Why doesn’t our Prime Minister support our Constitution and Charter?

Posted on April 18, 2012 by Stephen Pate

Isn’t the leader of a democracy supposed to uphold the foundations of that democracy?

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper in Santiago Chile, not happy with our Charter (Photograph by: SAUL LOEB , Getty Images Canada.com)

I was shocked yesterday to read that Prime Minister Stephen Harper wouldn’t support the 30th Anniversary celebration of Canada’s repatriation of our Constitution from England and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

“In terms of this as an anniversary, I think it’s an interesting and important step, but I would point out that the Charter remains inextricably linked to the patriation of the Constitution and the divisions around that matter, which as you know are still very real in some parts of the country,” Harper said. (Toronto Star) Continue reading →

One day internet blackout works but it’s not over yet

Posted on January 19, 2012 by Stephen Pate

Massive blackout of internet sites on Jan 18 influences lawmakers

The media stories have Hollywood corporate fat cats reeling from Wednesday’s shutdown or blackout of more than 12,000 websites like Wikipedia, Reddit and Wired. NJN Network did its small part by wearing black all day.
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NJN Network is darkened today to protest SOPA PIPA

Posted on January 18, 2012 by Stephen Pate

Wearing black for SOPA protest

Wikipedia goes dark for SOPA protest

If SOPA passes the US Congress in anything close to its current form, the internet as we know it will be essentially dead.

We are joining sites around the world to protest like Wikipedia, Flickr, and Reddit.
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Violence in Toronto predictable resulted from police buildup

Posted on June 27, 2010 by Stephen Pate

If you spend $1 billion to line the streets of Toronto with people who look like Darth Vadar’s storm troopers you are going to get reaction.

Toronto police line blocking protests on Queen image: CBC

The violence and property damage in Toronto is lamentable but predictable. Use of military power to limit public protest always results in violence, in Beijing, Tehran and Toronto.

In Beijing of course Canada denounces it as communist suppression of free speech and lack of democracy. The Iranian government is oppressive when it shoots at people protesting the election. In Canada somehow the government finds the use of police violence as appropriate when people want to end poverty or discrimination.

The same conference was held in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania with only $18 million in security costs and minor violence. “In Pittsburgh during the G20 meeting late in September 2009, about $50,000 in damage was caused by a minority of protesters.” CTV That wasn’t ten years ago, it was ten months ago. Continue reading →

Neda Agha-Soltan, a young Iranian girl is killed by plainclothes in Tehran

Posted on June 20, 2010 by Stephen Pate

A year ago today the symbol of Iranian struggle for democracy – Caution – this video contains graphic violence

A year ago that voter protests in Tehran resulted in death, injury and a crackdown on human rights in Iran. The death of 27 year old Neda Agha Soltan caught the world’s attention. Here was a young girl shot down randomly in the street and caught on cell phone camera. Her death has become an international symbol of the Iranian struggle for freedom.

امروز، سی خرداد، ساعت 7 بعد از ظهر این دختر جوان توسط لباس شخصی ها کشته شد

Basij shot to death a young woman in Tehran’s Saturday June 20th protests

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HBO documentary refutes official Iranian propaganda

Posted on June 5, 2010 by Stephen Pate

Film about Iranian protest victim Neda Agha-Soltan beats regime’s censors Jamming and power cuts fail to prevent documentary going viral

Video showing death of Neda Agha Soltan in new documentary

The Guardian – How the Neda film went viral Link to this video

Iran is jamming satellite broadcasts in attempts to stop people seeing a new film telling the story of, the young woman who was shot dead during the mass protests that followed last summer’s disputed presidential election.

Viewers in Tehran complained of jamming and power cuts on Wednesday and yesterday when the Voice of America Persian TV network broadcast the documentary For Neda, featuring the first film interviews with the family of the 27-year-old.

The 70-minute film, made by Mentorn Media for HBO and being screened in the US this month, has rapidly gone viral in Iran in the run-up to next Saturday’s anniversary of the disputed elections that triggered the protests. It is available on YouTube so can be seen by anyone with access to the internet. The video follows the story break.
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New Hampshire Supreme Court Rules Website Has Reporter’s Privilege

Posted on May 8, 2010 by Byline

New Hampshire rules bloggers can be journalists something the Supreme Court of Canada already acknowledged

By Sam Bayward, Citizen Media Law Project

This morning, the Supreme Court of New Hampshire handed down an important decision holding that a mortgage industry website, The Mortgage Lender Implode-O-Meter, is entitled to protection under the state’s reporter’s privilege.

The case is Mortgage Specialists, Inc. v. Implode-Explode Heavy Industries, Inc., which was argued before the New Hampshire Supreme Court last fall. The dispute centers on an article that Implode-O-Meter published in August 2008, which detailed administrative actions taken by the New Hampshire Banking Department against The Mortgage Specialists, a mortgage lender.

The article included a link to a financial document that The Mortgage Specialists allegedly submitted to the state banking authorities, which Implode-O-Meter had obtained from an anonymous source. After the mortgage company discovered the disclosure, it sued the website, demanding that the document be removed from the Internet and that the anonymous source be identified. A Rockingham County Superior Court judge granted these requests. Continue reading →

Apple rejects Pulitzer winner’s iPhone app because it ‘ridicules public figures’

Posted on April 16, 2010 by Byline

Apple censors satirical cartoons as objectionable to iPhone users – let’s compute like it’s 1984

By Rob Pegoraro, Washington Post - A Pulitzer Prize can win you a round of applause in a newsroom, but it won’t necessarily get your application in Apple’s App Store.

Freelance artist Mark Fiore, winner of the 2010 prize for editorial cartooning and the first online-only recipient of a Pulitzer, found that out in December.

This story surfaced yesterday, when the Nieman Journalism Lab blog (a product of Harvard University’s Nieman Foundation) reported on Fiore’s computing rejection in a piece about his critical success. Author Laura McGann wrote that Apple refused to list an iPhone program presenting Fiore’s animated cartoons because … well, they were mean to name-brand people. She quoted an Apple e-mail forwarded by Fiore: Continue reading →

Green Party organizer wants limits on free speech

Posted on April 6, 2010 by Stephen Pate

Just when we get freedom of speech on the Internet, someone tries to take it away

Wayne Crookes photo: P2Pnet

The Supreme Court of Canada is getting ready to hear the case of Wayne Crookes, a former fund-raiser and organizer for the BC Green Party.

Crookes took offense at alleged derogatory remarks made about him on several websites including Open Politics.ca

That’s the nature of the web, people say the rudest things, some of them nasty and perhaps defamatory. They do it anonymously. In the US, the web site and host can rely on safe-harbor provisions of the CDA (Communications Decency Act). “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” Section 230

Canada doesn’t have the same provisions although journalists are protected from defamation lawsuits when they report the facts they know. Continue reading →

Olympics lawyers switch bullying to new targets

Posted on March 25, 2010 by Byline

ICANN Threatened by Olympic Committee Over Intellectual Property Concerns

By David Goldstein, domainpulse.com - The International Olympic Committee appears to think it has the rights to all sport, given a recent letter to ICANN that raises concerns on the .SPORT gTLD proposal in particular, and new gTLDs in general.

A letter from Urs Lacotte, director general of the IOC, and Howard Stupp, the IOC’s Legal Affairs Director, says they wish to discuss with ICANN these issues with ICANN and notes the IOC has “serious concerns” regarding “intellectual property protection.”
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IRAN shuts down dissident websites

Posted on March 16, 2010 by Stephen Pate

Government moves to silence criticism it says is CIA funded

The government in Tehran has closed down 29 websites associated with dissident political groups. The government FARS news organization said the sites were funded by the CIA.

The government hacked the sites to detect who was running them and who used the sites. The government arrested 30 people in the crackdown on dissidents, proving the Internet is not a safe haven from governments.

Websites listed in the FARS statement are off-line. One site, Human Rights Activists in Iran, says it is down for maintenance.

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