On April 21 2010 10:27 Mortality wrote:On April 21 2010 08:31 Asjo wrote:
This ISP did the same with ThePirateBay, which is also incredible (mostly due to the fact that it should not be possible to ask ISPs to censor sites, something which I believe they are still fighting in court), but that is a whole other matter.
I'm going to take a tangent here, but I want to say this:
An ISP is providing you a private service, not a public one, therefore in a sense they are in the right when it comes to censorship. You're using their service, they are not obligated to allow access to any website in the world.
However, capitalism doesn't work when the customer doesn't know what he (or she) is purchasing. ISP's should be obligated to be upfront in terms of what kind of services they provide and a change of policy should not be something that can be implemented effective immediately. Customers need to be given the opportunity to re-evaluate the service they are receiving and consider changing services.
Of course, everything I'm saying comes with a drawback. In many parts of the world you have limited choices regarding your ISP. If I want internet at my apartment, I
have to use the service that the apartment complex has signed up with if I want cable internet. I don't even know if I can get DSL and nobody in their right mind uses dial-up. I've been satisfied with my service, but still -- lack of consumer choice kills a free market.
Just a rant from a crazy person...
Sorry for my late reply. I just saw your comment when using the new TL function of seeing a user's posts and backtracking my old comments. However, I just wanted to point out that was I meant was that companies should not be able to force ISPs to block something, not that ISPs weren't in their right to. The ISPs don't want to be the ones to censor internet access of the private user and are fighting this ruling for obvious reasons, however, until the courts decide to change their mind, the ISPs are forced to censor these sites.