[AfrICANN-discuss] Will 2012 be the year the Internet dies?

Wed Jan 4 12:12:40 SAST 2012

Hi All,I agree with you Maye,This affaire is taking place in US but will affect all Internet so we should give our positionbut how to make this position be taken into account ?
Regards

Brice ABBA

Ingénieur en Sciences Informatiquesmob: (+225)-08-607-228
fix(home): (+225)-23-512-912

Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2012 21:42:33 +0000
Subject: Re: [AfrICANN-discuss] Will 2012 be the year the Internet dies?
From: mayediop at gmail.com
To: africann at afrinic.net; n at gmail.com
CC: 

We need to state our position about this real danger.

Best regards
Le 3 janv. 2012 20:03, "Anne-Rachel Inné" <annerachel at gmail.com> a écrit :

http://lubbockonline.com/interact/blog-post/bert-knabe/2012-01-02/will-2012-be-year-internet-dies#.TwHYi4HNmCc

Will 2012 be the year the Internet dies?

Submitted by Bert Knabe on January 2, 2012 - 6:00am

This month two very dangerous bills will continue to be pushed in the

House and Senate. The "Stop Online Privacy Act" (SOPA) and the

"Protect IP Act" (PIPA) are among the most anti-Constitutional bills

considered in the last decade. If passed they will make it possible

shut down websites in the U.S. without warning and limited right to

appeal. It's only because of the "National Defense Authorization Act"

President Obama signed into law Saturday that they aren't the worst of

2011. More on the NDAA next time.

Eighty three of the scientists and engineers who created and developed

the internet have signed an open letter to Congress expressing their

concerns. Their concerns aren't minor. The technical concerns should

be enough to lay the bills to rest:

    If enacted, either of these bills will create an environment of

tremendous fear and uncertainty for technological innovation, and

seriously harm the credibility of the United States in its role as a

steward of key Internet infrastructure. Regardless of recent

amendments to SOPA, both bills will risk fragmenting the Internet's

global domain name system (DNS) and have other capricious technical

consequences. In exchange for this, such legislation would engender

censorship that will simultaneously be circumvented by deliberate

infringers while hampering innocent parties' right and ability to

communicate and express themselves online.

Unlike laws against yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, these bills

don't really do anything to protect anything, but do quite a bit to

damage everything. When you start looking at possible political and

economic consequences, it's even worse:

    The US government has regularly claimed that it supports a free

and open Internet, both domestically and abroad. We cannot have a free

and open Internet unless its naming and routing systems sit above the

political concerns and objectives of any one government or industry.

To date, the leading role the US has played in this infrastructure has

been fairly uncontroversial because America is seen as a trustworthy

arbiter and a neutral bastion of free expression. If the US begins to

use its central position in the network for censorship that advances

its political and economic agenda, the consequences will be

far-reaching and destructive.

In the end, these bills are perfect censorship tools. Having a site

removed from the DNS listings is insanely easy. That's the idea. Make

it easier for the groups owning intellecutal property to take down

sites that might be stealing it - or helping others steal it. It's so

easy you don't even have to give any evidence, just the accusation is

enough to get a site taken down.

The companies that would be hurt most by these bills are well aware of

the potential damage. An article by Declan Mcullagh at CNET.com says

that some of the largest companies on the internet - Google, eBay,

Amazon and others - are contemplating an Internet blackout, possibly

for the January 23rd, the day before the Senate starts debate on PIPA.

Imagine what would happen if for a day you couldn't access Facebook,

Twitter, or any other major social network. You couldn't go to eBay or

Amazon to buy or sell stuff. Youtube and other video sites are down.

And all of them have a placeholder telling you that this is exactly

what could happen if the Congress passes an Internet censorship bill

similar to PIPA and SOPA. Would you sit up, pay atten, and contact

your representatives? You should, because that is exactly what could

happen.

SOPA and PIPA are dangerous. They don't do anything for the problem

they are allegedly trying to solve and could do a whole lot of damage.

A good place to learn more is the EFF website. The article 2011 in

Review: Fighting the Internet Blacklist Bills is a good place to

start. Then contact your congressmen. For your senators go to the U.S.

Senate website. For your Representative go the the U.S. House website.

Tell them to fight SOPA (House) and PIPA (Senate).

_______________________________________________

AfrICANN mailing list

AfrICANN at afrinic.net

https://lists.afrinic.net/mailman/listinfo.cgi/africann

_______________________________________________
AfrICANN mailing list
AfrICANN at afrinic.net
https://lists.afrinic.net/mailman/listinfo.cgi/africann 		 	   		  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://lists.afrinic.net/pipermail/africann/attachments/20120104/ac98d19b/attachment.htm