Off the net for bad behaviour

This photo CC by LeeLeFever

When I was younger, so much younger than today my parents would block my internet access (by taking away the power chord usually) if I’d been particularly naughty. This was back in 1996/97 before the days of My Space and Bebo.

Now it looks like the ISPs want to take away the theoretical power chord from people downloading masses of torrent stuff and illegal content.

The plans, proposals drawn up between ISPs, record labels and movie studios, would see anyone caught downloading dodgy stuff banned from having a broadband account.

My first thought was - well thats one way of solving the oncoming UK bandwidth crisis (there isn’t enough of it). But then I dismissed that as overly cynical.

The web is a wild place, WiFi is increasingly prominent - can this really work? Any heavy torrent user will just go find themselves an open WiFi connection and get their wares from there.

In fact I’m thinking of opening my WiFi as a precaution - at least that way I can say it was someone else and get away with it if somebody else uses my connection - after all WiFi isn’t that difficult to crack.

Next post on this will be about how we compensate creatives in an everything free age.

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