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The Internet is Doomed #
Posted Friday 23rd January 2009 13:19 GMT
I am getting more & more pessimistic about largely open nature of the internet. I suspect in a mere 5-10 years it will be far more restricted & monitored than it currently is. So many things are combining against it's freedom: commercial interests, democratic governments, dictatorships, campaign groups. Yes there's a lot of dross & evil stuff out there but a lot of these processes that are going on are secretive & unaccountable. Actually I suspect they are opposed to the internet precisely because it gives so many people, good & bad, the ability to exchange information & ideas so freely & easily. It has undermined old elites. Conversely the internet may actually be an 'enemy' of freedom: it allows easier monitoring of the populacy &, as more & more people rely on it for news & other information, it is easier to control what they say & see.
Paranoid? Not in the slightest. A whistleblower has revealed that the NSA in the US spied on ALL AMERICANS, particularly journalists, & also credit card transactions (not everyone was listened on personally, but things were flagged up for analysis). Of course he could your typical disgruntled ex-employee, but even a US senator who sponsored the programme believes him. Is this the model for the UK government's proposed Interception Modernisation Programme? Or is it they simply want their own ability to surveil everybody? Don't believe it when they say they don't want to know the content of communications! This imperils democracy in this country. The only ways to avoid it are protest. I personally think there will be movements that develop that will shun computers & technology to keep their lives away from prying eyes.
