Worrisome Trends

...The most obvious being, my inability to update.

But now that I'm here, I figure it's time to post on some things that have been creeping up on, and profusely nagging at the back of my mind. Two of the largest ones are tied together on a common trend these days... censorship.

Lately, Boing Boing has ended up on SmartFilter's Hit List... and no one is quite sure why, as far as I can tell. This means numerous coorporations, schools and governments are blocking access to the best source of tech news links and wierdness on the net. I think BoingBoing is fairly harmless, which does beg the question of why Smartfilter is blocking it. Currently the best summary of this episode is probably Google Current's 'Darth Tater' post (Link)

While the blocking of one of the most popular sites on the web is somewhat unusual, there is a slightly thicker stink surrounding the blocking of a number of left-leaning political blogs and sites from access by military personel in Iraq. i owuld like to imagine that this is a mix up, but ti does seem too convenient that thsoe sites are blocked, while access to Limbaugh and other conservative-canted sites are allowed. Hopefully someone will realize how embaressing that is, and turn off said filtering before it becomes any more problematic. (Link)

And, in another disturbing trend, Senators Clinton and Lieberman are proposing that the CDC investigate gaming. This seems to be the newest piece in what is shaping up to be a democratic war on video games.. and frankly, that leaves a sour taste in my mouth, as if anything the word 'Republican' should be in there somewhere. It just seems strange for a party that has been (rightfully) taking offense to the domestic wiretapping issue and shrinking civil liberties to go after gaming in a way that seems destined to hurt free speech.

In my opinion, which at the very least matters for my personal vote, the Dems who are jumping onto this wagon and becoming 'defenders of family' are shooting themselves in the foot. I se a fair overlap with the people who are part of the netroots leftist movement, and video game enthusiasts. I guess the gist of the gamble may be picking up the concerned parent vote, at the cost of the enthusiasm of the young politically active gamer. I think it's a losing proposition.

Kotaku and Slashdot are perhaps the best places to keep an eye on these issues, as they've carried all these stories in the past few weeks.

And that's all he chuffed.
-Tiger