HexesofVexes

“If it continues long enough, even a reign of terror may become a fondly remembered period. People believe they want justice and wise government but, in fact, what they really want is an assurance that tomorrow will be very much like today.” - Terry Pratchett

It’s a good quote, and it tells you a lot about the idea of organising to forcefully change things. Change comes through education, patience, kindness, and self-sacrifice; it comes from teaching people that tomorrow can really be better. It’s never quick, it’s rarely (if ever) a great leader who brings it about, and it’s never such leaders who pay the price.

Already a member of the EFF, and I teach privacy to my students and coworkers already.

It’s more a rearguard than a fight at this point - most Brits are too distracted to care.

I’m not entirely sure how that’s panning out in Aus (a quick search suggests it’s a flop, but the sources aren’t great). I think the general consensus is that it’s not as enforceable as they hoped.

We are moving towards an era of a more locked down web in the UK. The main flag here is “robust age verification” - i.e. we’re moving from “you must provide ID to view adult material on social media” to “you must provide ID to use social media”.

One can quickly see “your id must be retained and linked to your account to reduce crime” and “any officer of the law may view this ID to better support crime reduction” slipping in over the next 20 years or so.

Overall, this feels like another Trojan horse to move towards a China-style de-anonymised web. Bad move all around really.