People involved in the Internet Regulation area have a recurring joke that the field is like being stuck in some form of digital Groundhog Day, in which we are re-living 1997 all over again. This is usually because we get to re-litigate some of the early debates regarding internet regulation Read more…
And so it has come to this, the great copyright battle of our time. After a troubled process that has spanned various stages of development, we finally have a proposed compromise text on the Digital Single Market Directive, the latest part of a future directive overhauling copyright for the digital Read more…
It’s a dance as old as (digital) time. When faced with a challenge, politicians will look for a scapegoat in which to assign the blame of a complex issue, and propose allegedly easy solutions to fix impossible problems. Terrorist attack? End encryption. Rise in populism? End fake news. Violent crime Read more…
This is a short post to bring together a few resources about the important vote taking place at the European Parliament on the proposed Copyright in the Digital Market Directive. I’ve written about the issues I have with the proposed new publisher right (Article 11) here: “this is a misguided Read more…
In 2004, one of my favourite Machinima, “Red vs Blue”, released a short called “Real Life vs the Internet” showing the disparities between our online and offline existence. One of my favourite sections is the discussion on politics. In real life you usually tend to avoid the topic, while political Read more…
As we have been covering in the last couple of articles, a controversial EU Copyright Directive has been under discussion at the European Parliament, and in a surprising turn of events, it voted to reject fast-tracking the tabled proposal by the JURI Committee which contained controversial proposals, particularly in Art Read more…
I love the Internet. Games. Netflix. Twitter. Cat gifs. Memes. The whole world’s knowledge at your fingertips. Expert opinion, peer reviewed articles, books in the public domain, online encyclopaedias. Never in history has been so much information made available to us in such a reachable fashion. Why is it then Read more…
I’ve just finished reading “Kill All Normies” by Angela Nagle, a thoroughly enjoyable experience for anyone who is interested in Internet culture wars and how politics is shaping and being shaped by various online tribes. The title comes from the name given to normal people in some online chatrooms, particularly Read more…
One of the most over-used (yet true) legal comparisons in Internet regulation studies is to contrast the European and US approaches to freedom of speech when it comes to cyberspace. The United States favours an almost unlimited view of freedom of speech, while Europe has put in place large caveats Read more…
I remember when I first logged on to the Internet like it was yesterday. I had been hearing rumours about this global communications network, and had met people who told me about electronic messaging systems that would send mail to people in universities around the world. It sounded like science Read more…