How to tell if your country is illiberal 2 Jul 2009 When the People’s Republic of China is less censorial censorious than your own country, you might be living in an unfree country. The PRC has bowed to demands by its own users and not put the Green Dam Youth Escort internet filtering software mandatorily on every computer sold in its borders. Meanwhile, it turns out that the Great Wall of Australia will filter out adult games, including Second Life. Even the Christians recognise this is more draconian than censorship in China. These games aren’t illegal, mind, just unclassified, because there is no adult classification category in the Censorship Board scheme, and the filter will block all RC (refused classification) games irrespective of why. This includes accessing Second Life domains, as well as downloading the game, which can still legally be bought in person. Have we had enough of teh stoopid yet? Censorship Internet filtering Politics Religion
Politics Indian terror suspect not really suspicious 20 Jul 2007 In yet further evidence that due process is a bulwark against the arrogance and incompetence, not to say potential police statery, of intelligence agencies, it turns out that the core piece of evidence against Dr Haneef, the Indian doctor being detained by the Australian government against the law, is wrong…. Read More
Education Science Communication and the Business Model 22 Mar 2009 There are a lot of folk who think they have a handle on how to communicate science to the general public, and a lot of folk, mostly scientists, who think nobody else does. But I was reading Carl Zimmer’s twittering today, about Rebecca Skoot getting a column gig for a… Read More
Politics Call it now 3 Nov 2008 I reckon Obama with 368 (or so) electoral votes. What say you? Read More
When everyone’s finished putting up proxies and Tor nodes for Iran, I guess we’ll have to turn around and do it for Australia. I’m trying to fathom just where your government is going with this. It’s almost as if there is somebody advising your PM and Cabinet who secretly wants to utterly undermine the whole thing by making it so outrageous that it will become politically impossible to support.
Apparently Evil Incarnate — I mean, Sony — shipped with the Green Dam software ahead of schedule. Par for the course for them, really. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we’ll have any change to the ratings classification any time soon either; Atkinson is still dragging his heels with the public consultation, and even if Labor loses at the next state election in SA (March 2010), the Liberals would not introduce the much-needed R18+ classification. (I know for a fact that the Shadow Attorney-General here in SA is in favour of introducing it; however, the rest of the party is against her.)