Be careful what you dream aboout in the land of nod

Be careful what you dream about in the land of nod - if you live in the land of Oz! At this rate their government will want to scan your dreams to check for explicit content such as small breasts or cartoon characters. When the tech becomes available I'm sure they will!

High horses

If you believe that the censorship scheme will stop with just kiddie p0rn and won't spread into political censorship, you're an idiot. Enjoy your sandboxed internet, it'll probably be perfect for you.

Good thing you bring that up

because El Reg is banned in Australia as of... now!

Our Mutual Citizen Kane

Political activism and organization has never been better in the US (much as your immune system would be having successfully fought off a yeast infection). Democracy as a whole is being damaged in the US, but the reason for that is much the same as it is in the UK and Australia, and all for the same reason... Rupert "I'm the dingo that ate your kids" Murdock.

Dumbed-down stories, biased editorial, and exaggerating/inventing conflict, and page 2 peodophilia diatribes next to barely legal and barely dressed page 3 girls do not for a health society/democracy make though they do make a health profit for News Corp.

And there [above] is the reason you should be worried by the Great Oz Barrier (GOB). Already the government is filtering based on commercial reasons (it really was rather petty to be blocking the website of a medical practice in Australia but meh...), so how much longer before Rupert can exchange a word/wad with a government official and have BBC news, the Onion, and even our beloved El Reg blocked at the GOB?

Judging by the standard or comedy in both countries I'd say British and American free-speech is doing just fine. However, does anyone know if Australia even has native grown comedy any more? (Note, performers and/or material that needed to first travel to the UK/US do not count).

High Horse Coming Through.......

"As long as Australians are free to read articles such as this criticizing the law, I don't see any threat to Australian democracy."

As long as you are free to read newspaper reports about your kidnap and torture, I don't see any threat to your rights or freedoms when you are kidnapped and tortured. Reductio ad absurdum mission completed, I'll move on.

Contagious

Australian politics has for decades followed the US with a 5-10-year lag.

FAIL

How is this an extreme free speech approach? You quite obviously do not understand what Mr. Conroy is proposing with this filter. Sure, he's selling it to the non-tech savvy public as a "saving your kids from the evil in the world", but if that were true then it would be an opt-in agreement, not this draconian measure.

This is a major threat to Australian democracy, and if you don't agree with that then you trust politicians far too much!

FAIL ... because you are commenting without understanding the topic.

Yes

Australia should not seek to express what is best and brightest about the Enlightenment democratic ideal, but seek to be just a hair better than a gulag. Why work for excellence when you can be slightly more competent than George W Bush. By this logic, Australia's top athletes ought to wait and compete in the Special Olympics, since actually showing the will to go above and beyond to show world-class form is not worth it if you can just outrun the Downs kid.

The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits.

But for how much longer will we be able to read articles like this one? With Luddite Conroy trying to force things through and micro-manager Rudd pulling the strings I don't see much hope for democracy in Oz, unless you're willing to toe the party line.

But America's democracy sickness has little to do with free speech.

There are many problems with American democracy, but little originate from "free speech".

One big problem with the United States is that the electoral districts are determined by politicians, rather than by independent commissions as in the UK, Australia and elsewhere. The Republicans and Democrats work together to gerrymander the seats so that most are safe for their respective parties, and very few are competitive indeed. This ensures that many representatives are representatives almost for life. They don't have to worry too much about the views of the constituents. (Mind you, they could have a primary challenge... but that's another story).

This related to the second big problem - corruption by lobbyists. All countries have this to some extent, but the United States has it bad. Reps don't have to listen to their constituents, but they like listening to lobbyists: they think the same way, they eat at the same expensive restaurants in Washington, they pay the election bills, and they might even get them a lucrative sinecure on some corporate management board upon retirement. It's no surprise that many pollies are at the corporate beck and call.

This problem is going to be made worse by a recent Supreme Court ruling, where 5 out of 9 ruled that the US 1st Amendment applied to electoral donations. But this isn't free speech - far from it. It's a perversion of free speech. The effect will probably be open slather buying and selling of politicians. I side with the other 4 Supremes, in case you can't guess. I seriously doubt that the original anti-Federalists (the group behind the Bill of Rights) would have thought the 1st amendment applied to companies. Once they grokked the implications, they would have been appalled.

Shorter me: free speech - by itself - does not cause or cure faulty democracies. You need other institutions as well.

Wow, what an incredibly ignorant comment.

So, being free to read criticism of the government is all that is required to qualify as free, is it? What about freedom to discuss topics the government has ALREADY SAID they wish to block? Subjects such as voluntary euthanasia or safer drug use? We in Australia have already taken many steps down the road to becoming a police state, and the filter proposal is another, fairly large, step in that direction. Do you really believe we'll remain free to read, or especially publish, criticism of the government for long if we continue down this path?

Incidentally, America may (and does) have many problems, but their First Amendment is a substantial bastion against many of the more totalitarian laws that have been proposed and in some cases enacted by their lawmakers. We have no such protection in Australia which is a major reason we need to subject proposals such as this to intense scrutiny and reject them if there is any doubt at all about their dangers.

"She'll be right" simply does not cut it any longer.

Taking account of past behaviour is not paranoia.

Let me spell it out for you: this policy, once legislated for, will allow a select committee (chosen by the government) to arbitrarily decide you should not be exposed to scurrilous rumour-mongering or playmobil-pron by El Reg and add it to their secret blacklist. They will not need to give you a reason for this, nor will you be able to appeal their decision. You just get the 403 error or whatever.

It won't be secret long of course, and in the same TV show they filmed (hilariously) three schoolkids circumventing the filter in three different ways in under three seconds. But that would probably make you a criminal when all you wanted to do was read The Register.

Even if you completely trust your Governators.... Mistakes happen.

An amusing real example as shown in the filter trials was the website of a school tuckshop volunteer being blacklisted... why? She was a can"TEEN" lady! ROFLMAO!!!

And you wonder why we have so little trust in their ability to get it right....... If indeed it is even possible.

Wha?

So censoring the website of a competing party's website isnt a threat to democracy?

Macho Men

Not long before they start censuring "Mad Max" Gibson then?

@because El Reg is banned in Australia as of... now!

If the Reg is ever banned there they should change the slogan from 'Biting the hand that feeds IT' to 'Banned in Australia!' as this would of course raise the Reg's street cred somewhat! Being banned is uber cool!

Help yourselves and help us all;

Lobby redtube and betfair and any other sites whose Aussie patrons will be affected by this to put Huge Notices on their login pages warning of this- it's too late once they can't see it any more!

@ Help Aussies

No, say it isn't so. As a Kiwi, I could just about live with the Great Aussie Firewall as apparently only some (most?) of our ISPs were to be inadvertently exposed to it and I'd yet to venture too far down the paths that would bring me into sight of the said wall. But, mate, you interfere with my Betfair account at your own peril - and do not even think of slowing down my connection to their servers.

Actually, if true, I suspect there are more than a few Aussies who would have the same realisation - Betfair as an standard-bearer for freedom and liberty? I never would have believed it.

By the way, Betfair is licenced by the Tasmanian state government. So, is it just going to be blocked for the big island?

You owe me....

a new keyboard!

@"Victorian Dept of Infrastructure"

Australia is the world's most over-governed nation (read "nanny state"). These pollies and public servants need something to do. It seems that a large part of the populace wants the Government to do everything for them. "My kids are bad because the schools didn't raise them properly". "There was no sign there so I jumped in the river and broke my neck. Why should I check the depth, the Government should have erected a sign!".

Now it's censoring the Interweb to save our children. This is crazy. So many ways around it, and who are going to be the fastest to find the loopholes? You guessed it; the children!