IT News released a twitter today about 125 Australian websites who are voluntarily blocking out people in protest to the new ISP filter policy the Australian Government imposed on the Australian public. This and other anti-filter campaigners were part of a movement called The Great Australian Internet Blackout http://www.internetblackout.com.au/websites/.
The tweet read:
AusIT #Technology #News Blackout: 125 websites self-censor to protest filters http://bit.ly/4qGk0U #Australia
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/165526,blackout-125-websites-self-censor-to-protest-filters.aspx?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
The article details this and some other active protests which attempt to send a message to the Government that it shouldn't impose such extreme measures. Its a great idea that if given the right support could realy pack a puch.
I had an alternative brilliant idea! Lets start our own internet! Who's with me?
Monday, January 25, 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010
Internet Censorship and ISP Filtering in Australia
So Internet Censorship is a hot topic at the moment and even though here in Australia we couldn't stop the government implementing an ISP filtering system there is still a great deal of talk. This article talks about Google, China and the freedom of global Internet and it points to a number of articles and posts on the subject around the world. In particular it pointed to this blog post Australian government's efforts to censor the Internet down under which details the Google view and how openness and freedom is essential to development as opposed to oppression and denial.
The article says "Germany and Italy have mandatory ISP filtering, however in both cases they are of a clearly limited scope. In Germany, the scope is child abuse material and in Italy, it is child abuse material and unlawful gambling sites. Australia's proposed regime would uniquely combine a mandatory framework and a much wider scope of content, the first of its kind in the democratic world. "
We all know child abuse material is wrong and forbidden and we would never endorse it but there is a limit to how much you can control especially over the Internet. This action will not automatically stop these people from doing illegal activities it will just force it even further underground and harder to pin. What is affected here is democracy. The aforementioned blog on Google and China quotes Jonathan Rosenberg, Senior Vice President for Product Management in The meaning of open and I paraphrase:
"Open will win. It will win on the Internet and will then cascade across many walks of life: The future of government is transparency. The future of commerce is information symmetry. The future of culture is freedom. The future of science and medicine is collaboration. The future of entertainment is participation. Each of these futures depends on an open Internet."
So if open and transparent government is the future then perhaps the solution for this problem is no to cut and filter individuals freedom of information but rather ask the people for a solution, give them power and opinion, use the open system to solve the problem, why not get people to report illicit activities and being rewarded etc... we need to think forward not backwards.
The article says "Germany and Italy have mandatory ISP filtering, however in both cases they are of a clearly limited scope. In Germany, the scope is child abuse material and in Italy, it is child abuse material and unlawful gambling sites. Australia's proposed regime would uniquely combine a mandatory framework and a much wider scope of content, the first of its kind in the democratic world. "
We all know child abuse material is wrong and forbidden and we would never endorse it but there is a limit to how much you can control especially over the Internet. This action will not automatically stop these people from doing illegal activities it will just force it even further underground and harder to pin. What is affected here is democracy. The aforementioned blog on Google and China quotes Jonathan Rosenberg, Senior Vice President for Product Management in The meaning of open and I paraphrase:
"Open will win. It will win on the Internet and will then cascade across many walks of life: The future of government is transparency. The future of commerce is information symmetry. The future of culture is freedom. The future of science and medicine is collaboration. The future of entertainment is participation. Each of these futures depends on an open Internet."
So if open and transparent government is the future then perhaps the solution for this problem is no to cut and filter individuals freedom of information but rather ask the people for a solution, give them power and opinion, use the open system to solve the problem, why not get people to report illicit activities and being rewarded etc... we need to think forward not backwards.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Major trends in 2010 Online Marketing
New Tweet style presentation of TrendSpotting's Online Marketing Influencers "Major trends in 2010 Online Marketing". Key trends tagged as #social media #games #e-mail #real time #direct response #measurement #mobile #geo-location #video #niche
Full series available here: http://www.slideshare.net/TrendsSpotting
Including social media 2010 trend predictions
And here's a nicely distilled set of predications for social media
2010 Online Marketing Influencers: Trend Predictions in 140 characters by Trendsspotting
View more documents from Taly Weiss.
Full series available here: http://www.slideshare.net/TrendsSpotting
Including social media 2010 trend predictions
And here's a nicely distilled set of predications for social media
Monday, January 4, 2010
Apple’s Tablet will make a splash in 2010
The iSlate set to launch some time this year (rumours being true) is certainly going to make a splash when it becomes available. There's no doubt it will be a hit in 2010 following hot on the heals of the iPhone and iPod phenomena. It tops the list of technologies to watch here, and here are a couple of other links to the rumours surrounding it's release:
http://www.islate.org/
http://gizmodo.com/5434566/the-exhaustive-guide-to-apple-tablet-rumors
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
RIP Australian net neutrality.
All Australians are free, within the bounds of the law, to say or write what they think about Australian governments or about any other subject or social issue as long as they do not endanger people, make false allegations or obstruct the free speech of others. The same applies to Australian newspapers, radio and television and other forms of media. Australians are free to protest the actions of government and to campaign to change laws.
- an excerpt from Life in Australia
When I migrated to Australia a few months back, Immigration provided me with Life in Australia, a 46 page booklet outlining the core values (including the one listed above) that ensure that Australia maintains its high standard of living as a free, democratic country; I was required to promise to abide by these values. As such, I was all the more shocked by yesterday’s announcement that the Australian government will move ahead with its ill-advised (and highly protested) plan to instill mandatory Internet filtering.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Murdoch's Anti-Google Ploy or how to Play Nice Online
Media Baron Rupert Murdoch informed media last week that his News Corp news resources which owns huge news and information websites including The Australian, The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post would be cutting a deal with Microsoft to block Google and give exclusive search results to Bing in an attempt to drive clicks away from Google's dominant search engine. Murdoch inferred that Google were stealing content stating they were "Content Kleptomaniacs" saying that they need to start paying for it.
Murdoch does have a point, however, that the NEWS services we receive today are based on a capitalist controlled consumer driven system that requires funding. Writers, services, cost and other aspects of the company need to be paid for some how. They are not a free service like abc.net.au. However I think blocking Google is a bit drastic!
On top of this online Advertising has not returned as much as first thought meaning the information services we receive for free today may change to subscription, blocking content to payed subscribers only.
A flip side to Murdoch's intention could be that if News Corp does block Google and people don't swap to Bing, then people would simply read their News from alternative free sources, especially in these hard economic times. This could give independant resources and channels a chance to win new readers and have a broader reach. Alternatively Google and News Corp could play nicely and come to some happy middle ground. Either way the changes that are happening will not stop the new generation of free information be it through search engines or the ever increasing social networking channels such as Twitter, where content providers work hard to earn their followers and advocates.
How these changes play out could severely effect the future of digital strategy and in a sense we are influencing these changes by supporting them or not. I've always said that the digital is an unpredictable medium which can't be controlled and this is a prime example.
Via: http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/11/25/cashmore.news.corp.google/index.html
It seems Google and News Corp are friends now... here is Google CEO Eric Schmidt's response
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107104574569570797550520.html
Murdoch does have a point, however, that the NEWS services we receive today are based on a capitalist controlled consumer driven system that requires funding. Writers, services, cost and other aspects of the company need to be paid for some how. They are not a free service like abc.net.au. However I think blocking Google is a bit drastic!
On top of this online Advertising has not returned as much as first thought meaning the information services we receive for free today may change to subscription, blocking content to payed subscribers only.
A flip side to Murdoch's intention could be that if News Corp does block Google and people don't swap to Bing, then people would simply read their News from alternative free sources, especially in these hard economic times. This could give independant resources and channels a chance to win new readers and have a broader reach. Alternatively Google and News Corp could play nicely and come to some happy middle ground. Either way the changes that are happening will not stop the new generation of free information be it through search engines or the ever increasing social networking channels such as Twitter, where content providers work hard to earn their followers and advocates.
How these changes play out could severely effect the future of digital strategy and in a sense we are influencing these changes by supporting them or not. I've always said that the digital is an unpredictable medium which can't be controlled and this is a prime example.
Via: http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/11/25/cashmore.news.corp.google/index.html
It seems Google and News Corp are friends now... here is Google CEO Eric Schmidt's response
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107104574569570797550520.html
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Social Media Use by Australia's Best Brands 2009
It's pretty clear that brands are getting into social media. This report published by Burson-Marsteller looked to identify how top Australian companies are using key social media platforms to communicate and engage directly with stakeholders, in particular via Twitter, Facebook and Blogging. This is a good look at what's being done in the social media arena by 20 companies as chosen by Interbrand in its 'Australia's Best Brands Report' for 2009. I think most notable is that these companies are favoring Twitter and Facebook over blogging as their preferred channels.
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