It’s worth looking at the heroes and villains finalists for this year’s ISPA Awards. The spiel that goes with each is an adequate summary of why they are in the list and needs no further comment from me. The heroes all deserve to win and the villains all deserve to lose.
On balance my vote goes to Stephen Carter for Hero. Whether he will have left a worthwhile legacy with the Digital Britain Report remains to be seen but at least he tried.
As far as Villains go I think they should all be locked up in the big brother house and the winner is the winner, if you know what I mean. Otherwise if I had to vote I’d go for Sarkozy because of the port blockades, air traffic controller strikes etc 
Internet Hero
• Billy Bragg and the Featured Artists Coalition - “For recognising publicly that the focus of music companies should be the development of new business models for distributing content online rather than attempting to pass responsibility to ISPs to take action against users”
• Community Broadband Network - “For their relentless pursuit and support for next generation access at grass roots level”
• European Parliament - “For rejecting by a significant majority an amendment to the Telecom Package designed to allow disconnection of users’ Internet connections for alleged copyright infringement without direct judicial oversight”
• Lord Carter - “For his attempt to bring a holistic view to government policy across the communications spectrum”
• Thomas Gensemer - “For showcasing the enormous power of the Internet in leading Barack Obama’s online presidential campaign”
Internet Villain
• Baroness Vadera - “For excluding a number of ISPs and Rights Holders in agreeing a Memorandum of Understanding that was exclusive and ineffective in progressing relations between the two industries”
• European Parliament - “For supporting an amendment to the Telecom Package on cookies which could yet bring the Internet to a standstill”
• President Nicolas Sarkozy - “For his continued commitment to the HADOPI law, which advocates a system of graduated response, despite repeated arguments suggesting the law is disproportionate from a number of important groups including the European Parliament”
• Stephen Conroy and the Australian Government - “For continuing to promote network-level blocking despite significant national and international opposition”
Following the publication of the Digital Britain Report there was a late entry suggestion that Lord Carter might also appear as a Villain with his 50 pence tax on phone lines. This missed the deadline so he stays as just a goodie on the list.
Timico has a table at the ISPAs. Look me up if you are there.
