Kiwiblog

Adam Bennett at NZ Herald reports:

Technology allowing police and other authorities to identify the location of callers may become mandatory for all cellphones in New Zealand in a move to improve the 111 emergency calling system.

But although the proposal could save lives, Telecom and the Privacy Commissioner have rung alarm bells.

The mandatory global positioning system (GPS) idea was raised in a discussion paper reviewing the 111 system issued yesterday by Communications Minister Amy Adams.

Umm, no.

I’ve chosen to have GPS on my cellphone. Personally I like the idea of the authorities being able to trace me in case of emergency. Hell, I’m even on Foursquare, so I boroadcast my location to several hundred people.

But that is my choice. Equally I should have the choice of being able to use a cellphone that does not indicate my location.

Once the Government has the ability to detect your location via your cellphone for one purpose (a noble one), there is a slippery slope that they will want to use it for other purposes.

Doing the rounds on Facebook. So very good.

InternetNZ CEO Vikram Kumar has a good blog post on how you can make money from zero priced products. He notes:

Accepting some people won’t pay doesn’t mean they can’t make money. Instead, they need to come up with innovative answers to the question, “How do we give people what, when, and how they want our products at a zero price?”

The answers are there but it takes effort, attention, and good ideas. Let’s take an example from another industry, the software industry.

Zero cost software

How do you make money from software without charging anything for it? It’s not simple but several models exist. For example, there’s the upgrade or “freemium” model (charge for extra features or functionality); the services model (charge for allied services, e.g. design or support or tools); the donation or funded model (customer pays what they can or want to, before or after the software is developed); the loss-leader model (gain popularity to sell other software); the advertising model (money made from advertisers); etc.

How can this be applied? Just ask Justin Bieber how he got his break. Or, read this great article in The Guardian about Gorillaz as well as the one in GigaOM where author Neil Gaiman talks about how he is selling more books in countries where his books are pirated.

The traditional business model of Hollywood is based on the 1970s, not the 2010s. It will take time, but eventually they will change.

One of the posters (not commenters) at The Standard posted this over the weekend:

As you can see he calls Fran O’Sullivan a traitor, enemy and sell-out who will be shunned and reviled. This is because Fran dared to support the Crafar farm sale. It shows how demented some of the opponents have become. Redlogix of course cowers behind his alias, and would never ever dare to write such stuff under his own name – unlike Fran.

But as you can see, not content with just having Fran labeled a traitor and enemy to be shunned and reviled, a commentor Millsy calls for her to executed, saying “the likes of O’Sullivan, Key, Williamson, and Coleman will find themselves … rewarded for their treachery with a one way trip to the gallows”.

Now Millsy is just a commenter, and this is not the first time he has advocated violence against those whose political views he opposes. I of all people would say you don’t judge a blog on the basis of a comment by a commenter. I mean, after all it is possible they didn’t even see the comment (I read a small proportion of total comments on KB). If they did, surely they would delete it and at least kick him off?

But no, as you can see Red Logix (who is an author, not a commenter) effectively endorses the comment, saying that while it was a marginal call, it is okay because he said “the likes of” and that Millsy is correct in general.

Fran actually had been contributing to the thread (and kudos to Fran for standing up to people who call you a traitor and enemy) and pointed out that Millsy is Brendon Mills (easily found through Google). Now get this – The Standard deleted Fran’s comment, but left up the one effectively calling for her to go to the gallows!

Fran sums it all up nicely, with this tweet from Fran:

The Standard? Internet version of the Ku Klux Klan. Happy to string up people behind web cloak of anonymity.

There is a reason so many of their authors (not all) wear virtual hoods to hide their identities.

A copy of the teapot tape has been placed online, and the link e-mailed to a huge number of people from an anon e-mail address.

There are a very small number of people who have that file. Bradley Ambrose and the senior staff of the Herald on Sunday and TV3. Will any of them be brave enough to admit they did it? I will say I don’t think it is anyone from the Herald on Sunday. To be fair to them, they didn’t publish the tape originally, and it was TV3 that turned it into a daily circus.

I said before the election it was inevitable it would come out at some stage.

The recording is on You Tube (uploaded by 2Johns2Cups), plus two other locations. I’m not providing a direct link due to the questionable legality, but I do not believe saying where it has been published (as I have done) makes me a publisher, anymore than when newspapers reported Whale Oil had broken a suppression order (which sent everyone off to his site).

The irony is that the recording is quite benign, as the PM has said. The media beat this up into a nonsense, that just lowered their standing with most New Zealanders.

Hopefully this release will mean that we can all move on now, except of course we await the Police decision on the legality of making the recording.

Please do not post a direct link in the comments.

Edward Gay at NZ Herald reports:

Internet multimillionaire Kim Dotcom has been declined bail.

The German businessman, a resident in New Zealand, is accused of being at the centre of a computer piracy empire through Megaupload, a website business he co-founded.

Judge David McNaughton delivered his decision at the North Shore District Court today in front of a packed public gallery. …

An immediate appeal has been lodged at the High Court.

The decision is totally unsurprising. His behaviour when arrested combined with four passports and 45 credit cards, screams out flight risk.

I predict the bail decision will not rest at the High Court but they will seek leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court. Likewise the extradition hearing itself will be appealed all the way to the top. The longer they can delay things, then they will use the Ahmed Zaoui trick and argue the time it has taken to get a decision, means it is unfair to keep him in jail (even though they have caused all the delays).

When he finally does get extradited back to the US, I note he has hired Bill Clinton’s old lawyer so that one will also be taken all the way to the Supreme Court. I expect a resolution to be two to three years away.

Kirsty Johnston at Stuff reports:

The men’s hearing comes as Opposition politicians call for accountability into Dotcom’s status as a resident.

Although the overweight, flamboyant former hacker – who legally changed his name to Dotcom from Shmitz – had convictions from his native Germany, he was able to settle in Auckland after investing $10 million in New Zealand government bonds in 2010.

Those bonds are now part of the assets frozen by authorities investigating the charges against Megaupload – which include racketeering, money laundering and copyright infringements.

NZ First leader Winston Peters called for the prime minister to set up an immediate inquiry into how Dotcom was allowed to stay permanently in Auckland, where he lived in a $30 million mansion belonging to the Chrisco enterprise founders.

“It has been reported that Dotcom is known in Germany as a notorious computer hacker and has been convicted of insider trading, yet immigration authorities let him settle here under the so-called investor-plus category. The prime minister should order an immediate inquiry … to see who was involved in this immigration scandal and ensure that it doesn’t happen again.”

Labour immigration spokeswoman Darien Fenton said that before there was an inquiry, it should be asked whose responsibility it was to allow the discretion to overlook his convictions.

The “investor-plus” category Dotcom’s residency fell into needed to be looked at to ensure others of “dubious” character were not also able to bypass the good character test, she said.

In a statement, the Immigration Service said that “Mr Dotcom made full disclosure of his previous convictions and they were taken into account in the granting of his residence. The Immigration Act allows for discretion to be exercised in certain cases. In this particular case, Immigration NZ weighed the character issue and any associated risk to New Zealand against potential benefits to New Zealand”.

Calling for an inquiry into why he had been granted residency before he has even had a trial, is a rather bad case of the horse before the cart.

Certainly based on what has been reported to date, I have a pretty negative impression of Mr Dotcom. And in fact in several media interviews have said that at this stage the copyright holders have acted appropriately in complaining to the authorities, and the authorities laying charges if they have a good faith belief laws have been broken.

This is very different to demanding that new laws be instituted so that people may lose their Internet access on the basis of accusation, or in the case of SOPA that ISPs be forced to block websites based on accusations. These damage the Internet terribly.

But having said that my initial impression of Dotcom is negative, he has yet to have his extradition hearing let alone have his day in court. Only if he is found guilty of breaking the law, would you then expect there to be (quite legitimate) questions about the process and decision making around his residency approval.

I’m in an area with very limited phone and Internet access, so I heard about the arrests yesterday, but couldn’t blog on them.

I’m reserving judgement on the issue, until details of the alleged offences are known more fully. I would make the point that to my mind there has always been a significant difference between someone who accesses a file-sharing site or torrent in order to (for example) see the latest episode of a TV show not available in NZ, and those who are commercially making money from infringing copyright, or assisting others to infringe.

Whether or not Dotcom and others have broken the law, will of course be a matter for the courts. It is worth noting that the NZ courts will not extradite unless the charges are for something that is also an offence under NZ law. So if for example there was an arrest warrant out for you because you took part in (adult consensual) oral sex in Utah, they would not extradite as thankfully oral sex is not illegal in NZ. Not sure if it still is illegal in Utah, to be honest – just using this as an example.

I’ve been saying for sometime that copyright issues will be a massive battle involving the Internet for the next decade or more.

In this case the US are not necessairly on the wrong side of the argument. I’m not saying their actions are justified either – it really depends on the details of the case. But few would argue that making money out of infringing other people’s copyright is a good thing (if that is what they have done). There is an argument they were just providing a service that “pirates” used. Again, will depend on what is revealed in court.

In other copyright news (and no I don’t think the timing is deliberately related), it looks like the SOPA and PIPA bills in the US Congress are dead. Senators have been dropping their co-sponsorship of PIPA as millions of Americans signed an online petitions and e-mailed their representatives on it.

Also of note is all the remaining Republican candidates for President have come out against the bills. So chalk this victory up to people power.

I highlighted Clare Curran saying “Farrar … is part of a group which is intent on censoring a prominent communication vehicle for the Labour Party” in a thread about NZ on Air. It seemed an obvious reference to NZ on Air being a communication vehicle for the Labour Party.

Now Clare has said she was referring to Red Alert:

Apologies for not being clearer. Labour’s Red Alert blog has been attacked by a number of anti Labour bloggers and commenters for a while. I was referring to this.

Farrar is part of this group.

Once again Clare is sadly wrong. She is infamous for having invented the Vast Right Wing and Non Labour Left Wing Conspiracy (VRWNLLWC), but now the conspiracy has expanded to include Labour activists!

Let’s look at who has publicly expressed doubts about Red Alert:

• Scott Yorke in August pondered if Red Alert is damaging Labour. Scott is a Labour Party member and activist.
• A senior Labour activist Patrick Leyland talks about the criticisms of Red Alert and how there needs to be better controls on it.
• Leftie Robert Winter is critical in this post.
• Zetetic at The Standard (the most Labour friendly blog out there) calls for Red Alert to be shut down or changed.
• Leftie Danyl Mc at Dim Post says it is mostly a train wreck.
• And Fairfax journalist Jon Hartevelt looks at its problems, but says tune it up instead of winding it up.

Painting this criticism as an organised conspiracy or group intent on depriving or “censoring” Labour of a communications channel, sums up all the problems Labour has. Rather than accept any of the criticism as valid, they see it as being done by enemies of Labour wanting to punish them.

And now here is the irony. I am not one of those who has been advocating Labour should close down Red Alert. In fact, quite the opposite.

For some reasons I get invited to talk on the Internet and politics on a regular basis. I’ve talked to classes at Victoria, Canterbury, Auckland and Massey universities. I’ve talked to rotary clubs, to legal publishers, to chambers of commerce and even the Business Roundtable on this area.

And you can ask anyone who was at any of those talks, what I said about Labour and Red Alert. They will tell you that I have consistently praised Labour for Red Alert, and think I think it is laudable that they are communicating in such a direct way.

Sure in the last year I have pointed out some of the SMOGs or Social Media Own Goals that have happened on Red Alert, but I always make the point that a political party has to accept there will be occasional own goals if you use this medium, and be tolerant of them – so long as people learn from their mistakes. I specifically say that overall I think Red Alert has overall been beneficial to Labour.

As I said, there have been hundreds of people at these talks, who can all back up that I have always spoken well of Labour for Red Alert, despite the occasional SMOG.

Those same attendees will also confirm that I regularly describe the National blog at nationalmps.co.nz as the greatest cure for insomnia ever invented. They are so mind numbingly boring, that I only subject my eyeballs to them around twice a year, as they start bleeding as I read about some organic carrot farm they have opened.

Of course to some degree this is a deliberate strategy by National. When in Government they want boredom, not excitement and controversy. What will be interesting is to see what National and Labour both do in the blogosphere, when they are in opposition and government respectively.

So if Clare really was referring to Red Alert, not NZ on Air, she got it absolutely wrong. The vast majority of the criticism of Red Alert is coming from the left, and I am one of the few people who has praised it in dozens of forums up and down New Zealand.

My view on Red Alert is that Labour should of course continue with it. I’d like all parties and MPs blogging. I do think for their sake they should look at how to reduce the number of own goals, but note you will never eliminate them entirely as blogging is not a medium you can control. My suggestion would be to have perhaps a couple of the less excitable MPs act as a sounding board and have them just eyeball posts before they get published, so they can point out that the way something is worded may lead to misinterpretation etc.

At the end a blog is just a tool. You don’t stop using a tool because you have some troubles with it. You just get better at using it.

Hollywood may have bitten off more than they can chew.

The studios got their lackeys in Congress to put forward a bill called SOPA – Stop Online Piracy Act.

Rather than target those actually infringing on copyright – it targets anyone who links to sites that allegedly infringe – including search engines such as Google. It basically wants Google and others to act as filters on behalf of Hollywood – a law China could be proud of.

The ramifications are massive. Someone might post a comment on Kiwiblog mentioning the name of a site which tells you where some good torrent sites are. Bang – Kiwiblog is out of the search engines.

But it gets worse than that. Under SOPA, ISPs (US ones anyway) could be forced to block access to sites. Just like in Syria and Libya. A summary of views against from Wikipedia:

On TIME‘s Techland blog, Jerry Brito wrote, “Imagine if the U.K. created a blacklist of American newspapers that its courts found violated celebrities’ privacy? Or what if France blocked American sites it believed contained hate speech?”^[21] Similarly, the Center for Democracy and Technology warned, “If SOPA and PIPA are enacted, the US government must be prepared for other governments to follow suit, in service to whatever social policies they believe are important—whether restricting hate speech, insults to public officials, or political dissent.”^[22]

Laurence H. Tribe, a Harvard University professor of constitutional law, released an open letter on the web stating that SOPA would “undermine the openness and free exchange of information at the heart of the Internet. And it would violate the First Amendment.”

My views are simple. No Government should censor the Internet. If people access illegal material on the Internet then they should be held liable in a court for that. If people commit crimes on the Internet, then they should be arrested for that. And yes if people infringe copyright on the Internet, they should be liable under the law. But to have laws giving the power to require all ISPs in a country to block particular sites is a practice that should remain the norm in China, not the US and definitely not NZ.

Amusingly the MPAA has actually cited China in their advocacy, with the MPAA Chairman having said that as Google has figured out how to block sites when China requests it, it can’t be that big an issue.

Anyway the backlash has begun and could be huge. Wikipedia is closing down later today for 24 hours as part of a black out protest. I can just imagine the millions of pissed off Americans who will be e-mailing their complaints into Congress.

Think if Google did the same? Maybe even for just three hours the search engines all turned off and displayed a protest page?

The MPAA and RIAA are used to being the biggest players in the game. I think they are about to find out they’re not.

Stuff reports:

People and businesses who find “.co.nz” insufficiently patriotic may be able to register websites that end with “.kiwi” from next year.

A group of ex-pat New Zealanders based in Vancouver has teamed up with Wellington lawyer Peter Dengate Thrush – a former chairman of worldwide internet governance body Icann – to found a new company, Dot Kiwi, which hopes to cater for those who want a more “Kiwi flavour” to their online identity. …

Dot Kiwi, which is Canadian-owned, would compete with New Zealand’s non-profit internet society, InternetNZ, which oversees “.nz” addresses and is funded by a compulsory levy on registrations.

Dengate Thrush said the administration of the “.kiwi” registry would be outsourced to Minds and Machines, a company he chairs that is based in Santa Monica in the United States.

InternetNZ president Frank March said all new and existing top-level domains competed with “.nz” and the society had not ruled out lodging its own application to run “.kiwi”.

“We’d certainly have a good case to put up, but there are very heavy costs involved in establishing a top-level domain and it is not a process we would undertake lightly. The arguments are quite finely balanced,” he said.

The .nz Domain Name Commission did some research last year through Colmar Brunton and around 11% of respondents (off memory) said that they would register in .kiwi in preference to .nz or .com, if they had the choice – so I think there is market demand for .kiwi. Whether or not the demand is high enough to cover the costs of a registry is another issue.

As a disclosure I’m on the working group which is looking at the pros and cons of InternetNZ applying for .kiwi. The WG’s role is not to decide, but to prepare consultation papers for discussion with the InternetNZ Council and members. As Frank March is quoted as saying, there are heavy costs involved, and many other issues.

In my blog at Stuff I propose:

New Zealand should ask for the US to commit to a law change that any copyrighted material released in the US for sale, can also be immediately sold (or re-sold) to New Zealand consumers.

So if a US studio releases an episode on iTunes for 99c the day after it is broadcast in the US, then no more blocking New Zealanders from being able to buy it.

Such a law change would probably do more to reduce infringing file-sharing of TV shows, than any amount of punitive measures.

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The Washington Post reports:

A file-sharing group that considers itself a spiritual organization said Thursday that Sweden has recognized it as a religious community. According to documents provided by spiritual leader Isak Gerson, 20, his Church of Kopimism received that approval in late December. …

Gerson said in an interview that some of the church’s roughly 3,000 members meet every week to share files of music, films and other content they consider holy and regard copying as a sacrament. He said the church’s philosophy opposes copyrights in all forms and encourages piracy of all types of media, including music, movies, TV shows, and software. …

“Being recognized by the state of Sweden is a large step for all of Kopimi. Hopefully, this is one step toward the day when we can live out our faith without fear of persecution,” he said.

This could become a very popular religion. When is the next NZ census again?

Whale Oil has hit the No 1 spot at Open Parachute based on sitemeter stats. Well deserved.

Stuff reports:

Wellington technology blog, ReadWriteWeb, consistently judged one of the world’s most popular blogs, has been bought by San Francisco digital publishing company Say Media for an undisclosed sum.

Major US technology website TechCrunch, which itself was bought for US$25 million last year, is reporting the deal is worth US$5 million – about $6.6 million in New Zealand dollars.

Run by Petone’s Richard MacManus since it was started in 2003, ReadWriteWeb has a staff of just under 20, most of whom are based in the US.

MacManus said the site attracted about 5 million page views and 2.75 million unique visitors each month.
It had begun looking for a potential buyer a few months ago, as it needed more resource to grow, he said.

He planned to increase the blog’s technology coverage, including of technology hardware.

Well done to Richard McManus. This is the great thing about the Internet, that someone in NZ can be globally successful from his house in Petone.

Stuff reports:

President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered an investigation into allegations of fraud in Russia’s parliamentary election, one day after tens of thousands of protesters demanded it be annulled and rerun.

Medvedev responded on his Facebook site to the protesters’ complaints that the December 4 election was slanted to favour of his and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party, but did not mention their calls for an end to Putin’s rule.

“I do not agree with any slogans or statements made at the rallies. Nevertheless, instructions have been given by me to check all information from polling stations regarding compliance with the legislation on elections,” Medvedev said in a post on the social media site.

“Citizens of Russia have freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. People have a right to express the position that they did yesterday. It all took place within the framework of the law,” he added.

His statement was a sign that the Russian leadership feels under pressure after the biggest opposition protests since Putin rose to power in 1999. The protesters themselves used social media to organise their rallies.

In a further sign of recognition that the people’s mood has changed after years of tight political control by Putin, city authorities across Russia allowed Saturday’s protests to go ahead and riot police hardly intervened.

State television and other Russian channels also broadcast footage of a huge protest in Moscow, breaking a policy of showing almost no negative coverage of the authorities.

I do not think the protests will stop Putin becoming President again, and the investigation will probably be a whitewash. However the significance of the protests is that they are occurring, and are being reported on. This is healthy.

These protests, plus the Arab spring, shows how vital it is that the Internet remain out of Government control.

The Law Commission has publicly released today its report on legal and other issues around new media such as blogs. I was one of those interviewed by them in initial consultation phase in formulating this issues paper. It is open for public comment until 12 March 2012.

I think the report is an excellent one, and I am enthusiastically supportive of their proposed model of media regulation in the digital age. There are some risks around the model proposed, but these can be mitigated. Balanced against those risks are considerable opportunities for “new media”.

News media have special protections under the law. The Law Commission recommends “news media” be defined as a publisher in any medium who

1. has a significant proportion of their publishing activities being the generation and/or aggregation of news, information and opinion of current value
2. disseminates this information to a public audience
3. regularly publishes
4. is accountable to a code of ethics and a complaints process

Kiwiblog (not that this is my main concern) would clearly qualify under points 1 to 3, so would need the accountability and complaints process to qualify. Whether or not this is worthwhile, will depend on the details.

A key point made by the Law Commission is:

It is important to note this definition is not intended to exclude others from reporting or commenting on the news. It simply proposes a set of statutory criteria to resolve the current uncertainty as to which groups and individuals qualify for the legal privileges and exemptions assigned to the media.

This is quite crucial, and one of the risk areas of a new definition. At present bloggers are allowed to report on court proceedings, attend Treasury lockups etc. This should continue to occur, even if a blogger does not qualify under the proposed definition. The definition is for qualifying for legal privileges, and should not be used to block genuine access for online publishers.

The key aspect of the Law Commission paper is an independent regulator for all news media regardless of format or delivery platform. This would replace the Govt appointed BSA for broadcasters and the Press Council for print media. There are significant anomalies in the current system, with an example being:

• A video broadcast by a broadcaster is subject to the BSA
• A video placed on a broadcaster’s website is not subject to any regulation
• A video placed on a newspaper’s website is subject to the Press Council

The Commission proposes the following features for a new regulator

1. Independent of both government and the news industry
2. Appointments to the regulator would be by an independent panel
3. Regulator would work with industry on different codes, so bloggers might have their own code (for example accuracy required, but possibly not fairness)
4. Recognised by statute and part-funded by industry and subsidised by the state

I think the independence from Government is crucial. Without that it becomes a path through which the Government could censor the media and I would be against. The details in these areas will be vital.

The subsidy is also a necessary evil. Bloggers are generally non-commercial and you can’t charge a blogger $10,000 a year to come under such a regulator. Likewise, I can’t see APN and Fairfax wanting to pay on behalf of bloggers. The Commission says:

It is in the public interest that as many news publishers, including small startups, belong to such a standards body and a lack of financial resources should not be an impediment to joining. The state and wider public have a strong interest in a robust and ethical news media and we see no reason why this body should not receive state support, provided there are no strings attached to the appropriation.

One of the issues in the paper would be whether membership of the regulator would be entirely voluntary for everyone, or whether commercial media should be required to join.

I believe it should be voluntary for everyone. The incentive to gain the legal protections of being news media should be enough. A key issue will also be what are the powers of the regulator. If they have the power to (for example) suspend a newspaper, then newspapers would not want to join. If the power is to require publication of a finding, and low level fines, then perhaps less of an issue. The print media are the ones who potentially lose a wee bit of freedom in this model, while broadcasters would end up with greater freedom. In a converged world, all media should be on the same level, and so long as the regulator is not Govt controlled I think that is a good model.

The Commission notes:

The large majority of New Zealanders publishing on the internet would not come within the ambit of the new regulatory system we propose. In essence they will be able to exercise complete freedom of speech. They can, without fear of any regulator, be inaccurate in their facts, unbalanced in their coverage and extreme in their opinions. The public can rely on them, or not, as they see fit. They would not be recognised as “news media” for the purposes of the statutory privileges.

They also note that such publishers are still liable to the laws of defamation, copyright, contempt of court etc.

There are other interesting issues the Commission looks at in its paper

• consider introducing a new offence of maliciously impersonating another person
• amend the Harassment Act 1997 to explicitly include cyber-bullying

But rather than have these go to court, which would be over-kill, they float a model of a Communications Tribunal “which could administer speedy, efficient and relatively cheap justice to those who have been significantly damaged by unlawful communications”

I think this aspect is more problematic, while well-intentioned. They do say:

The Tribunal would only deal with cases which it judges would have met the threshold of a breach of the law. It should not be a port of call for those with insubstantial complaints.

My suspicion is it would become exactly that. For such a model to work, it will need considerable safeguards against malicious and trivial complaints designed to (ironically) harass the person complained about.

The Tribunal would not have the ability to impose any criminal sanction they say:

Sanctions and remedies available to the Tribunal would include the ability to award monetary compensation up to a prescribed level; to order publication of an apology or correction; to order that a right of reply be granted; to order that the defendant cease the conduct in question (a type of injunction); and to make takedown orders against either the perpetrator or an innocent avenue of communication such as an ISP. It might also make a declaration that statements made about the victim are untrue. Failure to comply with an order would be an offence.

I do like the notion of the Tribunal being able to make a declaration that statements about a victim are untrue. Defamation is rarely viable for those who have false things said about them online. And victims of lies and slander often just want the truth affirmed, not damages. I do see considerable merit in the concept of the Tribunal. My concerns are around the small number of nutters out there would would try to use it as a form of harassment in itself.

Two safeguards against this might simply be requiring complainants to use their real names to complain. Those who post under an alias can not claim they have been harmed by speech against them when no one knows who they are. A further safeguard would be a requirement to pay a filing fee. This is the most effective way to stop serial complainers.

An alternate option they put forward is a Communications Commissioner as part of the Human Rights Commission. I don’t think this would be a good fit for the HRC, and in fact could distract them from their primary focus.

The paper is (as expected) very well researched, and shows great understanding of the online environment. I encourage people to read it, or at least the summary paper, and give your feedback. It is my understanding that there are likely to be some sort of forums organised where people can attend and discuss and debate the issues and proposals. I’ll blog details of these as they are known.

Finally it is worth noting this is an issues paper, not a final paper recommending action to the Government. That means this is the best time to influence it.

Computerworld reports:

A common sense approach has put the New Zealand government’s social media policy in high regard with IT research company, Gartner.

On a blog post on Gartner’s website, vice president Andrea Di Maio commends the policy for its principles based on an individual’s role, which he says are down-to-earth and provide actionable decision frameworks.

Di Maio is particularly impressed by the policy’s passive-active-engaged approach, which asks social media users in government to first listen to their community, understand what it is they are voicing, and then engage if it is appropriate.

There have been relatively few SMOGs (Social Media Own Goals) by government agencies. Most have been by politicians and corporates.

A group of supporters have set up a “We want David Cunliffe” website, giving reasons why Labour should make Cunliffe leader, and allowing people to e-mail their support to all 34 Labour MPs.

The site is a good concept in principle. I think it is good to see supporters of one of the contenders set up a support site. The more engaged supporters and activists get the better.

I was amused that they concluded by saying:

Don’t let the right-wing bloggers hijack your party’s Leadership election. Submit the form now!

So many people have got worked up that some of us have offered an opinion. I also had an opinion on the Green co-leadership contest between Bradford and Turei and it wasn’t such a big thing. I’ll probably offer my opinion on all leadership contests in all parties, except probably National where diplomacy would win out. Anyway back to this site.

While the site is a good thing in principle, three criticisms:

1. The design is awful. Looks like an excited eight year old did it.
2. The supporters are anonymous. This is a major fail. Who the hell sets up a support site and is not prepared to stick their name to it? It turns the site into an issue about who is really behind it – it could be Trevor Mallard for all we know
3. They have provided incorrect registration details to the .nz registry. They have done this to hide their identity, but the rules for .nz require a registrant to be named and contactable. Their domain name registration could be found to be invalid.

The substance of the site is pretty good though – it pushes his strong points well. Maybe we will see a site for Shearer also?

UPDATE: A reader points out a reason why the authors may be anonymous. They stated:

David Cunliffe wins elections. On Saturday David was almost the only Labour MP to increase his local majority. Labour will only be relevant when it can win enough votes to form the government. Cunliffe comes from a new progressive generation. We think he¹s the best candidate to beat John Key.

But DC was not the only Labour MP to increase his majority. Based on results to date the Labour MPs who increased majorities are:

1. Su’a William Sio +6,230
2. Nanaia Mahuta +4,485
3. Parekura Horomia +3,258
4. Grant Robertson +3,207
5. Chris Hipkins +2,373
6. Iain Lees-Galloway +1,884
7. Ross Robertson +1,405
8. David Cunliffe +450
9. Trevor Mallard +107

Such a basic mistake makes me wonder about who is behind it. Maybe it is actually the Young Nats having fun?

Tom Pullar-Strecker reports at Stuff:

Bloggers are nervously waiting for the publication of the Law Commission’s report on “new media” next Monday.

Former Commerce Minister Simon Power raised their blood pressure when he ordered the review in October last year, commenting that there was a “wild west out there in cyberspace”.

InternetNZ chief executive Vikram Kumar said at the time that if that was what Power really believed, “we’ve got reasons to be very, very worried”.

Power was concerned about breaches of suppression orders, libel on the internet, and whether bloggers and online publications should be subject to oversight by the Press Council or Broadcasting Standards Authority.

Blogger David Farrar, of Kiwiblog, expects a high-brow report but believes it is unlikely the Law Commission will advocate an “uber regulator” for new media.

I wouldn’t say I was nervous about it, but I certainly am interested and looking forward to blogging on the report next Monday. As with most areas of law reform there are likely to be opportunities and risks for those who are online publishers (which is anyone with a Facebook or Twitter account).

Whale is running a live chat tonight where you can ask him anything. Guaranteed to be fun and no censorship. Starts at 8.30 pm.

The Guardian reports:

Guardians of linguistic purity have long warned against the pernicious impact that text messaging may have on the young, but Pakistan officials have taken such concerns to a new extreme by demanding that mobile phone operators block all text messages using offensive words.

With a creativity and dedication to the task unusual for local officialdom, the country’s telecoms regulator has issued a list of more than 1000 words and phrases which will be banned.

After serious deliberation and consultation, officials from the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) have come up with more than 50 phrases using the word “fuck” and 17 involving “butt”.

The list includes several apparently innocuous words and phrases, including “flatulence”, “deposit” and “fondle”. Others would likely only make sense to frustrated teenagers.

Among the more printable terms are “strap-on”, “beat your meat”, “crotch rot”, “love pistol”, “pocket pool” and “quickie”.

The officials’ flair for the task was apparent, with prohibition embracing more figurative language, such as “flogging the dolphin”, and 51 terms with the suffix “ass” – although only one variation of the word ‘arse’. There were 17 variants on “tit” and 33 on “cock”, with officials managing to produce eight obscenities involving the word “foot”.

I’ve managed to get hold of a full list of the 1,109 words or phrases banned in Pakistan. They are included over the break.

Would be fun having a job where you have to know all the dirty words so you can ban them.

There should be a competition for who can write the best short-story that involves all 1,109 words!

(more…)

Massive dos attack is why we were down from around 6 pm yesterday. Some people are not so much into this free speech concept.

There was a cyberspace conference in London recently, organised by the UK Government. The British High Commission organised a panel in NZ to discuss some of the issues for the conference, and I was one of the three panelists.

Another panelist, Stephen Bell, has written an article about the panel. A couple of quotes:

Legislative co-operation across countries is productive in tightly defined categories of offence, said Farrar; he gave the example of child pornography or spam, where there is a common understanding of an online activity that does harm.

But an attempt to combine legislative systems designed within different cultures poses the danger of an unduly restrictive “lowest common denominator” system of regulation and of simplistic “remedies” such as UK prime minister David Cameron’s airing the idea of shutting down Twitter to avert riots of the kind that recently hit British cities. Cameron quickly thought better of that suggestion in the face of public protest.

I quite enjoyed having a little dig at the UK PM, as it was hosted by the UK High Commission

“In theory, it’s illegal for anyone under 14 to be on Facebook,” said Farrar; “but there are whole classes of six-year-olds on it; they just add ten years to their age. Do you educate them on how to use Facebook, or just say ‘they shouldn’t be on there; let’s pretend they’re not’?”

A pragmatic approach is best; perhaps a “Facebook lite for kids” should be set up, he suggested.

It is best to cater for demand, than try to pretend it does not exist.

There is huge opportunity for digitally assisted processes to make citizen interaction with government easier and to further democracy by easing interaction on the formation of laws, said Farrar. “As a small business owner, I love interacting with Inland Revenue – I never thought I’d say that. If there’s a problem nowadays, I don’t spend two days on the phone any more; I use their secure email service.”

Note I’m less enthusiastic over the size of my payments to them

The Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority is proposing minimum energy performance standards and labelling for computers.

This has a certain deja vu, with the proposed maximum flow for shower nozzles in 2008, on the grounds of energy efficiency.

I’m all in favour of energy efficiency labelling. This allows consumers to make informed choices. When I buy a fridge or a washer/dryer, I always look at the labels and they form part of the decision on what model to purchase.

But it is another thing to have the Government regulate a minimum energy efficiency for a type of device.  Consumers pay for their electricity, and they are best placed to decide if the cost of having a less energy efficient device outweighs the benefits.

This proposal is a form of nanny state. If agreed to, it would be the Government dictating to consumers what computers they are allowed to buy within NZ. The alternative option of mandatory labelling should be chosen instead. If the Government should not dictate out shower flow speed, neither should they dictate what computers can be purchased.

Having said that, I would point out that the comparison with shower nozzles is only partial. It is quite possible that requiring computers to be more energy efficient will not affect the performance of the computer in any noticeable way. The main impact is probably an extra $20 on the price. While the proposal to limit the pressure in showers, would absolutely and noticeably have affected the performance of the shower.