Battleangel

You’d be hard pressed to come up with a more somber news item headline. Candidates include: “Homo sapiens extinct” and “Earth uninhabitable in two weeks.”

Internet2 announced Friday that both the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) have joined the consortium as corporate members. The two groups plan to assist in creating methods to distribute content using digital rights management technologies.

“We look forward to collaborative work with a broad spectrum of Internet2’s members to develop new technologies that will enable us to produce and distribute digital content over next generation networks in ways that protect and enhance the value of creative works,” Cary Sherman, president of the RIAA said.

It’s not clear if the RIAA and MPAA’s direct sponsorship of Internet2 will give the groups additional access to information on those using the network for illicit file swapping.

No, but it’s a fair assumption.

It is clear that the corporate-fascist interests aren’t going to miss Internet2 as they did with the first Internet boom. Not only did they miss it but they commonly stood on the sidelines laughing about it. Well, look who is laughing now …
Unfortunately for the rest of us, they have learned from their mistake. Obviously there is no reason to move to Internet2 but I assume that the move will come, seamlessly and forcefully. And this could spell doom, not just for advocates of free information, but free speech itself. There is no shortage of powerful entities that feel that the Internet was big mistake in its current form and would like to start over.