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Valve, Duke, UDK updates and UK Law(lessness)

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kat:
Looks like the UK Gov finally went ahead with taxing broadband connections. The cynic in my says the following "right so they know they can't control the web and Internet itself, so what they do is control your access to it". Can you tax what the European Courts regard as a human right? - the "right" to unfettered access to the Internet; the subscription you pay for access is the cost associated with using an ISP's *services*, a 'tax' isn't, it's just an arbitrary revenue generation scheme that has nothing to do with service provision itself. It may not seem like much right now but this does set a worrying president.

It's 50p/month at initial introduction (about £6 per year) but you watch, over the coming year or two it'll increase. What doesn't seem to understand is that this isn't money that will go into a kitty (bank account) for investment into the broadband infrastructure as it's being pimped, but instead the influx of cash will be used for something else *now* with some other tax offset being used *later* for the actual implementation of the so called upgrades to the network.

ratty redemption:
@ kat, I whole heartedly agree with your concerns regarding this stealth tax :(

kat:
Apparently the UK Gov didn't do it's homework when putting together the legislation behind the Digital Economy Bill
--- Quote from: MCV ---"The UK Government has amazingly admitted that it made no attempt to gather its own evidence when formulating its anti-piracy plans that were included in the controversial Digital Economy Bill.

Instead, the decision to implement a “three strikes” rule and demand that ISPs play a role in internet censorship was based only on information supplied by copyright holder lobbyists"
--- End quote ---
What's astonishing is the blatant passing of the buck (by Adrian Brazier) to the rights holders, if the DEA team knew the data was 'compromised' at the time they were given it why then continue to make policy based on it without seeking a wider consultation or doing broader research into a subject that has far-reaching consequences?

Resources

* Hargreaves Review of Intellectual Property

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