back to article Social networks give Australia a throat to choke

Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo! and YouTube have stuck out their necks and offered Australia’s federal government the chance to choke them under a new “Cooperative Arrangement for Complaints Handling” launched by Prime Minister Julia Gillard. In return, the four get regular meetings with government. Cyber-bullying and trolling …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    "licence plates of unmarked police cars"

    Someone should warn the police about this. They drive around with these plates on public display. Self-arrest might prove embarrassing.

    1. LarsG
      Meh

      If

      If you put yourself out there, express opinions and make statements to the world you have to expect the consequences and if someone disagrees with you well, that's life I'm afraid.

      I'd suggest schools give a lesson on social media and consequences.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "licence plates of unmarked police cars"

      Biggest joke is some US states where their "unmarked" police cars have distinctive numberplates that identify them as police, might as well stick a blue light on them...

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Shadow Foreign Minister Julie Bishop

    Our very own Sarah Palin.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Strangle != choke

    'nuff said.

  4. Invidious Aardvark

    In what way is Twitter "responsible for much of the damage caused online"? The government may well want Twitter to allow users only to post about flowers, rainbows, and fluffy kittens but in the real world people have free will and their own causes to pursue. If, in the course of their pursuit, they break any laws, then by all means punish them using the same process as used for everyone else who breaks the law.

    I really don't think that a government approved programme for the speedy removal of stuff that offends the government Australian minor celebs citizens is the way forward. If someone does something that is illegal, prosecute them - that's what the law is for. Speech can be offensive without being illegal and noone has the right not to be offended by speech.

    Blame the users, not the carriers.

    1. Khaptain Silver badge

      Two sided sword

      Imagine that someone published information related to your wifes extra curicular activities, whilst you were out of town, which were completely false. I am sure that you would be happy that you could contact someone at Twitter, FB etc in order that the article be removed quickly before it caused you major harm, offense, embarasement etc....

      I agree that the Social Media site owners are not reponsable for the content but they do have some responsibility in providing the means or assistance, when required, in order to ensure that a 3rd party does not endure prejudice. The Social Media Sites are after all in control of the publication of said information.

      1. Invidious Aardvark

        Re: Two sided sword

        Then they are guilty of libel/defamation and can be pursued as such, should either my wife or I choose to do so. Part of that process would be a request to have the offending tweet removed, but quite frankly I couldn't care less what some random person tweets about my wife's extra curricular activities because I actually trust her.

        To turn your example on its head, what if those tweets weren't false? Does my wife have the right to request that factual tweets be taken down? We can both lie and say they're untrue, even if they're not. How is the service provider supposed to determine what is true and what is not?

        If you want to protect speech, you have to deal with speech you would rather wasn't said but still needs to be protected regardless. There are limits, I agree, and where such speech crosses those lines it needs to be dealt with. However, the proper place for such arguments over what is illegal is in the courts. I do not believe that service providers should have to interpret laws (over many jurisdictions) to determine whether people using their services are breaking those laws. That's what judges/magistrates are for.

  5. Rattus Rattus

    Julie Bishop

    I would not trust her to fall downwards if pushed off the Sydney Harbour Bridge... Though it is an experiment that really ought to be carried out.

  6. Oengus
    Black Helicopters

    And here is yet another example of the increasing prevelance of the Nanny state we are having inflicted on us.

  7. Best Before:
    Unhappy

    Time to move..

    To that Chinese version of FB (does it let you write in English?) to put all those unmarked cop cars licence plates up online...

    As for those sport celebs who were "twi$$er bashed" (that is just laughable in the first instance), I say grow some skin and balls.. pffft the state of Oz scares the hell out of me these days, I know the polly's don't have anything to do but seriously can't they instead just focus on screwing us out of hard earned money as opposed to interfering in what we can do or say..

  8. P. Lee
    Unhappy

    How about putting all that effort with twitter, fb et al

    into teaching people how to deal with ugly things they can't change.

    But no, we'd rather point the finger than grow thicker skins.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The real reason

    I suspect PM Gillard's problem with Twitter is not so much the service as a whole, but the #auspol hashtag in particular, which repeatedly discusses the alleged criminal activities of a former boyfriend of hers, and raises questions about her involvement in such activities.

    She would probably prefer that such things not be discussed at all, and certainly not publicly.

    This is, after all, an election year.

  10. magrathea

    Pardon?

    "Minor celebrities have also endured online harassment, with one hospitalised as a result."

    How exactly is someone hospitalised by an online interaction?

    Did they trap their finger between two keys and go to hospital to have the keyboard removed with vaseline?

    1. silent_count

      Re: Pardon?

      Yeah, I wondered about that too. Perhaps the "online harassment" took the form of someone posting "nicky-nicky, na-na! <minor celebrity> is a poo head!" which just happened to be the right string to make the universe align in such a way to make the celebrity's computer spontaneously combust.

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