I'm a massive fan of Charlie Stross and, while I've been wanting to write about the insanity that is the Digital Economy Bill, I think that he has hit the nail on the head.

I'm reproducing his whole article because I believe that it is important to get this message out there, and I hope he doesn't mind that I want to make sure that people read his article and aren't put off by having to follow a link.

I also humbly suggest that you go and read his blog. Then head over to the Open Rights Group and see how you can help. Even if it is just phoning your MP to let them know that punishment without trial is terribly un-British.

Imbeciles

I was trying to think of something coherent to say about the Digital Economy Bill published this week, but I'm too damned angry right now.

I'm a self-employed media professional working in the entertainment industry, who earns his living by creating intellectual property and licensing it to publishers. You might think I'd be one of the beneficiaries of this proposed law: but you'd be dead wrong. This is going to cripple the long tail of the creative sector — it plays entirely to the interests of large corporate media organizations and shits on the plate of us ordinary working artists.

Want to write a casual game for the iPhone and sell it for 99 pence? Good luck with that — first you'll have to cough up £50,000 to get it certified as child-friendly by the BBFC. (It's not clear whether this applies to Open Source games projects, but I'm not optimistic that it doesn't.)

Want to publish a piece of shareware over BitTorrent? You're fucked, mate: all it takes is a malicious accusation and your ISP (who are required to snitch on p2p users on pain of heavy fines) will be ordered to cut off the internet connection to you and everyone else in your household. (A really draconian punishment in an age where it's increasingly normal to conduct business correspondence via email and to manage bank accounts and gas or electricity bills or tax returns via the web.) Oh, you don't get the right to confront your accuser in court, either: this is merely an administrative process, no lawyers involved. It's unlikely that p2p access will survive this bill in any form — even for innocent purposes (distributing Linux .iso images, for example).

I've had problems in the past with idiots at Elsevier issuing DMCA takedown notices against legitimately-posted copies of Accelerando, on the basis of a web search conducted by spider. If this bill goes through, it's going to make it difficult for me to distribute fiction for free (encouraging readers to try my work); I don't want to see folks having their connectivity axed just because a filename they downloaded matches something with an ISBN in Amazon's database.

This bill isn't about securing our creative industries. It's about fucking the little guys, depriving them of channels to reach their public, and about protecting the cartel of big media organizations who are threatened by the development of the public internet. And it stinks from the head down.

I don't like to do incandescent anger (I have blood pressure issues). So I don't usually focus on issues like this on my blog (you want me to live long enough to finish the current book before I stroke out, right?). So I'm going to hand you over to Cory Doctorow, who has the goods, and to the Open Rights Group, who need your support.

That's all for now.

UPDATE: There's a petition on the Number 10 Downing Street website, "to abolish the proposed law that will see alleged illegal filesharers disconnected from their broadband connections, without a fair trial". If you live in the UK, I strongly urge you to sign it. While these petitions are in no way binding, large sign-ups send a warning sign to the government and have, in the past, provoked a re-think on controversial legislation. And this is especially likely in the run-up to a general election (which must be held within the next six months).

I've given up on the NaNoWriMo for this year - too many twelve hour shifts (I'm starting nightshifts today), coupled with some deadlines approaching and I'd have to spend twelve hour shifts when not at work writing to keep up with the schedule.

This doesn't mean I'm abandoning it, I'm going to keep writing it, and I may throw the 'beta version' up somewhere else - be sure I'll let you know when and if I do.

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Back to writing about ambulance work, work that often seems stranger than fiction.

The job I'm writing about today would, if shown as a 'Casualty' episode, have me groaning at the screen at how unlikely the events were.

We were sent to a 'male, collapsed', on the screen was the patient's name - it was a name I was somewhat familiar with.

It was a name I used to go by (sometimes I feel like Old Ben Kenobi remembering his time as Obi wan Kenobi with the amount of names I had...).

I've mentioned my father once on this site - in 2005 I wrote this,

The short version of my history with my father is that he left home when I was around fourteen (my brother was around twelve), and married another woman (without divorcing my mother first – an oversight on his part, he is after-all barely literate). Since then I haven’t seen or heard from him, which was a bit strange as the split between mum and him wasn’t acrimonious.

So my attitude toward him has basically been ‘Fuck him’, it appears that he wanted us out of his life as quickly as possible, and he has succeeded admirably on that point.

So…why was I thinking about how I’d love to meet with him, tell him how excellent my life is? I’d love to let him know that my brother is an excellent teacher and is getting well paid for his work. I’d love him to see how his walking out on us only freed both my brother and I to go on to do things that we love doing. I’d love to show him how relaxed and chilled out my mother is now. I’d love someone to read this blog out to him, so that he could know that I’m doing better without him in my life.

Actually…I wonder if he is still alive?

So – for one moment after not thinking about him for years, I’d love to rub his nose in how good my family and I have it now he isn’t on the scene.

And now I find myself going to someone who could well be him...

We arrived on scene, I was driving and I'd been telling my crewmate about my history with my father. It looked like the place where I'd last seen him more than twenty years ago, but I wasn't sure.

Then we entered the flats and from the tickle in my memory it was obvious that this was where he lived.

He was laying on the floor with one of our FRU people already looking after him. The FRU looked at us and started to give us a handover.

'This is *Firstname* *Secondname*', he said.

'I know', I replied, 'it's my dad.'

'Hey, your son is here', the FRU said.

'He probably wouldn't recognise me', I said back as my father turned to look at me.

The job itself was fairly simple, carry him downstairs, into the lift - then, after running some tests, off to hospital.

I wheeled him into the lift, it was small so his 'wife' walked down the stairs - me, my crewmate and my dad, alone in the lift.

He looked up at me and said the only two words he would say to me during the time we spent together that night.

'Say nothing'.

Now, if I had even the slightest care about him, those two words would rip out my soul and stamp on it. It would break my heart. That his son, who he hasn't seen for twenty or more years is here, saving his life and all he wants is for me to say nothing to him.

He has his new life, and he wants nothing to do with me, or my brother.

'Fuck him' would indeed seem to be the right attitude to have had over him, and I'm very glad that I've not worried, fretted or even given a moments consideration to the man that walked out on me and my brother. Now I knew why we'd never had even a birthday card from him.

He had obviously wanted to wash his hands of us.

So I switched to 'full on professional' mode. I spoke to his 'wife' (who seems quite a nice person actually) to get his history and I drove him to hospital.

After dropping him off I asked my crewmate if she thought it would be a good idea if I walked in to him, told him how well our family is doing without him and then walked out.

She rightly pointed out that despite wanting to give him a slap when he'd said 'say nothing' to me, it would do no good.

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So we left him at hospital - I don't know if he lived or died. To be honest I don't care - I care less than I would were he one of the strangers I pick up normally.

I told my mum about it, and she was furious - I think she would have quite liked to have turned up at the hospital herself, but I assured her that once my shift was over I'd stopped thinking about him.

So yes, stranger than Casualty - although I'm sure that Casualty would have had us reconciling...

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Oh, that 'other project' I mentioned? It's my new group website. And it's open.