“On Monday morning bloggers from across the political spectrum will be taking their blogs down in a “blog out” to protest the coming into force on the 28th of S92A of the Copyright Act.
Scores and scores of bloggers will be taking part, including Public Address, Scoop, Kiwiblog, The Standard, No Right Turn, Frog Blog, Whale Oil, Not PC, No Minister, Just Left, The Hand Mirror, Roar Prawn, Policy Net, Kiwi Politico etc etc. Supporters of almost every political party are taking part – National, Labour, Greens, ACT, Alliance, and Libertarianz, as well as non political blogs like the popular Television blog Throng, and the Scoop news site and NZ’s leading technology news community Geekzone.
To say we represent a diverse range of views is putting it mildly. Normally we disagree on everything. Even e=mc^2 can be regarded as a highly debatable proposition on our blogs.
So for us to all unite together, from across the political spectrum, to condemn S92A of the Copyright Act should send a signal as to how bad the law is. A law which can see people lose their Internet access on the basis of unproven allegations should have no place in the New Zealand statute books.
This law will come into effect February 28th. Across the world people are blacking out their avatars on Twitter and the New Zealand government is noticing. Now protest needs to be taken up a notch.
We’ll be looking at similarly misguided laws in Canada. Here is a brief summary of the New Zealand law’s ramifications:
If Section 92A is allowed to come in, ISPs will have to disconnect organisations such as businesses, public libraries, government agencies etc as a result of accusations that an employee has used their computers for illegal downloading. The customer may be innocent, there may be an error, or the downloading may well have been done by a virus. Everyday Kiwis with a computer that has been inadvertently hacked may have their Internet access terminated.
“This law needs to go back to the drawing board, with Government re-examining the issue and finding a better path forward.
What we can do to support internet users in New Zealand
1) Go to Join the Internet Blackout – Protest Against Guilt Upon Association Law
2) Sign the petition on the front page
3) The morning of February 23 starting at 8 am New Zealand time (check a time zone clock to c-ordinate your protest) with New Zealanders. Until noon websites will go black. New Zealand is ahead of countries in the northern hemisphere, so for many of us our black ups will go up some time Sunday.
Use Auckland as your base, type in your city/time zone and black out during your time period which will correspond with NZ.
Creative Freedom has the tool you need for your My Space, Facebook, website, blog, Twitter and Bebo.
The blackout page has a message to the New Zealand government.
If National really stupid enough to enpower S92A, im gonna go make some T-Shirts with new logo…
1. Logo looks like tui beer logo, with sign says “New Zealand is a Democratic Nation… Ya Right.”, then follow with “S92A, not our way, not our future.”
2. Sign says “Welcome to New Zealand… Respect, Freedom, Human Rights… Those are what we DON’T have.”, also follow with “S92A, not our way, not our future.”
3. A logo of a dog walking by a money sign, says “Our government is the best PET a rich guy can have.”
4. US Uncle Sam picture turned into NZ style, says “National… We Want You OUT!”, follow by “S92A… You bring it in, we kick you out!”