Patrice came up with a worrying thing that is especially interesting to
fsfeurope:
From: Patrice Riemens <patrice(a)xs4all.nl>
The new Italian law, whereby each and every piece of soft and hardware
used for commercial purpose (i.e. pretty much any, including public space,
even when non-profit - ascii cafe, pay attention!) must carry a stamp of
approval by the authorities (against copyright infringments) which is so
complicated & expensive to obtain that only very big firms (think of one)
can manage to do so, is another nice example. Not having the stamp on your
stuff (and possibly next, tatooed on yr skin, when the wetware will also
come under the purview of the protection of the biggos' 'intellectual
property') will be a penal offense and carry punitive fines and long
prison sentences. Open Source development activities and Free Software use
will become crimes. Now that's good news for M$ (and Co$?), well they
lobbyed hard for it.
(Full story in nettime - Or is it's again a piece of 'monkey
sandwich'- Dutch for urban myth - peddled by afficionados of conspiracy
theories?)