Whirlpool forum member Rupple has discovered that on Senator Conroy’s website there’s a little bit of code to make sure that any searches for “ISP filtering” aren’t actually published to the tag cloud of site searches. The filtering has already begun!
The code essentially tells the site to skip over any searches for ISP filtering, meaning that you’ll never actually see the term appear in the tag cloud. Considering how much backlash the government has received over the policy, it’s not exactly surprising. But at the same time, the tag cloud’s purpose is to show topics that people have been searching for and hiding the fact that people are trying to get more information about a controversial policy just highlights how ridiculous the whole concept is.
I mean, it’s not like searching for “ISP filtering” on the minister’s website is equivalent to criticising it. If you actually do the search, you still get results, and it’s important that people curious about the details of the policy be able to access the information.
If the government already filters its own sites to control what it wants people to see – especially for such a volatile topic for debate – how can they honestly expect us to not to expect them to do the same if the filter is introduced?
[Whirlpool via News via Lifehacker]