I recently joined, along with about 100,000 (and counting) people, in a Facebook group - Canadians Against Progroguing Parliament. I also joined one on ACTA - the Anti-counterfeiting and Trade Agreement that I've written about in other articles.

I write about government (Our Masters) sometimes, mostly to get something I've been stewing over out of my system. This (writing) is like taking an anti-histamine when you have an allergic reaction - you see I'm allergic to bureaucrats and politicians - I break out in shouting.

The thing is that until the advent of the huge social sites such as Facebook, getting the attention of our political leaders (or for that matter learning about what they were up to that was not directly available in your local newspaper) was really hard. Letters (snail mail) were pretty much the only thing that counted, although some open line radio programs and the callers' rants were listened to by some politicians.

Today however, we have the internet in general and the big social sites, Myspace, Facebook, etc., in particular. These sites allow what used to be a "back fence" conversation (over the back fence with your neighbour) that might eventually reach a hundred people over a few weeks, to blossom into a movement with hundreds of thousands of participants in hours or days. Regardless of how a statistician would categorize this "self selected" population as not necessarily representative of the overall population, the fact is that anything that gets this number of people interested enough to clutter their in-box with its messages in today's over-communicative atmosphere bears looking at by the subject of it - in this case the Prime Minister and his government. 

My good friend, David Ingram, has just sent out an email newsletter in his CEN-TApede series about "when do I have to file a State tax return?" and then he called me to discuss it. Most of the newsletter item is also available on his web site too.

You see I'm the one who turned him on to the situation of one unfortunate fellow who, in 2009 got a tax bill for 100% of his 2008 New York state taxes despite the fact that he lived in Arlington, VA. and telecommuted 60% of the time from home to his employer's offices in New York and his accountant had (reasonably) filed for only 40% of his income to New York, with the other 60% to Virginia. 

More recently, New York has been going after all manner of people who telecommute to businesses in New York, and after business who just have a "business nexus" (aka a rented warehouse or some other relatively minimal presence) to get corporate taxes and employee state taxes for work done on systems there, even remotely.

David called me because he recalled that one of my customers has rented computer service in New York and he was strongly suggesting that both my customer and I stop doing any work on that remote computer as fast as possible because in his opinion it is only a matter of time before New York (and other states are following suit by the way) started considering any electronic presence as a right to tax the business or individual.

This does not bode well for the server hosting industry in these states. It also does not bode well for the "cloud" computing industry in general as I can foresee them being told to keep track of when and where various businesses' applications actually run, even though they could theoretically run in many places at the same time and move from server to server at almost any time - such is the technology behind cloud computing.

As for me and my customer - I'm in the process of migrating them off the server to one hosted here in good old Vancouver, BC. The US in general and New York in particular loses, and Canada and BC win. The pricing here is a bit more than there, but at least if we're going to pay tax it will be to the same government we already deal with.

How about you? Are you potentially liable for taxes back for the past 10 years for work you've done remotely and/or having a "business nexus" through the hosting of your company (or personal) business computing in New York?

richard

It appears that the Stephen Harper lead Conservative government of Canada is stomping on free speech - at least freedom to speak by those who suck at the government tit so to speak. Non Governmental Organizations (NGO) that receive any funding from the federal government have been told to "be careful about your advocacy" by Keith Fountain, policy director for International Co-operation Minister Bev Oda.

Many (most) NGOs do a lot of work that benefits our society, and they have to survive across changes in government. If nothing else, the NGOs tend to act as advocates for some segment of the population in the never-ending fight for rational use of our resources and energies - pushing and pulling and hopefully balancing some of the excesses and neglects of other portions of our society - including government.

Some NGOs act as bellwethers in leading us toward better use of our environment. Some act as advocates for various segments of society that are in need. Some keep business honest and watch for long-term effects of short term decisions. I personally don't think we could get along without NGOs and their crusades - and most governments understand and agree with their continued existence and at least minimal governmental funding.

The problem here is not one of "should government be funding this NGO which is trying to do this and that?" The problem is one of using a specific warning against free speech as a whip. This is not a "governmental" action done with due consideration to the benefits and costs to society surrounding funding of a NGO, it is using political influence to stifle an NGO's ability to do what it sees is its course and mandate.

Fair debate on whether or not to fund NGOs in general and/or a specific NGO in particular and due process in this is one thing. Using direct threat is quite another.

Mr. Harper - we're watching you - and at this point I personally don't like some of the things you're doing.

Obligatory disclaimer - I do work for a NGO that is looking for federal funding for some projects

On the heals of Canada finally getting the OK to bid on US contracts funded by the US Stimulus package's "Buy American" clause it appears the European Union wants similar concessions from Canada for their member countries to bid on all things governmental in Canada, right down to the level of municipalities and school districts. There's push-back from some in Canada

Now don't get me wrong - I'm all in favour of open trade. In fact I like a lot of what the European Union has done to open up things like travel and business opportunities in Europe and I think that the US/Canada relationship should be much the same. This even includes the concept of shared currency and easier border crossing, in contrast to the more recent tightening up of the border. If the Americans won't open their border, then I really think we should be looking both to Europe and to the East. 

But then I'm a bit (a lot) of an idealist in some things like this.

My son, Michael, went to the anti-prorogue gathering in Vancouver yesterday. The Facebook group, Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament, has 214,067 members as I write this (I'm one of them) and there are another 89 groups with the word "prorogue" in them - statistically highly unlikely to be unrelated - with probably another 20,000 members total.

Barack Obama's presidential campaign proved that the internet is a political powerhouse - and Stephen Harper just proved he doesn't understand its power.

Barack Obama's YouTube channel has 1887 videos. Stephen Harper doesn't have a YouTube channel that I can find (there is one but it isn't him)

Governments and politicians all over the world are either embracing or trying to stifle the internet. What happens is up to us, the people who use it - especially those who use it to show governments and politicians that we're watching what they do, commenting on it, and gathering others of like mind to aid or oppose as the case demands.

Everyone has their pet peeve or pet project. The best thing you can do about it today is to tell others - others who may also share your peeve/project and who might tell others - and others and... pretty soon you have a movement. This of course works in "meat space" where you actually talk to others - but it works even better in the social network space.

Don't be put off if you don't get a ton of notice the first time you bring up a subject. Bring it up again in a different light, at a different time (even literally different times of day can make a difference) and if you really believe in it be persistent.

And of course if think we can be of help - tell David Ingram and me and we'll see about doing something on Around the World

Do you know where your personal information is today? You should - but "they" won't even tell you they're collecting it. HELP!!!

The Privacy Commissioner of Canada has launched a public consultation on emerging technologies, including online tracking, profiling and targeting of consumers by business. The deadline for written submissions is March 15th.

"In the practice of online consumer tracking, data about the browsing habits of individuals is collected through digital markers such as cookies. Additional data may be gathered using other technologies, such as deep packet inspection and the global positioning systems (GPS) common in many mobile communications devices.

Individuals themselves, moreover, volunteer significant amounts of personal information, especially through their participation in social networking sites, such as Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn, and other popular web-based services such as foursquare.

Personal data can be collated and mapped against other types of information to generate detailed personal profiles. Such profiles are valuable to marketers and other enterprises that want to target products or services to people of a particular demographic or with specific purchasing preferences. Companies may also use the information to evaluate the popularity or success of their online products or services.

Proponents say that online consumer tracking, profiling and targeting supports free Internet content, allows people to receive more relevant advertising and discount offers, and promotes the development of useful services. For example, in conjunction with data from sources such as GPS and cellular networks, users can enjoy location-based services that recommend nearby restaurants or keep tabs on the whereabouts of friends.

Critics, however, warn that people may be unaware that their personal information is being collected, and do not understand how it is used. They also argue that, even when the information is anonymous, it can sometimes be combined with other information to identify individuals."

They're soliciting written submissions from the general public and I intend to submit one. What I'm looking for is information from you, including opinions, that I can include in my submission.

I know you are busy - so am I - but if we work together maybe we can counter the well-funded lobbyists, including those of the publishing industries who want to be able to include privacy-invasive information gathering in the Digital Rights Management systems they want the government to enshrine in law that we can't break or circumvent.

There have been 3 recent Copyright law bills proposed that completely break privacy in my humble opinion. Fortunately all three have fortunately died on the order paper - but the most recent news is that the United States is using their ability to block trade in sugar from Costa Rica until Costa Rica (a nation of about 4.5 million people) knuckles under and implements a US-style copyright regime complete with "DMCA-style protections" (aka you're guilty until you prove you're innocent). With Free Trade always on the table between Canada and the US, and the "secret" ACTA in negotiation which includes similar copyright and anti-circumvention provisions to the DMCA, now is the time to hook privacy into the argument in a big way.

In addition, the European Union is pressuring Canada to extend author copyright to 70 years from the current 50 (remember, it was originally 14 years) and also jump on the anti-circumvention bandwagon.

The privacy aspects in copyright must be addressed.

The privacy aspects of the internet in general must be understood and our government must be made aware of what we feel are relevant problems and concerns.

You have to think about this in the context of your use of technologies in the networked world - read on for some examples that should make you think - and hopefully respond.

The future of the internet is not at all clear at this time. If the publishers and some governments have their way it will become merely another set of "airwaves" to be heavily regulated, taxed and bureaucratized. If you don't believe me, you might take a look at this story from Italy about their Communications Ministry wanting any/all who upload video to the internet to get a license. Absurd! The various proposals (and implementations) of a "3 strikes" law removing access to the internet is also absurd.

In Part 1 we dealt with basic copyright laws both in place and in the works to help prop up the publishing industry as it has been for hundreds of years.

In Part 2 we dealt with how your rights as the owner of hardware or purchaser of services have been and continue to be eroded.

In Part 3 we dealt with privacy and how it is being eroded.

In this part we'll sum the series up and deal with some insights into what might happen in the future - and what you can do to forestall the erosion of your rights under copyright and the extension of intrusive behavior into your lives at every point.

How is government, both on its own from bureaucratic self-interest and ignorance, and at the behest of the publishing businesses to protect its failing business model, eroding your privacy and rights using the internet and new technology as the lever?

In Part 1 we dealt with basic copyright laws both in place and in the works to help prop up the publishing industry as it has been for hundreds of years.

In Part 2 we dealt with how your rights as the owner of hardware or purchaser of copyright goods and services have been and continue to be eroded.

In this part we'll discuss privacy and civil rights in general and in relationship to the enforcement of laws that have no justification other than to continue business models that are outmoded or to foster a paternalistic government bureaucracy.

In this part we'll extend the discussion of technology stifling to include the hardware you purchase to listen to your music, watch your video and interact with the internet. The publishing industry has had a hand in all of it and wants to stop you from doing many things, things that are the essence of living in a technological world. In Part 1 you learned something of my background and about why/how the publishers are trying to stifle technology in the face of their changing business. In this part we'll explore the changes proposed to the works and hardware you purchase.