March 8, 2010 9:06 AM
The world's right to web access
Here's a contrast with the current shenanigans with the Digital Economy Bill - according to a BBC survey nearly 80 percent of the population of the world thinks that Internet access is a fundamental right.
A poll for the BBC World Service found that 79 percent of users agreed that access to the Internet was a fundamental human right, with a massive 96 percent of highly-wired South Korea agreeinig with the proposition. And to show how much of a desire there is for Internet connectivity, 70 percent of non-web users said that they should have access to the web.
It's a stark reminder of what our law-makers are having to deal with as they try to get to grips with the fundamental problems of copyright protection and why, the heavy-handed measures proposed by the French and UK governments, are probably not the best method of dealing with copyright infringements.
According to the BBC, some governments, such as Estonia and Finland, have already ruled that access to the Internet is a human right and, as I blogged last week, the German government is certainly wary of cutting off Net access to its citizens.
We're certainly moving into a new era for web users but the BBC survey demonstrates starkly that web use is now almost as ingrained in the human psyche as reading books - it's something governments need to take on board as they consider all Internet legislation.
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