Blog off, EU.
There have been mutterings for some time about the EU's intention to silence all us naughty bloggers for speaking out and saying non-EU-approved things. Old Holborn found a link to the EU report that now sets it in motion, and a discussion of it. It's also been picked up by Obnoxio, who I think gives a very restrained and calm response, considering what the EU want to do. As does Iain Dale. In Iain Dale's comments, there are a couple of commenters in support of this. They have both signed in as 'anonymous', as all such people do (I know not all anonymous posters are nuts, but all nuts post as anonymous). The smugness oozes from them in slow and sticky waves, because they cannot see what the new regulations mean to them. All they see is the impending closure of all blogs, of any political persuasion, that do not conform to the Big Brother model of total subservience. What it means to you, crazed trolls, is that you will no longer be anonymous. That will simply not be an option. When you turn up and spout 'nazi, paedo, racist' at people, we won't have to go to the trouble of tracing you. We won't have to wonder whether you're worth all the effort of tracking down. Your identity will be attached to every comment, every post, every submission to Facebook or MySpace or YouTube or anywhere else. Your only username will be your real name. That makes the initiation of defamation suits a breeze. What it would mean to me would be the end of blogging and of reading blogs. When they all contain as much intellectual stimulus as that 'Hello' comic there really won't be any point. The socialists will raise a cheer as me and my ilk are carted off for re-education sessions that will serve, I promise, only to make us more angry than we already are. This whole business of making blog owners accountable by not letting them be anonymous is complete crap. The men arrested recently for conversing on a fourm were traced not by their names, but by connections through IP numbers. The British hacker who found his way into the Pentagon's computers had done so while covering his tracks through a network of servers. They still found him. They can find any of us, any time they like. All this regulation does is to make it easy for anyone to find us. Fingermen, activists, thugs who happen to disagree, anyone. So we will not be able to criticise the actions of the EU, of the Brown Gorgon, even the ridiculous actions of local councils because they will know at once who you are and they can make life very difficult indeed. Consider, lefty trolls, what might happen if you criticised a Tory council you happen to live under. Bins kicked over instead of collected? Benefits delayed or lost? Council tax reassessed? Still think it's a great idea? These laws will apply to all. They will start as voluntary and soon become compulsory. They will start by silencing non-socialist blogs but they won't stop there. The powers, like all such powers, will trickle down to local level. Soon, any criticism of the traffic wardens will get you targeted for tickets. Even parking legally won't help because the warden will say you were on the yellow lines and the office will support that. Dare to say a word about an officious CSPO? Dare to criticise a council action? Dare to suggest that another party would be better? If this is allowed to progress then every blog will fall silent with the exception of those extolling the wonders of new EU legislation, controlled and dictated by the EU. That will be it for all, lefties. Not just us. Anyone who supports this, anyone at all, is a mug. http://leg-iron.livejournal.com/

How the EU plans to regulate blogs Shall I tell you the worst thing about being a Eurosceptic? It's that, when you report dispassionately on what Brussels is up to, you can end up sounding hysterical. After a while, you find yourself deliberately downplaying the EU's antics, so as to come across as more plausible. If, for example, I told you that the CIA and MI6 had funded the "Yes" campaign in 1975, you would think me a paranoid conspiracy theorist. So, despite the admission, years later, that this is precisely what occurred, I never mention it. It's the same when it comes to the EU's determination to clamp down on blogs. Eurocrats instinctively dislike spontaneous activity. To them, "unregulated" is almost synonymous with "illegal". The bureaucratic mindset demands uniformity, licensing, order. Eurocrats are especially upset because many bloggers, being of an anarchic disposition, are anti-Brussels. In the French, Dutch and Irish referendums, the MSM were uniformly pro-treaty, whereas internet activity was overwhelmingly sceptical. Bruno Waterfield recently reported on a secret Commission report about the danger posed by online libertarians: "Apart from official websites, the internet has largely been a space left to anti-European feeling. Given the ability to reach an audience at a much lower cost, and given the simplicity of the No campaign messages, it has proven to be easily malleable during the campaign and pre-campaign period." The EU's solution? Why, to regulate blogs! Back in June (hat tip, EU Referendum), MEPs began to complain that unlicensed blogs were "polluting" cyberspace with "misinformation and malicious intent". They wanted "a quality mark, a disclosure of who is writing and why". At the time, I dismissed it as the ramblings of a single dotty MEP. Not even the European Parliament, I thought, would actually try to censor the internet. I was wrong. We now have the full report and, sure enough, it wants to "clarify the status, legal or otherwise, of weblogs", and to ensure their "voluntary labelling according to the professional and financial responsibilities and interests of their authors and publishers". With a glorious lack of self-awareness, the Euro-MPs behind the report elaborate their motives: "The report points out that the undetermined and unindicated status of authors and publishers of weblogs causes uncertainties regarding impartiality, reliability, source protection, applicability of ethical codes and the assignment of liability in the event of lawsuits. It recommends clarification of the legal status of different categories of weblog authors and publishers as well as disclosure of interests and voluntary labelling of weblogs." My masters, are you mad? Or what are you? Have you no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/daniel_hannan/blog/2008/09/04/how_the_eu_plans_to_regulate_blogs