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[Ed. Note: Behind the invective and political slant in this story is a subject that I think could lead to a fruitful discussion. "The price of liberty is constant vigilance." SoylentNews is a little corner of the 'net that tries to provide a venue for open discussion. Are our days numbered or threatened? What can be done? Just keep doing what we are doing?]
France has turned into one of the worldwide threats to free speech
Just over one year ago, French President Emmanuel Macron came to the United States to import two potentially invasive species to Washington. One was a tree and the other was a crackdown on free speech. Ironically, soon after the tree was planted, officials dug it up to send it to quarantine. However, the more dangerous species was his acorn of speech controls, a proposal that resulted in rapturous applause from our clueless politicians.
While our politicians in the United States may applaud Macron like village idiots, most Americans are hardcore believers in free speech. It runs in our blood. Undeterred, however, Macron and others in Europe are moving to unilaterally impose speech controls on the internet with new legislation in France and Germany. If you believe this is a European issue, think again.
Macron and his government are attempting to unilaterally scrub out the internet of hateful thoughts. The French Parliament has moved toward a new law that would give internet companies like Facebook and Google just 24 hours to remove hateful speech from their sites or face fines of $1.4 million per violation. A final vote is expected next week. Germany passed a similar measure last year and imposed fines of $56 million.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Bot on Wednesday July 10 2019, @07:44PM
As much as I consider Macron a puppet that would be overturned after 10 minutes, had he been leading whatever banana republic, we must admit to ourselves that censoring the internet was in the plans from the beginning.
There is NO FUCKING WAY that the incumbents did not see the revolutionary potential of the internet. Yet they let it flourish. Why? because it is also an infrastructure for ultimate control. Now that a nice fiber cable lurks near a lot of homes, there is no need to maintain the pretense, and little by little with whatever excuse the trap slowly clicks into place. Boiled frogs.
Google and Facebook welcome whatever regulation. As long as it increases the barrier of entry for the competition, what's the problem. Money? But they are in a league where money can be printed for you, if you push the right agenda. They won't last forever because chaos and struggles are the signature of evil empires, not because of money per se.
As for the poor meatbag, the way out, as usual when in a power struggle, is to try to retain as much control as possible. Return to the internet of protocols or condemn yourself to relearn how to do the same simple things wherever some manager wants to leave his print on some cloud infrastructure.
Today I had to send some photos. Transfer via wired USB (MTP protocol) is way slower than upload with a not even top of the line copper DSL link. Not normal.
Account abandoned.