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	Thursday, 16 October 2008

Australia's Great Firewall: just like China, Syria and other "free" countries Andy sez, In a move that seems to be happening without comment from the Australian media, the Australian government is introducing a censorship regime ostensibly targeted at stopping teenagers accessing online porn. But rather than being an opt-in system, it's "opt-out". I use the scare quotes because, and this is most insidious part, you can't actually opt out - you can merely be placed on a alternative blacklist which, instead of blocking "content innappropriate for children", block any material deemed to be illegal. The fact that it will likely reduce everyone's internet performance is secondary; It will most likely incorrectly block 1% of sites, and now what you are allowed to view online is determined and controlled by the state (although most likely quite inaccurately). The rationale is that since they're setting it up anyway, they're morally obliged to block traffic deemed illegal: "Illegal is illegal and if there is infrastructure in place to block it, then it will be required to be blocked [base ']Äî end of story." I don't think I need to go into too much detail about the potential threat to our civil liberties. People of Australia, please write to your MPs to voice your opposition to this. No opt-out of filtered Internet (Thanks, Andy!) Go here and here if you want to do something about this.  [Boing Boing] 10:43:36 PM

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Dolphins lured and attacked: marine group There is concern at Whyalla in South Australia that dolphins are being lured with fish, then attacked by local youths. I thought I'd better post this because we don't usually get much news about dolphins. [ABC News: Breaking Stories] 8:54:33 AM

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