So anyway…

Well, Julia Gillard’s reshuffle didn’t remove Stephen Conroy from his position as Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy. It’s my understanding that she wanted to keep things as stable as possible until the next federal election (which, I’m hearing, could be as early as August), and I get that.

So what this means to me is that come the next election, I’ll be doing something I’ve never done, that is, voting below the line. I really want to send a message to Mr Conroy, concerning his harebrained scheme to force mandatory internet filtering at the ISP level (because 1) it won’t work the way they think 2) it won’t fulfill their goal, which is to “protect children” 3) it will probably cause major slowing 4) keeping blacklists of filtered sites is not really democratic or transparent 5) Mr Conroy thinks that Chinese-style internet filtering is a good thing, i.e., his contention if Google can do it for China, they can filter YouTube for Australia 6) the biggest petition ever in the history of Australia was sent to his office, in opposition of this filtering scheme and he totally ignored it 7) he appears to be pretty much technically incompetent and talks about “viruses passing through portals” or some other nonsense and 8) there are more, but I’m getting tired of writing this list).

So, Victorians, how do you vote below the line? How do you make Mr Conroy hear you? Happily, there’s an excellent website to help with that: Filter Conroy.

Yup. Mr Conroy, if you wouldn’t listen to the petition I signed or the thousands of technically competent people who have a list of completely solid reasons why this whole filtering thing is a really dumb idea, maybe you’ll listen when enough of us put you LAST and you lose your senate position…

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Well, this is all over the news in Australia, of course, but I know that some of the people who follow this blog aren’t Australian, and, anyway, I sometimes write about Australian politics here, so I’m going to do that.

We have a new Prime Minister, and it’s a woman, Julia Gillard. She was Deputy Prime Minister and now the party has decided they don’t want Kevin Rudd to lead any more, and he has resigned (rather than forcing a vote). I’m kind of fascinated by all of this, because it’s quite different from the U.S. system, where you’re damn well stuck with whomever it is until the next election. Here, the party can decide they don’t like the leader and can vote them out. I’ve seen it happen plenty of times with the party in opposition, but this is a first for me to see it with a sitting Prime Minister (it hasn’t happened in Australia for a long time, around twenty years). Very interesting business, this.

I also think I probably like Julia Gillard, but that does remain to be seen. I was pretty fed up with Kevin Rudd (as I’ve previously noted), and I utterly detest Tony Abbott. I was very much considering voting Green in the federal election, because I won’t vote for any party that Tony Abbott is leading, and I didn’t know if I could, in good conscience, cast a vote that would be an endorsement of Kevin Rudd. Now, I think I’ll probably support Labour and see how Gillard goes in the position, which is what I suspect a lot of Australians are thinking right about now.

So, there you go. Australia now has an unmarried, female, foreign-born, childless, redheaded, atheist Prime Minister. I guess we’ll see how we go.

As for Senator Stephen Conroy, currently (but probably not for long) Communications Minister who has been trying to push through manditory net nannying via a nationwide blacklist and who actually wanted Google to help Australia blacklist certain YouTube videos because “they do it for China”, I’m still pretty annoyed with him. He probably won’t be Communications Minister any more when the seats get shuffled around, but the man actually compared Australia with China’s draconian censorship laws and didn’t see a problem with that. (That’s the thing that bothers me. Not that stupid bill, or the ridiculous way they were trying to implement it, or the fact that it wasn’t going to work, anyway, but that Conroy actually seems to think China’s censorship is something we should look on favourably in Australia.) I think I’m still going to vote below the line and put Conroy last, just to send the message.

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The federal government is hiding controversial plans to force ISPs to store internet activity of all Australian internet users – regardless of whether they have been suspected of wrongdoing – for law-enforcement agencies to access.
[...]
Political opponents and other critics of the scheme have described the draft policy as “alarming” and accused the government of going “on a fishing expedition for as much data on the public as they can get”. One ISP executive has described the plan as “a nanny state gone totally insane”.

Note that this is not the “clean feed” scheme. It’s unrelated. This is just yet another example of the Rudd government’s idea of “reform”. Tax it, manage it, filter it, control it, waste a hell of a lot of money on it.

I don’t think this is going to fly, mind you, but just the idea that people in government would consider this in Australia is unnerving, to say the least.

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The internet censorship policy has joined the government’s list of “politically toxic subjects” and will almost certainly be shelved until after the federal election, Greens communications spokesman Scott Ludlam says.
[...]
Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has said he expects legislation to enable his internet filtering policy, which will block a secret blacklist of “refused classification” (RC) websites for all Australians, to be tabled in the second half of the year.

But will Conroy be back? I’m going to vote below the line and make sure I put him last. If you’re in Victoria, I suggest you do the same.

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[...] evidence is mounting that one of its key initiatives – mandatory internet filtering – may not prove as popular with voters as the government had hoped.

Gee. Ya think? The largest single petition in Australia’s history was mounted against this plan. Weren’t they listening? Suddenly, a “new study” comes out and NOW there’s doubt casting? Uhm, hello?

In February, a phone survey run by McNair Ingenuity indicated widespread support for the initiative among ordinary voters, but new findings from a study commissioned by the Safer Internet Group indicate that the more parents find out about the proposed filter, the less they support it.
[...]
“While parents were certainly concerned about what their children might be exposed to on the internet, when details of the proposed mandatory filter were explained and they became aware that other filtering options were available, their enthusiasm for the government’s approach dropped,” said the report conducted by GA Research.

Those of us who already knew more of the details were already in opposition to it. Now that the general public is becoming clear on what, precisely, Senator Conroy and the Labor Party want to put in place, the general public is also starting to think this is a bad idea. A bad idea and poor implementation is a bad idea with poor implementation, full stop. I’m gratified to see that more and more Australians are starting to see just how bad this idea is.

For what it’s worth, I’m still going to vote Conroy out of office if I can. There’s an election this year, and he’s a Victorian senator. I’m going to do something I’ve never done, which is vote below the line, and put Conroy last, just to send a message. If you’re a Victorian voter and you feel the same way, I urge you to vote below the line and tell the Labor government you’ve had enough of their patriarchal babysitting shenanigans

(Personal note: I’m not that keen on the Liberal Party, either, and I absolutely can’t stand Tony Abbot, budgie smugglers not withstanding, so I don’t know how I’m going to vote on the national level. Frankly, none of Australia’s political parties resonate with me much. Closest I come is the Green Party, and that’s not the best match, either.)

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Pauline Hanson claims to be moving to the UK. Let’s hope it’s true and not just another of her publicity stunts.

Anti-immigration mouthpiece Pauline Hanson is packing up her bags and emigrating.
 
She is departing for a new life in the UK, claiming that Australia is no longer the land of opportunity.

And the UK is? Hmmm…

I wonder what she’s going to do when she finds out that the UK is full of non-English immigrants. Let’s lock the door behind her so she can’t get back into Australia, shall we?

Do note that Pauline, famous for her “keep Australia for Australians” stance on immigration (really, you can Google her sorry arse if you don’t know, but trust me, the woman is both stupid and naive, and her position on immigration and related matters is decidedly racist), was welcomed by Nick Griffin, the leader of the notably racist British National Party (you can Google them, too, of course). Why am I not surprised?

Mr Griffin said Miss Hanson, who once claimed Australia was being “swamped by Asians”, would not be a “sponger”.
 
The British National Party leader and MEP also said Miss Hanson would also be “very welcome” to play a political role in the party.

Looks like a match made in heaven. Take her, UK. And please, keep her.

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This is a thoughtful, interesting article, which I thought was neatly summarised in this line:

A change in technology has caused a law to extend into territory it was never designed to cover.

Go read the article, it’s got a great take on the whole Australian internet censorship battle.

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In a follow up to the news report that Senator Conroy’s JavaScript generated tag cloud was censoring certain phrases that he didn’t want appearing on his website, comes this:

The web developer whose code was modified to remove references to internet filtering on a government website has asked for it to be taken down.
 
“I would appreciate it if you could remove my Javascript Tag Cloud from your website,” said developer and blogger Aleks Bochniak in a letter to the office of Communications Minister Stephen Conroy.
 
“I do not want in any way to be associated with yourself, your office or your policies.”

Can’t say that I blame him. Victorians, VOTE BELOW THE LINE in the Senate in this year’s election, and put Conroy LAST. Take him out of office. He’s not competent to hold the portfolio he’s holding, and Rudd won’t remove him, so let’s kick him out of office entirely. Maybe whomever Rudd puts in the job next will have at least SOME clue about, you know, TECHNOLOGY.

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