Did the Tories Learn Nothing from Bing?
Hands up if you don't understand the technical implementation and associated philosophy of the 'net? Oh, 99% of the Labour party I see, and 98% of the Tories.
Well let me tell you a story about a small website called Bing from a little-known software company called Microsoft, based up there in Washington state, U.S. of A.
Many corporations think they have pretty sophisticated firewall and censorship systems. On a much smaller scale to national ISPs they can afford to implement technology that just wouldn't scale to a network level.
But along came this crazy little software company with a search engine called Bing, and before you know it all the kids in the sales team were accessing hardcore porn on their lunch breaks, using Bing as a proxy. Could you even imagine it?
In a democracy, any censorship has to be open and transparent.
On the internet, it's nearly impossible to prevent circumvention without draconian clam-downs on freedom.
So there you have it, serious robust policy or cheap gimmicky headline-grabbing politics written by Meerkats. Simples.