Linked by Thom Holwerda on Thu 14th Apr 2011 21:41 UTC
A major win has been scored in Europe against the content industry and several governments who are trying to impose censorship on the internet through ISPs. The European Court of Justice, the highest court in Europe, gave a preliminary opinion which states that no ISP can be forced to filter the internet, especially not enforce copyright.
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Member since:
2006-02-15
It doesn't mean Internet filtering is outlawed, it only means that ISPs cannot be forced to do it. They are free to do filtering if they themselves wish to, like e.g. if they get enough money from MAFIAA-like entities to do it.
It is still an important decision given the fact that those aforementioned entities have been trying to force ISPs to do filtering, even when the ISPs themselves do not wish to do it. This releases those ISPs unconditionally from such. Also, it could possibly pave the way for actual outlawing of most Internet traffic, though I highly doubt it would mean all of it.
Expect some ISPs now to actually start advertising that they offer unfiltered Internet access if some of the other ISPs in the same country/area make a deal with MAFIAA et. al. and start filtering. It will become a selling point now that there is no worry about MAFIAA coming after them.