New Labour, New Luddite
Once again the New Labour machine continues to spit out policy ideas that show just how uninformed they are. The latest gem is from Culture Secretary Andy Burnham, who is considering teaming up with Obama to put film style ratings on individual websites.
The sheer idiocy of this is remarkable.
1. The numbers involved. According to the Netcraft Server Survey, in December 2008, there were around 186,727,854 websites.
So, the proposed scheme would have to classify 187 million websites. But it gets worse; in December 2008 an extra 1.56 million sites were created. Just to tread water 1,560,000 sites would have to be classified in December alone.
Lets say it takes an hour to look at a site, classify it and do the paperwork. In a working month of 160 hours, this would take 9,750 people to classify December's sites alone. Lets say the cost of employing them was 20,000 a year. The annual salary bill of the raters alone would be 195,000,000. Then you have the support staff, the HR etc. Then the buildings etc.
It is a ludicrous idea. It's a very, very expensive idea.
2. What are the standards? Take Channel 4's website. Some of it is very child-friendly, some more adult orientated. There are many more sites like this, so you are going to have to apply standards, not to websites, but individual web pages. This means that the sums above increase by a factor of thousands.
3. Who decides the standards? How are they going to be applied? What about an appeal process?
4. The internation nature of the internet. How are you going to enforce classification in China? Russia? Anywhere?
I could go on, but this should be enough to show just how embarrasingly uninformed, how unthinking, how unanalytical this government has become.
I think you will find this
I think you will find this is Labour doing the EU's bidding. They do adore its facist ways. The EU have stated that they want to control internet sites, almost explicitly saying that it is because they believe it was the web wot lost them the Irish vote. See http://infowars.net/articles/October2006/171006Internet.htm (sorry I can't do HTML)
Our EU masters dislike criticism in any form, so they will find new and inventive ways to close web based criticism down. All that stuff about protecting kids is bollocks. But like ID cards are not about terrorism but about controlling people, the fact that this law would not protect a single kid doesn't matter.... it's not intended to.
Actually no. The EU are very
Actually no. The EU are very aware of the reasons the Irish vote was lost. The main reason is the shockingly poor campaign from the Yes camp. Additionally the confusing wpording of the treaty is a major factor.
The EU does have many faults, but it is much more open and transparent than national governments and it has given us more rights than the UK government has.
Actually they will probably
Actually they will probably make us apply for a licence, then just put your site on a list of banned sites which major ISPs are not allowed to access until your licence has been approved.
With the way whatever ministry that is doing the licencing operates you'll be long gone before you get approval.
"Our EU masters" *WOOP
"Our EU masters"
*WOOP WOOP*
Daily Mail reader alert!
*WOOP WOOP*
"But like ID cards are not
"But like ID cards are not about terrorism but about controlling people, the fact that this law would not protect a single kid doesn't matter.... it's not intended to." FYI, check your esources before you make such a foolish comment.
It also ignores the fact
It also ignores the fact that websites content is already rated by commercial companies who sell software for parents to install on home computers to limit what is seen by their children. This system works pretty well, and can even be had for free from people like:
http://www1.k9webprotection.com/aboutk9/index.php
But, of course, zanulabour would far rather spend more money it hasn't got to re-invent the wheel...