Corporations Plan To Pull Plug On The Free Internet

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Corporations Plan To Pull Plug On The Free Internet

Web users naive about agenda to turn Internet into regulated cable TV model

 

Paul Joseph Watson

_Prison Planet_ (http://prisonplanet.com/index.html)

Thursday, June 12, 2008

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The Internet is the last true unregulated outpost of freedom of speech but

moves are afoot to stifle, suffocate, control and eventually pull the plug on

the world wide web as we know it. These threats are not hidden nor are they

hard to deduce and yet a significant number of Internet users remain naive as

to their scope.

Despite many questioning the _authenticity of a report that claimed ISP's had

resolved to restrict the Internet to a TV-like subscription model _

(http://prisonplanet.com/articles/june2008/061108_kill_internet.htm) where users

will

be forced to pay to visit selected corporate websites by 2012, while others

will be blocked, the march towards regulation of the web is clear and

documented.

We have been warning about the plan to let the old Internet die and replace

it with a restricted and controlled Internet 2 for years. In 2006, _we

published an article _

(http://prisonplanet.com/articles/november2006/291106shutdown.htm) about how the

RIAA were attempting to broaden intellectual property

distinctions to a point whereby merely linking to external content is judged as

copyright infringement.

At the time, the article was met with a mixed response. Many were aware of

the imminent dangers that threaten to change the face of the Internet but

others were more hostile to the supposition that the world wide web could be

devastated by landmark copyright case rulings as well as plans to develop

" Internet 2. "

Some accused us of yellow journalism and scaremongering yet the warning that

the _Elektra vs. Barker case_

(http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/) could criminalize the very

mechanism that characterizes the Internet was

not concocted by Alex Jones or Paul Joseph Watson, it was a statement made by

the very lawyer fighting the case, Ray Beckerman.

It was a danger also reported on by one of the UK's biggest technology news

websites, the Inquirer, which also highlighted the frightening development in

an article entitled, _RIAA wants the Internet shut down_

(http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36027) .

The RIAA's argument was that defendant Tenise Barker downloaded music files

and made them available for distribution by placing them in a shared folder.

Though Barker paid for the files and downloaded them legally, and the files

were not copied by anyone, the RIAA's motion states that simply making the

files available constitutes copyright infringement.

As Beckerman points out, the entire Internet is nothing more than a giant

network of hyperlinks making files 'available' to other people. If we link to

_CNN.com_ (http://cnn.com/) , we are making the file that constitutes the CNN

homepage 'available' to other users. We don't own the copyright to any of

CNN's material therefore if the RIAA's argument is accepted, by simply making

that CNN file available from our website, even if no one clicks on the link, we

are committing a breach of copyright.

At no point in our article did we suggest that the ruling definitely would

shut down the Internet, we highlighted the fact that hundreds of transnational

corporations like Amazon.com who solely rely on Internet trade would scream

bloody murder. But what the ruling would grease the skids for is the move

towards a strictly regulated Internet whereby government permission would be

required to run a website and that website would be subject to censoring and

deletion if it violated any " terms of use. "

This wouldn't be much of a problem to giant transnational corporations,

because their websites would remain accessible for everyone. Yet for thousands

of

political websites and blogs, the plug could be effectively pulled.

After a long legal fight, Elektra vs. Barker _was decided largely in

Elektra's favor_

(http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080331-new-ruling-may-grease-the-wheels-\

of-riaa-litigation-machine.html) , after a federal judge

essentially validated the RIAA's position that having songs available in a KaZaA

shared folder violates the distribution right under the Copyright Act.

The example that we cite in discussing what life would be like under

" Internet 2 " (http://prisonplanet.tv/audio/291106watson.mp3) was that running a

blog

would be like having a You Tube account - any politically sensitive or

controversial information that the owners dislike would immediately be removed

as

it is frequently on You Tube.

In addition, the slide towards a licensed Internet that will be sold using

fear of identity and credit card fraud could lead to mandatory biometric thumb

or finger scanning simply to access the world wide web.

This is hardly a stretch of the imagination, since numerous public services

and functions of society are increasingly accessible only through providing

some form of biometric identification. Credit passes for travel, ATM terminals

and access to theme parks like Disneyland are just a few of the many

services we use that are shifting towards mandatory biometric gatekeeping.

Furthermore, _Pay By Touch Online_

(http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104 & STORY=/www/story/02-06-20\

06/0004275205 & EDATE=) and other

companies have already developed and launched keyboard biometric finger

scanning

terminals that require users to submit their biometric print before they can

access the Internet or buy online.

Piggybacking the net neutrality debate, Internet 2 is being shaped to

replace the old Internet, which will be allowed to self-destruct as it labors

under

the pressures of being relegated to slower and slower pipes and users will

simply desert a painstaking system.

More than two years ago in an article entitled, _The End of the Internet?_

(http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060213/chester) , The Nation magazine reported,

" The nation's largest telephone and cable companies are crafting an alarming

set of strategies that would transform the free, open and nondiscriminatory

Internet of today to a privately run and branded service that would charge a

fee for virtually everything we do online. "

" Verizon, Comcast, Bell South and other communications giants are developing

strategies that would track and store information on our every move in

cyberspace in a vast data-collection and marketing system, the scope of which

could rival the National Security Agency. According to white papers now being

circulated in the cable, telephone and telecommunications industries, those

with

the deepest pockets--corporations, special-interest groups and major

advertisers--would get preferred treatment. Content from these providers would

have

first priority on our computer and television screens, while information seen

as undesirable, such as peer-to-peer communications, could be relegated to a

slow lane or simply shut out. "

Internet 2 is being billed as the next generation of the world wide web and

it has already set _global speed records_

(http://www.internetnews.com/infra/article.php/3403161) in terms of data

transfer, far outstripping the old

Internet.

One of the fathers of the Internet, David Clark, who served as chief

protocol architect for the government's internet development initiative in the

1980s, has been given $200,000 by the National Science Foundation to covertly

work

on a " whole new infrastructure to replace today's global network, " according

to _Wired Magazine_

(http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,68004,00.html) .

Clark has vowed to create a " brave new world " in designing the new Internet,

characterizing what he wanted for the new network to be " a coherent security

architecture. "

Dovetailing the onset of Internet 2 are government propaganda campaigns to

demonize the existing Internet as a wild backwater for hate crime, child

pornography and a terrorist recruiting ground.

Establishment kingpins and their cheerleaders have increased their level of

vitriolic rhetoric against the Internet in recent years , as legislation in

both the U.S. and Europe to regulate, stifle and license the Internet moves

forward.

The White House's own recently _de-classified strategy for " winning the war

on terror " _

(http://prisonplanet.com/articles/september2006/070906terroristrecruiters.htm)

targets Internet conspiracy theories as a recruiting ground for

terrorists and threatens to " diminish " their influence.

In addition, the Pentagon recently announced its effort to _infiltrate the

Internet and propagandize_

(http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Raw_obtains_CENTCOM_email_to_bloggers_1016.ht\

ml) for the war on terror.

In an October 2006 speech, _Homeland Security director Michael Chertoff

identified the web_

(http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/October2006/171006Web.htm) as a " terror

training camp, " through which " disaffected people living in

the United States " are developing " radical ideologies and potentially violent

skills. "

Chertoff pledged to dispatch Homeland Security agents to local police

departments in order to aid in the apprehension of domestic terrorists who use

the

Internet as a political tool.

The _European Union, led by former Stalinist and potential future British

Prime Minister John Reid, has also vowed_ (http://prisonpl

anet.com/articles/october2006/261006targetsbloggers.htm) to shut down

" terrorists " who use the

Internet to spread propaganda.

The dangers to the freedom and very existence of the Internet as we know it

are all too real and the way to counteract these developments is to get

involved and get the word out. Simply burying our heads in the sand and being

apathetic and naive about the threat is only going to aid those who wish to see

the last outpost of freedom of speech shut off forever.

 

 

 

 

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