Telstra Clear plays last post for Sec92a ?

Telstra Clear, one of New Zealands largest ISP's, won't be supporting the proposed code of practice being hammered out by the Telecommunication Carriers Forum, TCF. The code is designed to navigate the implementation of the controversial Sec 92a of the Copyright Amendment Act which requires ISP's to monitor and police practices around copyright disputed customer downloads.

Despite their best efforts to put a positive spin on the news , the TCF will be hard pressed to make the code work.

Others to follow?
It will also be interesting to see which other ISPs decide to go the same way as Telstra Clear by close of play today. I'm picking at least one more of the top 5 service providers will throw in the towel and say, "nope, its too hard, why should be be the ones that try to make sense of a piece of legislation which even Prime Minster John Key described as "a bit ropey"

Radio New Zealand report
Karen Gregory-Hunt from Radio NZ did a fine piece on this on Morning Report, National Radio.
Download: Ogg Vorbis MP3

Colin Jackson
Colin Jackson, NZ based internet analyst and commentator and one time President of Internet NZ has also blogged on the latest developments , here. In part he says,

"The next step here is to get S92A repealed altogether. Then to start a wider conversation involving artists and Internet folk - some of whom are the same people - to work out how copyright should work in the Internet age. It would be truly wonderful if the government would facilitate that."

I totally agree with both sentences, with the emphasis on the second - time to start a conversation and get this sorted for all concerned. Polarity only works for batteries. It is not a long term solution for real people