SPLINTERNET 3: GDPR and the Right to be Forgotten

Ephemera

Splinternet is an irregular report from Ephemera. Once upon a time, we thought of the Internet as like the Wild West; anarchic and mostly empty. The dream of the World Wide Web was ‘all of the world’s knowledge, at all the world’s fingertips’. But this dream has failed to materialize. As Scott Malcomson says in his book ‘Splinternet’, from which I’ve taken the title of this series: “the Internet is cracking apart into discrete groups no longer willing, or able, to connect.”

This month, we’ll be looking at the regulatory approach of the European Union, which seeks to curtail and police the Internet, but in a way that defends the privacy and human rights of Internet users. This is quite different from authoritarian forms of policing the Net, and the EU are pioneers in uncharted territory on this. Are there problems with the EU’s approach to copyright and surveillance? Are they being adopted elsewhere? Will they work? ---

SHOW NOTES: My sincere thanks go out to ephemera’s patrons. I couldn’t have done a research-focused series like SPLINTERNET without your support. Patronage also includes nearly an hour of bonus episodes, two hours of other content, and the right to do a voice on the show. View all current and former patrons on this page: http://storiesfromtheinter.net/about While you're there: http://patreon.com/ephemerapodcast http://storiesfromtheinter.net/zine http://storiesfromtheinter.net/music

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Want a better handle on the idea of the “splinternet”? Here’s a quick and good tv interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZJSRR66teM There are a lot of new GDPR compliance related businesses that want to sell YOUR business their products. More here: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/10/world/europe/10spain.html

More on the right to be forgotten in criminal cases: https://www.datainnovation.org/2018/09/the-eus-right-to-be-forgotten-is-now-being-used-to-protect-murderers/

PDF link （！）to the letter signed by Tim Berners-Lee, Jimbo Wales, and a lot of other Internet luminaries about the dangers of the copyright directive: https://tinyurl.com/LuminariesLetter

MEP Julia Reda’s blog posts on articles 11 and 13: https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/extra-copyright-for-news-sites/ https://juliareda.eu/eu-copyright-reform/censorship-machines/ James Bridle's "Citizen Ex", with an essay on algorithmic citizenship and downloadable browser extension. https://citizen-ex.com/ PS here's his self-driving car hex: https://vimeo.com/208642358

You actually CAN get an internet passport. The ultimate in cyberstatehood swag! https://thefpl.us/also-made/passports