One things I didn’t manage to follow up on fully while I was in France was the issue of Internet censorship. As one commenter (thank you, Paul!) mentioned, France is in the process of passing some fairly draconian laws that allow for disconnection of users suspected of piracy. There’s an overview in The Guardian here. It all sounds very similar to what happened in New Zealand a while back, with Internet users potentially being pronounced “guilty” on the say-so of big corporations and no right to a trial. That one we won. As for France (insert Gallic shrug)?

I talked about this briefly with Lionel and he says the situation is quite complex. In particular there is European activity in the pipeline that could render the new French regulations illegal under European law. Where things will go from there it is difficult to say. Sorry I can’t be more precise about this.