Re:UK government’s plans to regulate the internet are a thre...
by arp242 on Thursday September 17, 2020 @11:48AM
(#24506090)
Besides, you could get prosecuted for obscenity or blasphemy in many countries (including the US), never mind J. Edgar Hoover's FBI persecuting everyone deemed "too red".
The past really wasn't all that rosy.
Re:UK government’s plans to regulate the internet are a thre...
by tremon on Thursday September 17, 2020 @11:29AM
(#24505844)
Sure, I could say whatever I wanted at the pub or Speakers' Corner
No, even at the pub there are limits to what you can say, however that's usually governed by a social contract, not a law. The lack of social contract (or rather, social ramifications) is what makes the situation on the Internet different.
What happened is that wide publishing used to be expensive and thus restricted to the ruling/educated class.
Sure, I could say whatever I wanted at the pub or Speakers' Corner (to take British examples) but it would not go further than the people in the immediate vicinity. I.e., no-one cared.
Beyond that, there was either newspapers (filtered and not everyone could read) or published books (filtered), and, later radio and TV, which are filtered like newspapers. So 'improper' material and disinformation (or what was deemed to be) was controlled.
Now the barriers to global circulation are close to nil. So how do we deal with that? It's not unreasonable to adapt the legal framework because very clearly this has a lot of negative consequences.