the media. Since 2006, it has fallen to small committed groups like Prachatai to keep that effort alive, often at considerable risk to those involved. None of the mainstream print and broadcast outlets can today be counted as defenders of the right to speak freely. This last week is proof of that.

“The first casualty when war comes,” U.S. Senator Hiriam Johnson once famously said, “is truth.” While both sides in the latest battle for Thailand’s future were arguing furiously about how many lives and limbs they had claimed, the first casualty went uncounted. Its passing is now more obvious than ever, its presence sorely missed.

–

(Awzar Thi is the pen name of a member of the Asian Human Rights Commission with over 15 years of experience as an advocate of human rights and the rule of law in Thailand and Burma. His Rule of Lords blog can be read at http://ratchasima.net)

Zack and Miri [Can’t] Make a Porno-Wise Kwai

Censorship Watch: Zack and Miri [Can’t] Make a Porno: Crank. High Voltage short-circuited
wisekwai
The Nation: April 21, 2009

http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/wisekwai/2009/04/21/entry-3

Apparently for its concept alone, the raunchy sex comedy Zack and Miri Make a Porno has been banned in Thailand.

Local distributor M Pictures attempted to release American director Kevin Smith’s film on March 12 in a limited run at Paragon Cineplex, but the movie was  pulled over concerns by censors.

The distributor then made an appeal to the National Film Board, which today announced it has firmly stood by its decision to ban the film, saying “its explicit sexual content go against moral principles [in Thailand]“, according to an article on The Nation’s website.

The comedy is about a pair of friends, played by Seth Rogan and Elizabeth Banks, who hatch a scheme to make pornographic films as a means of getting out of debt.

Culture Ministry permanent secretary Vira Rojpojchanarat offers the reason the film is banned in Thailand:

“The screening of this film may encourage copycats here.”

Zack and Miri Make a Porno has been a lightning rod for controversy since it was first proposed.

In Hollywood, the Motion Picture Ratings Association initially gave the film a NC-17 rating, meaning that only people age 17 and older can be admitted to the film. It’s the most restrictive rating a film can receive in the US. Film studios typically seek to avoid the harsh rating because it limits how widely the film can be advertised and released.

After an appeal, the film was rated R (requiring that viewers under age 17 be accompanied by a parent or guardian) for “strong crude sexual content including dialogue, graphic nudity and pervasive language.”

Smith also fought a pitched battle with America’s ratings board over the film poster. After an image of Rogan and Banks purportedly receiving oral sex was rejected (but allowed in neighboring Canada), the initial teaser poster for the U.S. was of stick figures. The final poster was a fanciful cartoon drawing.

Zack and Miri Make a Porno was released in the U.S. last October.

People who have has seen the film say it is loaded with the typically raunchy but witty dialogue that Smith is known for, but the nudity primarily consists of bare breasts, which are sometimes allowed to be seen in Thai cinemas.

Update: Here’s the full story from Daily Xpress.

Update 2: And DPA picked up the story, pointing out that “pirated versions … are already widely available on the streets of Bangkok”.

Update 3: Kevin Smith’s News Askew website has comments about this as does the film blog, Cinema Blend.

Too gay for monks-BBC

‘Etiquette guide’ for Thai monks
BBC News: April 27, 2009

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8020311.stm

It is customary for Thai men to enter the monkhood for training at least once.

A Buddhist preacher in Thailand has announced plans for new guidelines aimed at curbing the flamboyant behaviour of gay and transgender monks.

The “good manners” curriculum – the country’s first – is being introduced in the northern province of Chiang Rai.

The senior monk told the BBC he was particularly concerned by effeminate activities among novices such as the wearing of make-up and tight robes.

More than 90% of the Thai population are followers of Buddhism.

The BBC’s Jonathan Head in Bangkok says tales of monks behaving badly are nothing new in Thailand.

In recent years, they have been accused of abuses of their exalted position in society that range from amassing dozens of luxury cars, to running fake amulet scams, to violating their vows of celibacy, our correspondent says.

Senior monk Phra Maha Wudhijaya Vajiramedhi told the BBC he would address issues like smoking, drinking alcohol, walking and going to the toilet properly, which are all detailed in the traditional 75 Dharma principles of Buddhism, and the 227 precepts for monks.

He was especially concerned, he said, by the flamboyant behaviour of gay and transgender monks, who can often be seen wearing revealingly tight robes, carrying pink purses and having effeminately-shaped eyebrows.

Thailand has a very large and visible population of transgender men, and Phra Vajiramedhi acknowledged that it was difficult to exclude them from the monkhood but he hoped his course could at least persuade them to curb their more extrovert habits.

If successful, the “good manners” course, at the Novice Demonstration School, would be replicated at other Buddhist monasteries and seminaries, he said.

Take the Power Back!-EFA

Take the Power Back
Electronic Frontiers Australia

http://www.nodecity.com/empower

1. EMPOWER YOUR CHILDREN 2. EMPOWER YOURSELF 3. GOTO 1.

…and stop INTERNET CENSORSHIP in Australia and around the world while you’re at it!

Watch and share the video above of three of the worlds leading IT security experts talking about MANDATORY national internet filtering/censorship in Australia. This is the first test run of nationwide mandatory censorship in a western democracy. It cannot be allowed to succeed or to infect other countries. There is a war being waged once more against the open nature and collaborative power of the internet. The internet is a giant mirror held up to humankind. We should fix the root causes of our issues, rather than sweep the bits under the carpet and cripple the medium.

Interviewees:
1. Dan Kaminsky, Director
2. Pete Lindstrom, Director
3. Marcus Ranum, Chief Security Officer

Step 1: Learn a Common Sense Approach to Internet Safety.

a) To help children and parents surf the internet more safely and confidently, please watch and share the below video “A Common Sense approach to Internet Safety” for basic hints and tips for all ages.

Step 2: Get involved! Just a few clicks of your time!

a) Forward this websites videos and information to family and friends easily -> HERE !

b) Interested in learning more? Want to keep updated in the fight for our rights? Keen to Ban Censorship? We promise we won’t spam you or sell your address. No more than one email a week, though generally one  email a month. Get educated, keep informed, be empowered.

c) Begin using tools like Twitter http://twitter.com/ where you can follow @efa_oz and @GetUpAus and join the conversation by searching http://search.twitter.com/ for the hashtag #nocleanfeed

d) Volunteer your expertise by emailing empower@nodecity.com and join us @ campaign headquarters  http://campaign.nodecity.com/

Step 3: Go to Step 1.

Bonus video –> http://vimeo.com/channels/bancensorship

Research:
Electronic Frontiers Australia
Overclockers Archive
NoCleanfeed Campaign

UN: Only free speech states to UN HRC-AHRC

UNITED NATIONS: Elect Rights-Respecting States to Human Rights Council
General Assembly Members Should Not Reward Rights Abusers with Votes
Asian Human Rights Commission: April 20, 2009

http://material.ahrchk.net/docs/AHRC-PRL-023-2009-01.pdf

Serious human rights violations in Azerbaijan, China, Cuba, Russia, and Saudi Arabia undermine their candidacies for the May 12, 2009 election to the United Nations Human Rights Council, a global coalition of international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) said in a letter released today.

In a letter to UN member states, the NGO Coalition for an Effective Human Rights Council expressed concern that the human rights records of Azerbaijan, China, Cuba, Russia, and Saudi Arabia, all of which are running for re-election, fall far short of the required “highest” standards of human rights. The coalition urged UN member states not to vote for these countries as they have not made real progress to address human rights violations and to cooperate fully with the council ahead of the election.

“These five countries stood out as rights violators in 2006 and sadly still do today,” said Steve Crawshaw, UN advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “They have made many promises but taken few steps to make them convincing candidates for a human rights body.”

Member nations of the UN General Assembly in New York will elect 18 new members to the 47-member Human Rights Council in Geneva, the UN’s leading human rights body. Council members are required to “uphold the highest standards” of human rights and “fully cooperate” with the council.

The make-up of the Human Rights Council reflects the UN’s geographic composition, and seats are allotted by regional group. In four out of five regions, the number of candidates is expected to equal the number of seats allotted to the region, thus eliminating any meaningful competition and comparative scrutiny of candidates. Even so, each candidate must secure an absolute majority of the General Assembly – 97 votes – in order to obtain a seat.

“The old practice of regional endorsements and rubber-stamping was supposed to go out with the Human Rights Commission,” said Yap Swee Seng, executive director of Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA), referring to the Human Rights Council’s predecessor. “But the lack of real choice in so many regions suggests that many countries have gone back to putting politics and vote trading ahead of human rights and an effective Human Rights Council.”

In the African region, Cameroon, Djibouti, Kenya, Mauritius, Nigeria, and Senegal have declared their candidacies for the five available seats, but delegates from the African region say that one of the candidates will withdraw before the election and the region plans to again present a non-competitive slate. In the Western European and Other group, Belgium, Norway, and the United States are running for the region’s three open seats. Although New Zealand was running, it withdrew from the election after the United States declared its candidacy.

“It is especially disappointing that for the first time the longstanding democracies in the Western group have chosen to run a non-competitive election for the Human Rights Council,” said Dokhi Fassihian, executive director of Democracy Coalition Project. “We fear this poor decision will undermine efforts to improve the membership of the council through competitive slates.”

Only in the Eastern Europe slate are member states sure to have a choice of candidates, with Hungary, Russia, and Azerbaijan vying for two seats. The coalition noted that Azerbaijan harasses and intimidates human rights defenders, continues to hold political prisoners, and uses criminal charges to silence independent media. The human rights situation in the country has deteriorated during its three years on the council. Similarly, Russia has tightened control over civil society, restricted freedom of expression and the media, and allowed harassment and violence against journalists and activists to go unpunished.

“Among Eastern European candidates, the choice is clear,” said Igor Blazevic, head of the Human Rights and Democracy Department of the People in Need. “Russia and Azerbaijan simply do not uphold the highest standards of human rights.”

China, Saudi Arabia, and Cuba are running in non-competitive elections. Although Cuba remains the one country in the Western Hemisphere that represses nearly all forms of political dissent, it faces no competition for its seat, with only three countries (Cuba, Mexico, and Uruguay) running for the three open Latin American seats. Countries in the Asian regional group have gone so far as to endorse unconditionally all five candidates running for the Asian region’s five open seats, including China and Saudi Arabia, two countries well known for their human rights violations. Bangladesh, Kyrgyzstan, and Jordan are also running.

“We had hoped that the election of Azerbaijan, Cuba, China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia to the new council in 2006 would lead to much needed reforms to improve their rights records, but have only seen empty promises of change,” said Bahey el-din Hassan, director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS). “Saudi Arabia is a prime example of failure to reform. Grave human rights abuses occur regularly there. Saudi citizens cannot form political parties or associations or peacefully assemble, religious minorities still suffer obvious discrimination, and women – for no other reason than being female – are denied basic rights.”

The NGO Coalition for an Effective Human Rights Council urged UN member states to cast their votes only for those countries with records of human rights protection and cooperation that meet membership standards.

“Widespread, serious human rights abuses by China, Cuba, and Saudi Arabia should carry a cost, even in the absence of competition,” said Paula Schriefer, director of advocacy at Freedom House. “Members of the international community should not reward failure to promote and protect human rights with their votes.”

To read the letter from the NGO Coalition for an Effective Human Rights Council to UN member states, please visit: http://www.hrw.org/node/82596

For profiles of human rights conditions in countries running for the Human Rights Council, please visit: http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/features/hrc2009/index.html

For more information, please contact:
In New York, Steve Crawshaw (Human Rights Watch): +1-212-216-1217
In Washington, DC, Paula Schriefer (Freedom House): +1-202-747-7021
In Cairo, Bahey el-din Hassan (Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies): +20-2-2-795-1112; or +20-2-2-796-3059
In Washington, DC, Dokhi Fassihian (Democracy Coalition Project): +1-202-721-5630
In Geneva, Yap Swee Seng (Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development): +41-22-740-2947
In Kampala, Hassan Shire Sheikh, (East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Network): +256-312-265821
In Hong Kong, Michael Anthony (Asian Human Rights Commission): +852-2698-6339
In Santiago, Chile, Lorena Fries (Corporacion Humanas Centro Regional de Derechos Humanos y Justicia de Genero): +562-253-2128
In Prague, Igor Blazevic (People in Need): +420-77-778-7914
In Serrekunda, The Gambia, Hannah Forster (African Democracy Forum): +220-446-2340

The full text of this press release can be found here: http://material.ahrchk.net/docs/AHRC-PRL-023-2009-01.pdf.

The full text of the letter to the UN can be found here: http://material.ahrchk.net/docs/AHRC-PRL-023-2009-02.pdf.
# # #

About AHRC: The Asian Human Rights Commission is a regional non-governmental organisation monitoring and lobbying human rights issues in Asia. The Hong Kong-based group was founded in 1984.

Internet our biggest hope-AFP

Internet has only just begun, say founders
Daniel Silva
Agence France-Presse: April 22, 2009

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/afp/20090422/tc_afp/internetmediait

While the Internet has dramatically changed lives around the world, its full impact will only be realised when far more people and information go on-line, its founders said Wednesday.

“The Web as I envisaged it, we have not seen it yet. The future is still so much bigger than the past,” said Tim Berners-Lee, one of the inventors of the World Wide Web, at a seminar on its future.

Just 23 percent of the globe’s population currently uses the Internet, according to the United Nation’s International Telecommunications Union, with use much higher in developed nations.

By contrast, just five percent of Africans surf the web, it said in a report issued last month.

But that level is expected to rise, especially in developing nations, as mobile Internet access takes off, making it no longer necessary to use a computer to surf the Web, said Internet co-founder Vinton Cerf.

“We will have more Internet, larger numbers of users, more mobile access, more speed, more things online and more appliances we can control over the Internet,” the Google vice president and chief Internet evangelist said.

Robert Cailliau, who designed the Web with Berners-Lee in 1989, said having more data on the Internet, and more people with the ability to access it, will spur the development of new technology and solutions to global problems.

“When we have all data online it will be great for humanity. It is a prerequisite to solving many problems that humankind faces,” the Belgian software scientist said.

The Internet has already led to the development of businesses that could not have existed without it, boosted literacy and learning and brought people closer together through cheaper modes of communication, the Internet pioneers said.

“We never, ever in the history of mankind have had access to so much information so quickly and so easily,” said Cerf.

With the help of other scientists at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), Berners-Lee and Cailliau set up the Web in 1989 to allow thousands of scientists around the world to share information and data.

The WWW technology — which simplifies the process of searching for information on the Internet — was first made more widely available from 1991.

The number of Web sites has since ballooned from just 500 as recently as 1994 to over 80 million currently, with growing numbers of sites consisting of user-generated content like blogs.

Even its founders are surprised by its popularity.

“What we did not imagine was a Web of people, but a Web of documents,” said Dale Dougherty, the founder of GNN, the Global Network Navigator, the first web portal and the first site on the Internet to be supported by advertising.

For his part, Cailliau said he was impressed that search engines can still sort through the myriad of material that is now on-line.

“To me the biggest surprise is that Google still functions despite the explosion in the number of sites,” said Cailliau.

Press freedom down worldwide-Freedom House

[FACT comments: Why didn’t they mention Thailand?!?]

Global Press Freedom Declines in Every Region for First Time
Israel, Italy and Hong Kong Lose Free Status
Freedom House: April 28, 2009

http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=70&release=649

Washington – May 1, 2009 – Journalists faced an increasingly grim working environment in 2008, with global press freedom declining for a seventh straight year and deterioration occurring for the first time in every region, according to Freedom House’s annual media study. The rollback was not confined to traditionally authoritarian states; with Israel, Italy and Hong Kong slipping from the study’s Free category to Partly Free status.

“The journalism profession today is up against the ropes and fighting to stay alive, as pressures from governments, other powerful actors and the global economic crisis take an enormous toll,” said Jennifer Windsor, Freedom House executive director. “The press is democracy’s first defense and its vulnerability has enormous implications for democracy if journalists are not able to carry out their traditional watchdog role.”

Freedom House will formally release findings from Freedom of the Press 2009 on Friday, May 1 at 10 a.m. in Washington in front of the organization’s giant Map of Press Freedom at the Newseum. A live webcast and photos from the event will be available for download on www.freedomhouse.org.

The study indicates that there were twice as many losses as gains in 2008, with declines and stagnation in East Asia of particular concern. While parts of South Asia and Africa made progress, overall these gains were overshadowed by a campaign of intimidation targeting independent media, particularly in the former Soviet Union and the Middle East and North Africa.

There were some notable improvements. The Maldives made the study’s largest jump, moving to the Partly Free category with the adoption of a new constitution protecting freedom of expression and the release of a prominent journalist from life imprisonment. Guyana regained its Free rating with fewer attacks on journalists and a government decision to lift a boycott on advertising in the main independent newspaper.

Out of the 195 countries and territories covered in the study, 70 (36 percent) are rated Free, 61 (31 percent) are rated Partly Free and 64 (33 percent) are rated Not Free. This represents a modest decline from the 2008 survey in which 72 countries and territories were Free, 59 Partly Free and 64 Not Free. The new survey found that only 17 percent of the world’s population lives in countries that enjoy a Free press.

Key regional findings include:

• Asia Pacific: Cambodia dropped to Not Free status because of increased violence against journalists. Hong Kong slipped to Partly Free as Beijing exerted growing influence over media. China’s media environment remained bleak. Media in Taiwan faced assault and growing government pressure. South Asia saw improvements in the Maldives, Bangladesh and Pakistan, while Sri Lanka and Afghanistan suffered setbacks.

• Central and Eastern Europe/Former Soviet Union: The region suffered the biggest drop in press freedom of any region, with journalists murdered in Bulgaria and Croatia and assaulted in Bosnia. Russia’s score declined with the judiciary unwilling to protect journalists from attacks, as well as the frequent targeting of independent media by regulators.

• Middle East and North Africa: The region continues to have the world’s lowest level of press freedom. Restrictions on journalists and official attempts to influence coverage during the Gaza conflict led to Israel’s Partly Free status. The Israeli-Occupied Territories/Palestinian Authority saw declines with both Hamas and Fatah intimidating journalists. Iraq saw the security environment for journalists improve and new legal protections for media in the Kurdish areas.

• Sub-Saharan Africa: Press freedom suffered in Senegal with an increase in both legal and extralegal action taken against media. In Madagascar, media outlets critical of the government were targeted. Other declines were seen in Botswana, Chad, Congo (Brazzaville), Lesotho, Mauritania, South Africa and Tanzania. Comoros, Sierra Leone, Angola and Liberia improved.

• Americas: Guyana regained its Free rating, while Haiti and Uruguay saw significant improvement. However, Mexico’s score dropped again because of increased violence, the government’s unwillingness to make legal reforms, and pressure on media from local and state officials. Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala and Nicaragua registered major declines.

• Western Europe: The region continues to boast the world’s highest level of press freedom. However, Italy slipped back into the Partly Free category with free speech limited by courts and libel laws, increased intimidation of journalists by organized crime and far-right groups, and concerns over the concentration of media ownership. Greece also suffered a significant decline.

Freedom House has assessed the degree of print, broadcast and internet freedom in every country in the world since 1980. The 2009 ratings are based on an assessment of the legal, political and economic environments in which journalists worked in 2008.

“The declines in East Asia are particularly disappointing, given the increased attention on the region because of the Beijing Olympics,” said Karin Deutsch Karlekar, Freedom House senior researcher and managing editor of the study. “China should have had a better record in 2008 and upheld its promise to ensure press freedom during the Olympics, but instead it chose to remain the world’s largest repressor of media freedom.”

Key trends that led to numerical movements in the study include:

· Fragile Freedoms: Declines in Israel, Italy and Taiwan illustrate that established democracies with traditionally open media are not immune to restricting media freedom. Over the last five years, a number of emerging democracies have also suffered considerable declines in press freedom including: Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Thailand, the Philippines and Senegal.

· Consolidating Control: Authoritarian states are increasingly consolidating control of the media. In the last five years, space for independent media shrunk significantly in countries like Russia, Ethiopia and The Gambia.

· Violence and Impunity: The level of violence and physical harassment directed at the press by both government and non-state actors continues to rise in many countries. Many of these cases go unsolved and these attacks have a chilling effect on media, contributing to self-censorship.

· Punitive laws: Both governments and private individuals continue to restrict media freedom through laws that forbid “inciting hatred,” commenting on sensitive topics such as religion or ethnicity, or “endangering national security.” Libel and defamation laws remain a widespread way to punish the press.

· New media: Freedom House’s recently released internet freedom index finds that new media outlets are often freer than traditional media and have the potential to open repressive media environments such as China and Iran. However, as new media gains influence, governments are beginning to crack down on internet users by employing traditional means of repression.

The world’s worst-rated countries continue to include Burma, Cuba, Eritrea, Libya, North Korea and Turkmenistan. The study found that the level of media freedom in these countries remained stagnant in 2008, despite hope that the internet and new media might provide openings in the media environment.

UK govt wants ISP police-Reuters

[FACT comments: Govt is giving us freedom of choice. Would you rather have all your private thoughts held by govt or private industry...forever? This goes way beyond "Big Brother". Maybe Big Cancer or Big Siamese Twin you can't get rid of. These people are just evil.]

UK rules out government database of emails, phones
Reuters: April 27, 2009

http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSTRE53Q2RX20090427

Britain has ruled out a controversial proposal to set up a government database to store Internet and telephone traffic, saying it prefers to have such information held by private companies.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith says the data is needed to combat terrorism and other crimes. Critics have called the idea excessive and an infringement of civil liberties.

Home Office research has estimated the proposal would cost up to 2 billion pounds to implement.

In a statement, Smith stressed that the information from mobile phones and computers that might need would be the “who, when, where and how” of communications and not the content.

“My key priority is to protect the citizens of the UK, and communications data is an essential tool for law enforcement agencies to track murderers and pedophiles, save lives and tackle crime,” she added.

“It is essential that the police and other crime-fighting agencies have the tools they need to do their job. However, to be clear, there are absolutely no plans for a single central store.”

In nearly all recent major counter-terrorism trials in Britain, prosecutors have used data about phone calls as part of their court case against suspects.

Details about where calls were made, to whom and for how long have been used to show links between cell members and as evidence of preparation for an attack.

The government still proposes legislating to allow all data that public authorities might need, including that generated overseas but crossing British networks, to be collected and retained by communication service providers (CSPs).

Opposition parties have strongly criticized the idea, saying officials had shown they could not be trusted with people’s confidential information after a series of embarrassing data-loss scandals.

Civil rights groups say it would be a massive invasion of privacy.

“The big problem is that the government has built a culture of surveillance which goes far beyond counter-terrorism and serious crime,” said Conservative home affairs spokesman Chris Grayling.

“Too many parts of government have too many powers to snoop on innocent people and that’s really got to change.”

(Reporting by Frank Prenesti; Editing by Steve Addison)

Lock down the Internet-CNet News

[FACT comments: We find this completely pathetic. With all the free potential of the Internet, can’t we find solutions other than legal lock’-em-up? Sounds to us like there are too many lawyers.]

The next frontier of Internet legal battles
Michael Songer
CNet News: April 27, 2009

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10228015-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, we have seen a number of well-known legal disputes: legality of peer-to-peer services such as Napster and Grokster, cybersquatting, laws (trying) to regulate porn, even “veejay” Adam Curry trying to use the MTV domain name.

As we head into 2010 and beyond, here are some legal issues that are likely to careen through cyberspace in the next few years.

1. Lawsuits related to stupid/silly conduct shown on the Internet.
The assimilation of broadband brought with it those “viral videos”: Star Wars Kid, Numa Numa Dance, Aleksey “Impossible is Nothing” Vayner, and the like. The latest fad seems to be taking videos of crude behavior and posting it for all to see–think of the two girls bathing in the Kentucky Fried Chicken kitchen, or the Domino’s employees creating a “special” meal for a customer.

Someone will be offended, someone will sue. In some cases, the lawsuits make sense (violating health codes for the KFC and Domino’s videos); in other cases, they don’t (Star Wars Kid sued, and Aleksey Varner threatened a suit, though the legal basis for these is shaky).

Expect to see a rise in these types of lawsuits related to conduct shown on the Internet and calls for Congress to do something. What, exactly, can be done is less clear; it’s hard for the legal system to regulate conduct that, while not breaking the law, is merely stupid. But that won’t stop people from trying and lawyers from garnering headlines.

2. Lawsuits related to social media.
The last few years have seen a number of lawsuits brought against Facebook and MySpace for conduct occurring on those sites–think of the Megan Meier case (Megan Meier was the teenager who committed suicide after a woman pretended to be her friend, and then turned on her).

The government prosecuted the offender in that case, though the legal basis for the prosecution is less than clear, and an appeal is under way. And there have been calls for regulating what you can and cannot do (no sock puppets!) on these sites.

These are likely to continue for the simple reason that more and more people are using these new technologies. With that increased use comes the increase in libelous statements, crude conduct, even illegal activity (think prostitutes using Craigslist to advertise their services).

I’m sure–if it hasn’t already happened–that someone will sue over some “tweet” in the next year. Expect more of these lawsuits.

3. The next battle in the copyright wars.
The $1 billion battle between Google’s YouTube and Viacom is churning away, with no end in sight. At issue is the liability of sites like YouTube for hosting content posted by others.

Like the earlier Napster decision, this case has major ramifications for content on the Internet. However, just as Napster begat legal file sharing (iTunes), consumer demand might work out a solution faster than the courts.

YouTube recently announced a deal with Sony to stream movies, with television shows on the horizon. But whatever the final outcome of the YouTube lawsuit, nagging copyright issues associated with liability and fair use of content uploaded into social sites will not go away.

Recently, the Associated Press threatened to sue aggregators and clamp down on the use of their articles, and others are sure to follow this path. Expect more content owners to use copyright lawsuits to shape what we view and read on the Internet.

4. Blogger liability for the comment section.
Currently, bloggers cannot be sued for libelous statements posted in the comment section of their blogs. Something called “section 230″ (after the particular legal code) immunizes bloggers from legal harm caused by another’s comments (bloggers, however, can be sued for libelous statements that they post).

This immunity was enacted in the mid-’90s and was designed to protect the “publishers” on the Internet at that time: the AOLs, CompuServes, and ISPs that enabled Internet access. The law never contemplated the explosion of bloggers, MySpace authors, and other “social publishers.” And the law never contemplated the accompanying (usually anonymous) comments to those posts, as well as the ill will associated with the all-too-common flame wars.

Several courts have expressed dissatisfaction with the blogger immunity–particularly when the blogger knows that the comments are defamatory or wrong. Expect more challenges to this immunity, and perhaps calls for Congress to roll back section 230.

5. The taxman cometh.
Anyone who has read a phone bill has seen a dizzying array of taxes, assessments, and special charges. Your Internet access is free from such taxes until at least 2014, due to Congress and the Internet Tax Freedom Act. The law, passed in 1998 and extended by the Bush administration, prohibits federal, state, and local governments from taxing access to the Internet, and it bans “Internet-only” taxes such as bandwidth or e-mail taxes.

States remain free to tax sales on the Internet.) Of course, that was before the current economic crisis, and the general rise in taxes on everything from mobile phones to cigarettes. A bill has been introduced to make the tax ban permanent, but nothing is “forever” with Congress. Expect to see calls for Congress to tax these areas before 2014.

Of course, given a steady pace of new Internet technologies that allow different ways for humans to interact with one another, more unique, complex, and downright strange events will occur that give rise to legal disputes. (Think “upskirt” cams.)

The legal system is flexible and has dealt with much over the last 10 years, in many instances driving Internet growth in ways both good and bad. The next 10 years promise much of the same.

Michael Songer is a partner at Crowell & Moring in Washington, D.C., where he specializes in Internet and intellectual-property law. He also teaches the “Law of Cyberspace” at Georgetown University Law School. Michael is not an employee of CNET.

USA: The mother of all Blackberrys-Wired

[FACT comments: Omama, dontcha just want one?!? So Obama can have privacy (if we believe the spooks are ever playing fair) but the rest of us can’t??? We kind of hope it gets hacked!]

Obama to Get Back BlackBerry at Last, Toughened by NSA
Charlie Sorrel
Wired: April 24, 2009

http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2009/04/obama-to-get-ba.html

The presidential CrackBerry is undergoing final testing before being handed back. The NSA is hammering on the SecurVoice software which has been loaded onto the Obama-phone and is in the last stages of testing just how secure it might be.

The BlackBerry is an 8830, the standard business handset, but the added software encrypts both calls and messages. Cellphone calls are encrypted anyway, but there are some back doors if you know where to find them (and of course, the NSA knows exactly where they are).

The company behind the SecurVoice software is Genesis Key, which is handily based in Washington DC. Be careful not to confuse this with spam-alike secure-voice.com, whose site reads, rather unconvincingly, thus: “The development of the Secure Voice lasts from 2001 and we have now a wide range of devices as well as Landline version of the solution.”

Since winning the election, President Obama has been limping along with two devices — a standard BlackBerry and a secured handset called the Sectera Edge, an unwieldy device that not only offers encrypted communications but is also so ugly that nobody would ever want to steal it. Both machines need to be tethered to each other to work, making every presidential e-mail look something like a game of Wii Boxing.

If the NSA tests come up clean, he could have his customised BlackBerry in his hands soon, which in governmental terms means a couple of months. And of course, secure communications aren’t much good if the person you are talking to is an open and easy target. To this end, Mrs. O should be getting one, too.

The odd fact is that the NSA usually likes everybody else to be locked out but itself. Giving the SecurVoice such a big endorsement will either mean that the encryption is indeed unbreakable (and therefore fit for the president) or that it wants everybody to think that it is unbreakable, therefore giving the NSA back-door access to every single SecurVoice customer. Paranoid conspiracy theory? Hell yes. Accurate speculation? Maybe.

Inside the Ring: Obama’s BlackBerry [Washington Post]