It’s a service delivered in the UK, though, so it should have to abide by UK law. The problem is we’ve had the internet for 30+ years now and we’re only just getting round to thinking about this stuff, so it’s become normalised that the internet is just this lawless, godless, Wild West place. No one has really got a handle on the notion of what it means for the internet to be everywhere and nowhere. How do you legislate for that? The government is decades late to dealing with this stuff, so it will be all the harder to do anything, and that’s before you even get to thinking about whether what they’re doing is a good thing.
Ofcom to fine 4Chan
- Thread starter JonRGV250
- Start date
- Status
I disagree, in the same way if I sent a Tiananmen Square book to China, it's up to China to accept it, or block it, but I don't have to follow the their law.
Trying to create a website that abides by the laws of 180+ countries, plus state and other more local laws is impossible.
Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Sep 2003
- Posts
- 5,834
- Location
- Newcastle upon Tyne
Companies make physical products that adhere to laws in many countries you’d think it would be easier to make a website compliant.
We have laws, just about, that would prohibit the sale of certain books into the UK, and certainly videos. Why is it different when the medium is the internet?
As for the question of whether websites should be abiding by laws in umpteen countries… I imagine that’s not an issue for most “above board” websites as it stands. For the rest of them, this is another problem arising from this having not been considered decades ago.
Is it though? Just because it's accessible from the UK, I doubt that means it's delivered here in terms of offering an actual service... I'm not well versed in what they offer, but as far as I know, it's a troll image board; I doubt they go as far as offering it as a service... it's 'just there' is all
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 13 Apr 2013
- Posts
- 13,617
- Location
- La France
It’s incredibly difficult even for utterly legitimate corporations who employ huge teams specifically to ensure they do comply with the relevant local laws.
This why websites try to steer you to their regional site. Additionally, it greatly reduces translation costs when you only have to support the regional languages. For example, you’d only translate your Asian regional T&Cs into Simplified Chinese for Asia not translate your North American T&Cs into Finnish.
This why websites try to steer you to their regional site. Additionally, it greatly reduces translation costs when you only have to support the regional languages. For example, you’d only translate your Asian regional T&Cs into Simplified Chinese for Asia not translate your North American T&Cs into Finnish.
But the foreign company making the books doesn't have to comply with UK law. Now if they want their book sold in the UK, they need to otherwise it's going to be blocked.
4chan isn't interested in changing it's content, nor does it have to. The UK can either accept it or block it, but 4chan doesn't have to change for foreign laws.
Soldato
- Joined
- 13 Apr 2013
- Posts
- 13,617
- Location
- La France
And have been for at least 3 decades.
Well, yes, and that’s the quandary we find ourselves in. The UK government is trying to impose laws on foreign businesses who want to operate here, which is perfectly reasonable, but because it’s on the internet it falls into a legal black hole. We either expect them to comply with our laws, which they can refuse to do, on the basis of cyberspace not being governed by UK law, or we block them outright, which is a bit sinister and clearly open to abuse.
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 29 Sep 2003
- Posts
- 5,834
- Location
- Newcastle upon Tyne
Or the site voluntarily blocks countries whose laws they don’t want to adhere to.
Anyway. I suspect Ofcom have deliberately picked 4chan for this, because they know 4chan will tell them to do one, and you are guaranteed a court case and some legal wrangling straight away. Then Ofcom can go back to the government and tell them that the law they’ve just proudly enacted is unenforceable.
You only pick 4chan because you know you’ll get told where to go in no uncertain terms. Ofcom could pursue any number of porn sites and probably get them to comply, but 4chan will fight this, which I think is what Ofcom want.
You only pick 4chan because you know you’ll get told where to go in no uncertain terms. Ofcom could pursue any number of porn sites and probably get them to comply, but 4chan will fight this, which I think is what Ofcom want.
Yes, that is something they could do, if they were scared that the country’s legal system could actually bind them. 4chan clearly think it can’t, hence they will probably not do anything.
The legislation leaves both parties for any given (affected) site with a choice - the site owner can choose to amend their website and the way it works when visited from the UK if they think there is value in doing so, or they can leave it as it is. If they take the latter, then the UK has a choice to make about how it wants to respond to that choice of not complying with our requests.
Hopefully this argument will blow up with a few more high profile normal websites so the legislation can be seen for the nonsense that it is without being buried by 'but 4chan is a cesspit anyway' or 'its all about porn, think of the kids (but not like that)'
Hopefully this argument will blow up with a few more high profile normal websites so the legislation can be seen for the nonsense that it is without being buried by 'but 4chan is a cesspit anyway' or 'its all about porn, think of the kids (but not like that)'
It seems to be this way. Hopefully someone sensible within Ofcom realises this and that is their goal, and it isn't a stepping stone to try and increase the arsenal of censorship tools.
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 24 Jun 2021
- Posts
- 4,514
- Location
- Oxon
Which is justification for a change in tactic from "this website must.." to "this citizen must..". E.g. it is illegal for a UK citizen to access a blacklisted website
Soldato
- Joined
- 13 Apr 2013
- Posts
- 13,617
- Location
- La France
Whoopie! I expect any site or service not singing HMG’s praises to be on the naughty list ASAP.
Good luck the govt policing that.
All that happened when DL’ing from TPB was a snotty email from my ISP telling me I’m a very naughty boy and not to do it again.
I 100% don't, it's the parents responsibility not the governments to control what media our children consume.
If as an adult you can't be bothered setting stuff up that's on you. I have so much blocked at home.
I think if the government wanted to make a start they should have told ISPs to provide better equipment so you can better setup your home network, most are rubbish.
Last edited:
- Status