On 2003-12-06 00:19:13 +0000 Paul Taylor <ptaylor@uklinux.net> wrote:
[...] The people that benefit from back-handers in government circles and "pork belly legislation" (to borrow from the yanks) are the same people that own and therefore dictate the editorials of newspapers.
There's also the problem that many journalists see current copyright system as an essential tool to get money for their work. If the far more restrictive practices of software copyright licensing gets overturned, they fear that similar questions will be asked of their "media empires." After all, if every Jack could duplicate their newspaper or magazine, their circulation would fall and they'd not get paid, would they? Of course, there are some brave ones who have realised that publications are at least as much about the service of publishing and distributing.
and saw first hand the menal immisseration of people by the media in order to keep a docile and ill-informed (therefore innactive) public. We are now fast-tracking that way.
http://www.deliberatedumbingdown.com/ may be worth a read to get you thinking, although please be careful about the bits where "it's all the fault of too much government/they copy the soviet methods/ktp" -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know. Please http://remember.to/edit_messages on lists to be sure I read http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ gopher://g.towers.org.uk/ slef@jabber.at Creative copyleft computing services via http://www.ttllp.co.uk/