Somewhere in the dark and nasty regions of Australia, where nobody goes, stands an ancient castle.

Deep within this dank and uninviting place, lives Michael Atkinson “Ello!” – overworked servant of the Thing Upstairs.

“Atkinson! Feed me!”

…But that’s nothing compared to the horrors that lurk beneath the Trap Door… for there is always something down there, in the dark, waiting to come out!

I don’t know what’s worse, Stephen Conroy and his bloody internet filter or Michael Atkinson and his election censorship laws.

Despite nobody asking for such laws to be put in place, early this year the South Australian government passed a law effectively prohibiting anyone from anonymously commenting on elections in South Australia.

The new law, which came into force on January 6, requires anyone making an online comment about next month’s state election to publish their real name and postcode.


Although already passed, the law doesn’t come into effect until writs are released for the election on March 20th. The writs themselves can be written up and released anytime up to 25 days before March 20th.

Currently when leaving a comment an online you leave your details in a form and can choose whatever alias you want.

Once people start commenting about the South Australian election nothing much is going to change. If I want to put in Humphrey B. Bear with a postcode of 90210 who’s going to stop me?

At worst the comment I left won’t get published.

At best I’ll leave a realish looking name with a bogus postcode and still enjoy the benefit of publishing anonymously.

Either way the law is already ineffective. It does get worse though…

The law requires media organisations to keep a person’s real name and full address on file for six months, and they face fines of $5000 if they do not hand over this information to the Electoral Commissioner.


Can someone tell me why the Electoral Commissioner needs to know what I am saying about various political candidates or political parties?

What are they doing, monitoring news websites and waiting to pull people in for questioning everytime something they disagree with is published?

And how technologically cumbersome is it going to be for publishers to keep people’s names and full address on file for 6 months?

The data cannot be verified so integrity is already compromised from the beginning. Talk about your exercises in futility.

Like every attempt to control the internet in Australia I can’t help but roll my eyes and wonder which dinosaur of a politician approved this law.

Stand up and take a bow South Australian attorney general Michael Atkinson.

Fifty one year old Michael Atkinson not only approved the massive blow
to public privacy but also lashed out defending his decision.

Attorney-General Michael Atkinson denied that the new law was an attack on free speech.

“The AdelaideNow website is not just a sewer of criminal defamation, it is a sewer of identity theft and fraud,” Mr Atkinson said.


It seems that one old fart’s grudge against people being able to publish without any form of identification verification in place is at the roots of this new law.

The good news is that after the law was passed we’ll all still be able to publish anonymously, we’ll just have to use realistic sounding names.

Short of everyone installing some sort of monitoring software how the hell is a commenting system going to know you’re not really Lady Von Touchmybottom?

Way to go Atkinson. Mission: Ineffective?

Additionally I wonder if the irony of complaining  that people can publish as anyone is defamatory and labelling a newspaper publication as a sewer of criminal defamation, identity theft and fraud’ is lost on him.

Additionally there’s talk that the censorship law will extend over Facebook, Twitter and talk back radio… because y’know, nobody publishes under nonsense internet pseudonyms on Facebook or Twitter.

As for talkback radio, yeah good luck with that one. When was the last time you gave your full name and address to some random over the phone?

Perhaps we could all get identity barcodes and just make life easier for the government.

Talk about population explosions, increasing welfare, screwing over anyone who wasn’t a working class family and the gradual curtailing of civil liberties are amongst some of the reasons I packd up and left Australia.

The combination of politicians not understanding how the internet works (along with it’s limitations such as identity verification on name and addresses alone), and the introduction of laws like this only serve to cement in my mind that I made the right decision.

Unless someone can come up with a better answer, the only people I see benefiting from laws like this are the ones in power. The general public certainly don’t have anything to gain.

Rest assured though this is a once off deal. In response to criticism Atkinson sought to reassure everyone by stating there “there was no intention to broaden the law to take it beyond the period of elections”.

The similarity between Atkinson’s comment censorship and Stephen Conroy’s ‘we’re only testing the viability of an internet filter’ routine seem to sum up Labor’s stance on internet censorship;

‘As soon as we find something that works we’re going to make sure nobody says anything online we disagree with’.

In supporting this law when it was proposed I believe the Liberals aren’t too far behind either.

Despite not having free speech per say I’ve always believed that in Australia we at least had political free speech. If so, what does it matter what name I use to publish my opinions on an election?

1. Michael Trkulja sues search engines over results
2. Stephen Conroy admits internet filter is useless
3. Stephen Conroy on 4 Corners: Lies and spin continues
4. The future of Australian internet under Stephen Conroy
5. Google says no to China censorship, but Australia ok?