A new law has been rushed out allowing Goverment officals to block certain websites and even completly lock you out of the internet completly (Similer to what Microsoft does if your caught modding online).
This has been applied in China and doesn’t seem to be a fan favorate, Many other politicians are speaking out against this saying it will also hurt the innocent, The law states that you can have your internet block by pirating, which is understandable, and from reciving files, which is a problem because if somebody thinks the file is unallowed (say for example the soundtrack of a game) they might block the internet for your house, this is a problem because what if you have to work online and somebody, say a relative, gets the internet blocked you’ll probitly have to begin searching for a manual labour job.
how does this relate to gaming? well as people know when they get control over something they can extend it, today its blocking internet because of a assumption that could be wrong (For example, I could pirate Rome: Total war, HOWEVER! I bought the game after, I could Empire earth, AOE 1 & 2 + there expansions, Sim city 3000 HOWEVER! I own these discs but the discs don’t work, should I lose my internet because I pirated something then bought it or Pirated something because my discs of the said game are broke?)
Tomorrow it could be like China (No offense intended) the next week they could block you outright online for saying “Ass”
Of course this is most likly the “never going to happen” imagination of an 18 year old teen however the goverment have talked about blocking outright before, Namly Youtube, MP’s have also spoken out about games (most recently Modern Warfare 2) which makes the chance of them blocking online gaming a slim but possible chance
Despite law officals rushing the law through several other MP’s are disagreeing with this law and can possibly try to change or overrule it as quoted from Jim Killock, who is a Director at the Open rights group said “Its the most Farcical ,Draconain way of trying to enforce copyright law. website blocking isn’t something that happens in democratival countries, its something that happens in China”
Labour MP Tom Watson also risked being disicplined by voting against the new law, he stated it as “Undemocratic to forword such a Bill in just 24 hours”
Although this is not game related I will keep you informed to see if any other steps are made due to how this is a VERY big issue
Stay safe
-Tik