Canadian ISPs Plan Net Censorship

Canadian ISPs Plan Net Censorship




Concerns grow that Canada's plan will wipeout alt news sites and
spread to U.S.





By Mike Finch




A net-neutrality activist group has uncovered plans for the demise of
the free Internet by 2010 in Canada. By 2012, the group says, the trend
will be global.



Bell Canada and TELUS, Canada’s two largest Internet service providers
(ISPs), will begin charging per-site fees on most Internet sites,
reports anonymous sources within TELUS.



“It's beyond censorship, it is killing the biggest ecosystem of free
expression and freedom of speech that has ever existed,” I Power
spokesperson Reese Leysen said. I Power was the first group to report
on the possible changes.



Bell Canada has not returned calls or emails.



The plans made by the large telecom businesses would change the
Internet into a cable-like system, where customers sign up for specific
web sites, and must pay to see each individual site beyond a certain
point. Subscription browsing would be limited, extra fees would be
applied to access out-of-network sites. Many sites would be blocked
altogether.



We had inside sources from bigger companies who gave us the
information on how exclusivity deals are being made at this moment
between ISPs and big content providers (like TV production studios and
major video game publishers) to decide which web sites will be in the
standard packageoffered to their customers, leaving all the
rest of
the Internet unreachable unless you pay extra subscription fees per
every non-standard site you visit,Leysen said.

We knew the sourceto be 100% reliable, but we also knew the story would be highly
controversial if we released the information. We did it because we knew
that we get more official confirmations once we come forward
with it. And indeed that is what happened. Dylan Pattyn, who is writing the
soon-to-be published article for Time Magazine, received
confirmation from sources within Bell Canada and TELUS after we
released the information.



The plans would in effect be economic censorship, with only the top 100
to 200 sites making the cut in the initial subscription package. Such
plans would likely favor major news outlets and suppress smaller news
outlets, as the major news outlets would be free (with subscription),
and alternative news outlets, like AFP, would incur a fee for every
visit.



The Internet will become a playground for billion-dollar content
providers just like television is, said Leysen. It won'tbe possible
for a few teenagers in their parents basement to start a small site
like E-bay that then grows out to be the next big thing anymore. Right
now the Internet belongs to those with the greatest ideas. In the
future, it'll belong to those with the biggest budgets.



With plans in Canada uncovered, I Power thinks that companies in the
United States and other nations are also planning similar actions.



By 2012 ISPs all over the globe will reduce Internet access to a
TV-like subscription model, only offering access to a small standard
amount of commercial sites and require extra fees for every other site
you visit. These other sites would then lose all their exposure
andeventually shut down, resulting in what could be seen as the end of the
Internet, Leysen said.



Such a subscription plan could possibly restrict free speech far beyond
even the current restrictions set by the governments of communist
China. Not only would browsing be limited, but privacy would be
invaded, as every web site viewed would likely be recorded on a bill in
a manner similar to a phone bill.



Why would the ISPs institute such a plan? One word: money.



This new subscription model is commercially far more beneficial to
them than how it is now, Leysen said. If Fox wants to launch a
new television show online, they'll have to pay big money to all major
ISPsto ensure that their new show will be offered and pushed in the
standard package& of sites/services/channels that people will
get through their Internet access. Plus ISPs will also gain extra revenue
out of people trying to access the rest of the Internet, as they'll
pay extra subscription fees for every web site they visit.



But it's not just the big ISPs that stand to gain.



Marketing and big budget content-pushing just doesn't seem to work
on the Internet, and this is something that several industries want
fixed. ISPs know this and will benefit greatly by fixing this for the
marketing and entertainment industry, Leysen said.



The ISPs are said to be confident they can institute such plans through
deceptive marketing and fear tactics.



The Internet will be more and more marketed as a place full of child
pornography and other horrible illegal activity in order to get people
on their [the ISP side once they start restricting it and make it
safer, Leysen said. Unless we really make a stand for this and make
sure that mainstream media thoroughly covers the issue, the whole thing
will be eased in with proper marketing to make sure that most
mainstream customers won’t make a big deal out of it. They will only
realize what was lost long after it's gone.

--------



For more information about this story see http://ipower.ning.com



For more information about Internet freedom: savetheinternet.com





Not Copyrighted. Readers can reprint and are free to redistribute - as
long as full credit is given to American Free Press - 645 Pennsylvania
Avenue SE, Suite 100 Washington, D.C. 20003