ThruIT

Officer: “Is that a Macbook”

Woman: “Yes…uh… err, wait no!”

Officer: “Sorry Ma’am we are a PC only country, We are going to have to put her down.”

::Officer takes out gun, and proceeds to put three bullets into it::

Officer: “You are free to enter the country now.”

Welcome to the weekend everybody! Time for another installment of the Policy Roundup. It was an awkward week out there on the interwebs – most notably for our more scurvy readers, The Pirate Bay officially shut down its tracker. The move comes at the end of a very drawn out, sketchy takeover of the domain by an independent buyer. And while PEX and DHT will obviate the need for trackers in the long run, it’s sad to see TBP fizzle out so impotently.

So at the end of each week here at ThruIT, we will review interesting stories related to IT policy and law from around the globe. Or, at the very least we’ll post whichever quasi-interesting policy stories have turned up on Gizmodo.

At any rate, two standout items this week are the patenting of a particular flavor of the “sudo” UNIX command by Microsoft, and the MPAA-forced shutdown of a municipal WiFi network over one illegal download.

Information has been appearing all over the ‘net about the secret Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement being negotiated between roughly 40 nations in Seoul, South Korea. Rumblings about ACTA have been going on for a while now, but it seems what is actually in the treaty is beginning to come to light. What is allegedly being discussed is terrifying – a global DMCA-like regime that makes ISP’s the watchdog for copyrighted content (lions), three strikes disconnect policy (tigers), the end or major changes to safe harbor provisions (bears), and other major changes that could dramatically change the internet forever (Oh my!).

Different arguments have been made in the past for the treatment of ex-convicts and their privacy. Various laws have been implemented that violates their privacy (for example Meghan’s Law) and this article is not setting out to argue whether they are right or wrong. However, a new law that is starting tomorrow in Georgia seems to be a little bit too extreme.