Internet Freedom - Well done EU!

If you think that Internet brought revolution only to individuals (and maybe different businesses that market themselves over the Internet)  than you miss one important link, telecommunication companies. Before the Internet they were in charge of everything related to communication and they did whatever they wanted, in the supposed name of the customers. If they thought that something isn't good, then no matter what people wanted, they weren't getting it. And we shell not forget pricing, which generated huge revenues. But, after the tremendous success of the Internet, things drastically changed. For some of the underlying reasons you can read in my other post, but the key is that the control was given to users, not network (i.e. telecoms). Now, telecoms are what they should be: data carriers only.

All good, but the problem is that there are no huge profits in data transfer, at least not as it used to be and telecoms don't just sit and wait. And so, every now and then we hear of some brilliant idea coming from telecommunication industry by which they either try to bring back good old days, or they try to offer something that doesn't make sense. Just in case you didn't know, ATM was one such idea that, fortunately  was a big failure! Even more interesting is a comment on this blog post from a guy (or guys) that are trying to reimplement some protocols from mobile telephony. They criticize specifications produced by telecoms (and related industry) for introducing new things, not because they are necessary, but because they are patented and in that way allow manipulation!

But, these days there is one other "very interesting" idea. Probably not many people know that ITU is trying to introduce mechanisms in order to regulate the Internet. Fortunately, EU isn't approving that, along with US. I approve that wholeheartedly  and I can not describe how outraged I am when I think about telecoms and ITU!

But, it is probably enough to point who is proposing regulation and to be clear what real motives are. Also interesting are requirements by some countries that Google and other Internet providers would have to pay to them to be allowed to distribute content to their citizens. This is absurd, because who forces users to access Google?

And ITU is also something I really dislike, a lot! It is a bureaucratic institution that produces standards for telecommunications. It's a dinosaur of the past. If you, as a single person, want to propose something, or just take part in some activity, you first have to be member of some member state standardization body, which isn't free. Then, you have to be delegated as a representative to ITU, and only then you can take part in some activity. And now we come to the best part, specifications that were produced common purpose were quite pricey. Truth to be told, they are now distributing specifications free of charge, but if it weren't the Internet, we would still have to pay for them. Contrast that to IETF, where membership and participation is open to everyone who wants to participate. Also, all the specifications produced by IETF are available for free to anyone. Now, I'm not claiming that IETF is perfect, but I certainly do claim that IETF is much better than ITU.

And while I'm at ITU/IETF, it happened to me several years ago that I called our Ministry in order to ask for funding to visit IETF. Apparently, this particular Ministry was willing to do that, or so it was written on their Web pages. The only caveat was that it didn't include IETF for a simple reason it isn't so bureaucratic as ITU. To cut the story short, bureaucrat I talked with didn't understand what I was talking about, nor he was interested to find out. And it ended without a grant...

SOPA ilitiga Stop Online Piracy Act...

This is a post about SOPA. There are many posts, news and other stuff about it on the Web primarily in English, and a lot less in Croation. So I decided to write a post in Croatian, but links are to English sites.

Ponekad se doista smatram sretnim što ne živim u Americi. Na žalost, činjenica što ne živim tamo ipak mi ne pomaže puno jer što god Amerikanci napravili, to utječe na sve ostale u svijetu, htjeli mi to ili ne.

Ovaj puta povod za takav stav je SOPA, ilitiga Stop Online Privacy Act, prijedlog zakona s kojim se pokušava dokrajčiti piratstvo na Internetu. Da se razumijemo, piratstvo je problem, ali rješenje tog problema sigurno nije SOPA! Naime, taj zakon bi omogućio Američkoj vladi, odnosno nekoj njenoj agenciji, da blokira bilo koju Web stranicu (ili nekakav drugi sadržaj na Internetu) i to na temelju samo sumnje da se na njemu nalaze piratski sadržaji! I da razjasnim "blokira" znači da se stranici ne može pristupiti unutar Amerike ako je stranica izvan, a ako je unutra, onda su stvari još zanimljivije. Uglavnom, to znači da vlasnik Web stranice ne mora biti obavješten niti čak može znati da se njegovim stranicama više ne može pristupiti, a o potencijalnoj reakciji na prijave i optužbe da ni ne govorim - ništa, samo se blokira pristup! Očito je da se radi o nečemu nečuvenome! Naime, na neki način stvara se vatrozid (firewall) koji odjeljuje Ameriku (jer u njoj vrijedi taj zakon) od ostatka svijeta. Na neki način Amerikanci kreiraju Veliki Kineski vatrozid (moj prijevod Great Firewall of China) čija prvenstvena zadaća je da kontrolira svoje vlastite građane, a ne da ih štiti od vanjskih prijetnji.

I tko to gura? Pa, MPAA, RIAA i slični, dakle udruge u rangu našeg ZAMPA (u Hrvatskoj bar, u drugim državama postoje ekvivalenti) čija zadaća je zaštita autora, ali koji postaju sami sebi svrha i čija zadaća je u međuvremenu postala iscjeđivanje novaca od ljudi! Oni definitivno ne shvaćaju moderno doba i očajnički pokušavaju spriječiti napredak. To je totalno krivi pristup, jer trebali bi u postojećoj situaciji naći načina za zaradu. Problem je što zahvaljujući Internetu više nisu monopolisti na distribuciju, a teško se odreći monopola...

I ako mislite da to nije problem, uzmite u obzir da je na nedavnom suđenju izašlo na vidjelo kako je Warner Bross slao prijave da se piratizira materijal koji nema veze s njima! Jednostavno su imali nekvu aplikaciju koja je "automatski", na sve sumnjivo, slala prijave! Da mi je to netko rekao ovako, pomislio bi da mi prepričava neki skeč Monty Pythona!

To je došlo toliko daleko da su Google, Facebook i još neke druge velike Internet tvrtke platile oglas preko cijele stranice u New York Timesu u kojemu upozoravaju na štetnost tog zakona.

U ovom postu (od niza drugih) analizira se SOPA, a posebno se osvrće na svjedočenja pojedinih osoba pred Kongresom za koje se kaže da su pristrane i da očito ne razumiju Internet (a s tim ni vrijeme u kojemu žive). Kao zanimljivost post također izvlači svjedočenje jednog od čelnih ljudi MPAA 80-tih godina kada su video rekordere htjeli zabraniti s opravdanjem da im otimaju profit! Uglavnom, nevjerojatna skupina nevjerojatno neupućenih ljudi.

I da, dobra stara Europa koliko god svojih problema imala - a hvala bogu ne manjka ih - ipak ne slijedi Ameriku u svemu (za razliku od nekih!). Te su tako jasno rekli kako smatraju da SOPA nije rješenje! Što reći drugo na to nego AMEN!