More filtration processes
I’ve heard about this from a couple of directions today:
Europe could follow France in proposing a law that would shut down all internet access for those caught illegally sharing files. We reported last week how French president Nicolas Sarkozy would endorse a plan that, in exchange for dropping many DRM restrictions, would create an agency to monitor all high-volume internet users’ traffic - and snip their connections if they persist in sharing after two warnings. Now that plan is cited as an example of one way to balance copyright rules with stimulating the European online media market. . .
Links here and here. Is this legal? Are all ISPs going to go along?
And this from Japan, where an all-IP “next generation network” is about to be launched:
See that IMS layer? That stands for “interactive multimedia subsystem.” Wikipedia describes it as a “horizontal control layer that isolates the access network from the service layer.”
IMS is the technical version of the “agency to monitor all high-volume internet users traffic” that the Europeans are working on. The general goal is to make internet access much more like the current US version of wireless “services” - more easily billable, controllable, and knowable.
I’m retreating to the letters of Noel Coward. He would have something funny to say about this, and I will search it out and report back.