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Originally Posted by tompe
Yes, but since the morally superior goal is to get open source programs than hurting commersial alternatives is not so bad.
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I'm not even gonna go there...
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Originally Posted by Lucien21
Ok back to the topic of Traffic Management.
The Uk has recently hinted at legislation to force ISP's to monitor the usage by their customers and Ban people from the internet for downloading piracted items.
The ISP's are saying that there are many legal as well as technical barriers to this and strongly impose any role other than "mere conduits".
Most ISP's have some sort of traffic management programme that throttles the speed of torrent files etc, but encrypting the file and other measures ensure the downloaders are usually one step ahead of the ISP's.
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I suggest we all look at what China is doing about these issues. If individual countries decide that sharing files like this is too counter-productive, even dangerous, there's little reason why more of those countries can't put into effect the "digital borders" and outlawing of encryption and other services that China practices.
The key is legality, a state that can always change. Just as laws had to be developed to rein in the automobile when it was first introduced (in the name of public safety), so laws can be rewritten to rein in digital file propagation if it is seen as counter to a country's safety and security.
Whether we like it or not, a sizable measure of traffic management is possible. And I suspect that if a better system isn't found at some point, TM is going to be a more attractive alternative to a lot of countries. The internet can conceivably find itself broken up into as many distinct pieces as there are countries. I'm not saying it would be easy, or preferable, just that it could happen.