Plans to force internet providers to block sites carrying pirated music and films 'threaten freedom of speech and the open internet', says internet and telecom companies

Plaid MEP Jill Evans has welcomed a decision by the European Parliament to support internet freedom. Ms Evans voted in favour of the proposals which state that a user's access to the internet cannot be restricted without a prior legal ruling. ... full story

These are all internet problems and [internet users] think someone should do something about it. Although many internet users think the government should keep out of the internet, I suggest to you that most ordinary people who just use the internet like they use the banking system or the trains think that the government should make sure it all works properly for them and that bad things get stoppe...

NHS Blog Doctor: £5 to save freedom of speech on the internet.I am not sure that paying a blogger's legal costs to defend a libel claim is quite going to "save freedom of speech on the internet," but secure in...

Here’s a sophisticated pro-China argument on the fallout from the Google affair, specifically on the internet freedom versus internet sovereignty issue. There’s a good point within it: The infrastructure for the Internet was built in a way which did not...

The splendiferous Doc Searls has an alarming article about an outfit called the Global Internet Freedom Consortium. Global Internet Freedom Consortium sell tools to break the Great Internet Wall of China. Cool. They also sell the private details of their clients who have purchased these tools to 'vetted' companies for 'personalised advertising'. Extremely un-cool... catastrophi...

I have a confession to make. I don't know a great deal about electronic issues, especially how they relate to the law. Ask me about the electoral system used for the London Assembly and I could talk for ages, ask me about issues of electronic freedom, internet piracy, and such things, and I would struggle. But there is somewhere on the internet that I trust to provide me with the latest elect...

As a Lib Dem working in online and multimedia communications, the concept of an ‘Internet election’ is something I have thought quite a lot about. In the build up to the election I expressed my concerns about the Lib Dems use of online tools on my own blog. I am pleased to say that on

I was rather irritated this morning to read this article on the Guardian website which, apart from ignoring whole aspects of the internet campaigning (about which I may blog later, but may not), included this sentence: A more colourful Lib Dem, Lembit Opik, has been using Facebook in his bid for the party leadership. Even leaving aside

Why are internet service providers above the law? Why do we assume the internet is above and beyond the law? The world wide web should be as much subject to the laws of the land as any other form of communication. Yet it’s still the “wild west web” where lawlessness is rife and politicians wring their hands claiming there is nothing they can do. The truth is that the internet ser...