[ppml] IPv6 flawed?

David Schwartz davids at webmaster.com
Sun Sep 23 23:55:13 EDT 2007


> There are many governments in the world that do not like criticism
> and more importantly, the do not like a forum to exist that allows
> government critics to find each other and organize.  The Internet is
> such a forum and countries like Germany would like nothing better than
> to censor it.
>
> Ted

As would the United States. Some of what the United States would like to
suppress is not controversial, such as people using the Internet to hire
killers. Some of it is not so controversial as to goals but conversial as to
means, such as efforts to suppress the production of child pornograhy by
criminalizing its distribution. Some of it is as about as crazy as what
countries like Germany would like to do, such as suppress gambling.

The United States is also interested in forms of business model regulation
that border on censorship. I would put net neutrality in this category but
certainly others would disagree. However, there's no point is fighting
censorship on the Internet across countries if "business model" regulation
can, for example, mandate charging more for controversial content.

To take a principled stand against other governments, the United States
would have to give up its own censorship and regulation aspirations. Who is
willing to do that?

DS





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