About Internet Freedom
I'll warn you right away, the article is very controversial. Ardent opponents of holivar, please skip it without reading. This article reflects my personal opinion, and I am sure that it will not coincide with the opinion of many habraousers, but this is also good.
Some fifteen years ago, the Internet was for some people something distant, unfamiliar. You quickly get used to the good, now a lot of people use it. These are different people, from different social backgrounds, with different education, schoolchildren and pensioners, businessmen, and in some places even homeless people.
Perhaps one of its main advantages is freedom. Such freedom of communication, the expression of one’s thoughts and the receipt of information was never available before.
Of course, this freedom is a great evil for those who govern states, religions, and indeed large communities of people. For example, twenty years ago, the main sources of information in the USSR were newspapers and television, and both of these were controlled by the state. It was only possible to find out the news that was not approved by the government by sending it to each other in person, by mail, or by telephone. It was extremely problematic to notify a large number of people in such a way, and even without government opposition.
')
In principle, this applied to almost all states of that time. It was much easier for people to control, not to give them the knowledge that could interfere with the stability of power, but at the same time being able to feed them any fairy tale from the screen of controlled television or from newspapers.
With the advent of global computer networks available for use by ordinary citizens, newspapers and television began to rapidly lose popularity among people able to think independently, trying not to live according to an imposed pattern, trying to trust only information obtained from independent sources.
News began to spread without the help of the state, from one person to thousands of readers at once, from thousands to tens of thousands, and so on.
Hide more or less significant event has become extremely difficult. Imagine an explosion at a chemical plant on the outskirts of a city. Previously, such an event would simply shut up. At best, television and newspapers would mention a small incident, and even then only if information about the accident was leaked, for example, in the case of large victims, people would write and call their relatives in other cities. However, even such leaks were quickly eliminated, the scale of the tragedy was minimized, the impression was diligently smoothed out. Even now you can easily notice the difference in what is shown in the evening news and what can be found in the tops of the blog entries. Even the same news can be given in completely different ways.
Now, in just a few minutes, the event will hit the network, testimonies of eyewitnesses will appear on Twitter, photos on social networks and blogs, videos on youtube and so on. Fast, very fast and almost uncontrollable. To stop such a stream, or at least control it, is very difficult.
And yet, I am sure that most governments will fight this freedom to the end. Until they can control the dissemination of information on the Internet, if not as well as twenty years ago, then close to it. It is a question of the survival of any power, its stability.
Attempts at such controls are made constantly. Everyone probably knows that during the recent unrest in Iran, their government tried to limit attempts to highlight the events that took place there. The Great Chinese Firewall is also not a secret to anyone, including the Chinese themselves.
Or take for example the fight kopirastov with pirates. It is clear that if the government has a lobby for copywriting, the will of the latter will be part of the will of the government itself. It is not so important that their interest is not to get and hold power, but to get more profit. The important thing is that they need control over what citizens can and cannot download from the Internet. Thus, the government has a strong and rich supporter with similar interests.
The fight against freedom is inevitable, it is one of the main features of any state. And in my opinion, this freedom will be suppressed sooner or later.
I even care little about how it will be done. Whether the courts, disabling unwanted, total surveillance or something else. There are many methods, new ones constantly appear, they are combined with old ones. It is not always advantageous to rest on one’s foreheads, one can be cunning, and one will be cunning More and more often, garbage information will appear (here it is not necessary for the government to strain, we will do everything ourselves in the best possible way). More often there will be ducks, custom articles. In the comments to any objectionable entry will pour dirt on the author of the article. It may be the methods described by Orwell, it may be the methods predicted by Huxley, it may be their combination or something new. But it will be.
Not so long ago, it seemed to me that with the advent of the Internet, our life will change dramatically, that people will finally be able to find out for themselves what they need with minimal distortion and at any time. But the farther, the more noticeable that these changes will hardly ever happen.
Governments slowly, bit by bit from this freedom. They try to appear the foot quagmire, look for a path. And sooner or later they will find it. Yes, of course, individual citizens and their communities resist this. There are things like P2P, TOR, VPN, but they only protect one loophole. The struggle may go so far that such technical means will become too difficult for the majority to master, or the need for their constant improvement will constantly increase, people will no longer have time to keep track of all the changes, becoming ever more defenseless before the opposing side. Yes, and ways to limit the dissemination of information can be non-technical, or combined with them. It is not necessary to listen to all the traffic of all users, if you can publicly flog a dozen or so uncomfortable citizens on the main square of the country. We ourselves will spread the pictures of the execution, we ourselves will be outraged, but each time we will be more and more afraid. Strengthening control is already happening, everywhere and at once, but using different methods. The most successful methods will be applied in other countries. In essence, the freedom of each individual is opposed by governments and large organizations of many wealthy and not very rich countries. Ordinary people will lose because of their own disunity, as they have always lost before the states.
Maybe it will sound like some old-fashioned one, but in my opinion, the golden time of Internet freedom has already passed. It was then when the Internet managed to develop strongly enough, but at the same time did not have time to attract the attention of the rulers. I'm not saying that the Internet will not be in principle, or that it will become generally worse than it is now. I say that it becomes less free, and that it is inevitable.
Some fifteen years ago, the Internet was for some people something distant, unfamiliar. You quickly get used to the good, now a lot of people use it. These are different people, from different social backgrounds, with different education, schoolchildren and pensioners, businessmen, and in some places even homeless people.
Perhaps one of its main advantages is freedom. Such freedom of communication, the expression of one’s thoughts and the receipt of information was never available before.
Of course, this freedom is a great evil for those who govern states, religions, and indeed large communities of people. For example, twenty years ago, the main sources of information in the USSR were newspapers and television, and both of these were controlled by the state. It was only possible to find out the news that was not approved by the government by sending it to each other in person, by mail, or by telephone. It was extremely problematic to notify a large number of people in such a way, and even without government opposition.
')
In principle, this applied to almost all states of that time. It was much easier for people to control, not to give them the knowledge that could interfere with the stability of power, but at the same time being able to feed them any fairy tale from the screen of controlled television or from newspapers.
With the advent of global computer networks available for use by ordinary citizens, newspapers and television began to rapidly lose popularity among people able to think independently, trying not to live according to an imposed pattern, trying to trust only information obtained from independent sources.
News began to spread without the help of the state, from one person to thousands of readers at once, from thousands to tens of thousands, and so on.
Hide more or less significant event has become extremely difficult. Imagine an explosion at a chemical plant on the outskirts of a city. Previously, such an event would simply shut up. At best, television and newspapers would mention a small incident, and even then only if information about the accident was leaked, for example, in the case of large victims, people would write and call their relatives in other cities. However, even such leaks were quickly eliminated, the scale of the tragedy was minimized, the impression was diligently smoothed out. Even now you can easily notice the difference in what is shown in the evening news and what can be found in the tops of the blog entries. Even the same news can be given in completely different ways.
Now, in just a few minutes, the event will hit the network, testimonies of eyewitnesses will appear on Twitter, photos on social networks and blogs, videos on youtube and so on. Fast, very fast and almost uncontrollable. To stop such a stream, or at least control it, is very difficult.
And yet, I am sure that most governments will fight this freedom to the end. Until they can control the dissemination of information on the Internet, if not as well as twenty years ago, then close to it. It is a question of the survival of any power, its stability.
Attempts at such controls are made constantly. Everyone probably knows that during the recent unrest in Iran, their government tried to limit attempts to highlight the events that took place there. The Great Chinese Firewall is also not a secret to anyone, including the Chinese themselves.
Or take for example the fight kopirastov with pirates. It is clear that if the government has a lobby for copywriting, the will of the latter will be part of the will of the government itself. It is not so important that their interest is not to get and hold power, but to get more profit. The important thing is that they need control over what citizens can and cannot download from the Internet. Thus, the government has a strong and rich supporter with similar interests.
The fight against freedom is inevitable, it is one of the main features of any state. And in my opinion, this freedom will be suppressed sooner or later.
I even care little about how it will be done. Whether the courts, disabling unwanted, total surveillance or something else. There are many methods, new ones constantly appear, they are combined with old ones. It is not always advantageous to rest on one’s foreheads, one can be cunning, and one will be cunning More and more often, garbage information will appear (here it is not necessary for the government to strain, we will do everything ourselves in the best possible way). More often there will be ducks, custom articles. In the comments to any objectionable entry will pour dirt on the author of the article. It may be the methods described by Orwell, it may be the methods predicted by Huxley, it may be their combination or something new. But it will be.
Not so long ago, it seemed to me that with the advent of the Internet, our life will change dramatically, that people will finally be able to find out for themselves what they need with minimal distortion and at any time. But the farther, the more noticeable that these changes will hardly ever happen.
Governments slowly, bit by bit from this freedom. They try to appear the foot quagmire, look for a path. And sooner or later they will find it. Yes, of course, individual citizens and their communities resist this. There are things like P2P, TOR, VPN, but they only protect one loophole. The struggle may go so far that such technical means will become too difficult for the majority to master, or the need for their constant improvement will constantly increase, people will no longer have time to keep track of all the changes, becoming ever more defenseless before the opposing side. Yes, and ways to limit the dissemination of information can be non-technical, or combined with them. It is not necessary to listen to all the traffic of all users, if you can publicly flog a dozen or so uncomfortable citizens on the main square of the country. We ourselves will spread the pictures of the execution, we ourselves will be outraged, but each time we will be more and more afraid. Strengthening control is already happening, everywhere and at once, but using different methods. The most successful methods will be applied in other countries. In essence, the freedom of each individual is opposed by governments and large organizations of many wealthy and not very rich countries. Ordinary people will lose because of their own disunity, as they have always lost before the states.
Maybe it will sound like some old-fashioned one, but in my opinion, the golden time of Internet freedom has already passed. It was then when the Internet managed to develop strongly enough, but at the same time did not have time to attract the attention of the rulers. I'm not saying that the Internet will not be in principle, or that it will become generally worse than it is now. I say that it becomes less free, and that it is inevitable.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/86068/
All Articles