Today I have joined the many free-thinkers who have blacked out their MySpace, Facebook, or Twitter avatars in protest to an absurd law in New Zealand, under which any party "accused of Copyright Infringement" can lose thier internet connectivity; permanently.

Now, sure - you can say "but I live in the UK (or US, AUS, EU)" and think that this law won't affect you, but you'd be forgetting that this law is more than just "another piece of foreign legislation". Much like the UK's form 696, if this proposal goes through many more gorvernments could follow suit, and we'd lose another footholding in our civil rights. As I'm sure you intelligent people are aware, the IFPI is years behind in the way it deals with internet P2P sharing, and the last thing it wants to do is adapt to the new evironment; it would rather squash it.

If this sounds law like a bad idea to you, please black-out all of your public profile avatars, and educate your friends about the protest, until February 28th when this daft law is supposed to go through.

Thank you.

Update (16/02/09): I only wrote this post today, and I already found another that puts my point across much better than I do.

Update (01/03/09): If you took part in this protest, give yourself a pat on the back. The New Zealand government have said that a decision will be made on March 27th, after a re-wording of the legislation to remove the ambiguity of what constitutes a "copyright infringement".