Archive
Category: Politics
-
Architecture as policy: EFF panel discussion
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has posted video from a great panel discussion on how platform architecture affects the rights and choices available to users. Cindy Cohen chairs the panel, which begins with a basic overview of Lessig’s ideas about code and policies, and moves through various stories which illustrate how decisions made during system design… Read more →
-
Senator Conroy criticises ongoing iiNet defence, breaches separation of powers
Senator Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, has issued a stinging attack on iiNet’s position in Roadshow Films Pty Ltd & Ors v iiNet Ltd. Speaking at the CommsDay summit in Sydney yesterday, Senator Conroy described iiNet’s defence as something which ‘belongs in a Yes Minister episode’ — ironic, given that… Read more →
-
Ban ‘Offensive and Menacing Behaviour’, Alston Argues
Australia’s most vociferious luddite has proposed to ban the use of the internet for offensive and menacing behaviour, with offenders to face up to two-years in prison, according to a press release issued by the Department of Communications, yesterday. People using the Internet to advocate or facilitate violent protests, for example by spreading information on… Read more →
-
US Looks Set to Re-Enter Nuclear Arms Race
Though hyping their recent destruction of chemical weapon supplies, the administration was rather less forthcoming about a meeting which brought together 150 of the United States’ top nuclear scientists. The meeting took place at Offutt air force base, Nebraska, and sought to establish a new generation of high-yield, low-payload nuclear weaponry for localised battlefield deployment.… Read more →
-
Equality and Law
I stumbled upon an interesting idea in one of my law lectures today: substantive equality is impossible. I say substantive (as opposed to formal) equality in the sense that measures are taken to reduce pre-existing negative social offset by actively promoting disadvantaged persons or sectors of the community. It is not possible because we cannot… Read more →