Australia’s Communications Minister Stephen Conroy and the government he represents and serves, have been awarded the title of "Internet Villain of the Year", mainly because of plans to introduce mandatory Internet filtering to the Lucky Country, reports Tony Poulos.
Not surprisingly, the award was handed-out by the Internet Service Providers' Association (ISPA) in the United Kingdom where Aussie bashing is as popular as cricket (and the two often go hand-in-hand).
Mr, Conroy tops a cracking list of people and organisations that the Poms hold in contempt. They include:
The European Parliament - "For supporting an amendment to the Telecom Package on cookies which could yet bring the Internet to a standstill”.
The French President, Nicolas Sarkozy - "For his continued commitment to the HADOPI law, which advocates a system of graduated response, despite repeated arguments suggesting the law is disproportionate from a number of important groups including the European Parliament". The proposal would ban persistent downloaders of pirated content from all French ISPs for twelve months.
The UK Business Minister, Baroness Vadera - "For excluding a number of ISPs and Rights Holders in agreeing a Memorandum of Understanding that was exclusive and ineffective in progressing relations between the two industries".
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