Legal Crap [was: William was raided for running a Tor exit node. Please help if you can.]

Barry Shein bzs at world.std.com
Sun Dec 2 17:54:35 UTC 2012


I think one error being made here is discussing the culpability of law
enforcement per se.

That's like blaming the UPS delivery person because something you
bought from Amazon was misleading. Or praising him/her because it was
great.

One way of asserting authority over any property is making very
visible arrests and similar (shutdowns, etc.)

If you follow the Internet Governance sphere a lot of what is going on
is a frantic power grab by various players, particularly govts but
also NGOs, for control of the internet.

This is being heightened by the competitiveness involved, if one
player grabs it before you do then you LOST THE GAME!

Even when they haven't a clue (or only barely) what they're fighting
over surely they can understand that it is bad to LOSE THE GAME!
Particularly to players you don't much like or trust.

As the great VP Dan Quayle was once quoted as saying: If we don't
succeed then we run the risk of failure!*

And that these players are finally figuring out just how powerful the
internet is, at least potentially.

Yeah you can say this has been going on for (insert your own
professional life time in years which is what people do.) Heck, the
whole thing was basically started by the US Dept of Defense, end of
argument, talk about a power player!

But that's sort of like saying that people were trying to capitalize
on the internet for years before the dot com bubble of the late 90s.

It misses the point. Yes you can find examples, no you can't find the
kind of activity and earnestness we're seeing of late.


* If you try to debate, confirm, etc that quote you're a loutish bore,
it stand on its own :-)

-- 
        -Barry Shein

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