For those who care (and you all should) ACTA, or, the “Anti-Counterfeiting and Trade Agreement” treaty has been leaked from start to finish online. All 56 pages are ready and waiting for your prying eyes to delve deep into the twisted grammatical concoctions. Just in case “the cave” has been your house for the last few months, ACTA is an all encompassing bill of sorts that will bring about some pretty monumental changes to the online world. Namely, IP infringement and network policing are two of the bigger items.
Of course, this whole “leak” wouldn’t be all that important in the news if the committees and governments drafting this legislation actually adhered to previous promises of “openness” and “transparency”. Both of which all parties involved have lacked up until this point, even going as far as threatening in various forms those who do try to share any information.
From the beginning, I as well as countless others have been highly against the secretive approach that’s been taken. If a bill is going to affect so many people in pretty profound ways, there is absolutely no reason it should be kept a secret. Corporate lobbying at it’s best I’m afraid. Now it’s our turn.
I haven’t read through it all yet, but will spend a good deal of the latter of the day doing just that. Go ahead and let me know anything interesting you find!
- Check out ACTA from start to finish here.
