Fighting 3 Strikes And You're Out in Europe; again for those interested

Some of you I know may be interested in this blog post .

The next vote on the future of the Telecoms Package is on November 27th and La Quadrature du Net has organised a cross-Europe write to your minister/MP/MEP campaign before then.

Please think about joining it (scroll down to the bottom of the link for details of what you can do). Feel free to pass this link on (I have left it public) - LJ worked very well as a grassroots movement last time we tried this , back in July!!

Note that this vote is undertaken this time by MINISTERS for each member of the EU - not by MEPs. So the principal target of a campaign should probably be ministers, although it would be useful to write to any or all of the minister, your MP or your MEP.

You can easily contact your MP and MEP via http://www.writetothem.com/ . You can write to the below Ministers that way too.

On a quick scan the UK minister at BERR responsible for Telecoms appears to be Stephen Carter but there is also some joint responsibility with Culture, headed by Andy Burnham .

I'm now advised teh best Ministrs to\write to and their addresses are

Stephen Carter : mpst.carter@berr.gsi.gov.uk

Baroness Shiriti Vadera: mpst.vadera@berr.gsi.gov.uk


It might also be useful to contact Paul Murphy , the Minister responsible for the government's massive digital inclusion plans , pointing out this vote might result in the digital *exclusion* of many 1000s of people, especially the young and students.

What would you write to say? The aim of the La Quad campaign is, in particular, to try to make sure Amendment 138 stays in the package - so far the European parliament and the Commission have backed it but the Council of Ministers, and in particular France, want it out. This amendment is crucial as it guarantees the right to due process and to fundamental human rights - in other words it would be impossible for you to be disconnected from the Internet for allegations of file sharing without a court agreeing this was appropriate and reasonable; and copyright interests would not be allowed to simply trample over your rights of privacy eg your right not to have all your email monitored and/or filtered.

This isn't a campaign to say that file sharing should be legal - that's between you and your conscience. What it's about is making sure that you still have basic human rights, and due process rights, even if you are suspected of file sharing (just as you have if you are suspected of shoplifting, or other minor crimes). File sharing isn't even, in essence, a crime - it's a civil breach of copyright. Yet under these plans, those accused of it, by evidence often known to be flawed or plain wrong, would have less rights than ordinary criminals.

For more details see blog post above, or contact me via LJ.

Tee heeee!

Take this bohemiancoast...


"Google's voice search is, it turns out, optimised for North American accents and has distinct problems understanding proper English as the BBC defines it - forcing English users to adopt the kind of dodgy accents not usually seen outside a karaoke night.

Google's iPhone application warns users that "Voice Search only works in English, and works best for North American English accents", as noted by Cult of Mac, but one doesn't expect to have to adopt an septic twang just to get an internet search completed - though that appears to be the case.

The Telegraph reports that a Scot asking for iPhone was offered searches for Sex instead, while a Welsh accent delivered "gorillas" and "kitchen sink". Even a Surrey accent failed, delivering "my sister"."