ACTA In Ireland

For the past month I have been shying away from my usual vices such as videogames and movies to cover something a lot more important and a lot more urgent. We all know the affects SOPA was going to have on the internet and the basic privacies of millions of people. The online community responded swiftly by blacking out as much of the web as possible, sites like wikipedia went dark in protest to the bill and even photo giant flickr offered users the ability to block out their chosen images. Millions of people all over the web joined the many online protests and soon enough their voices were heard.

The same cannot be said about ACTA, the European counterpart of SOPA. This is due partially to the fact that governments have been deliberately keeping people and the media in the dark, in Ireland especially they don’t want you to know ACTA even exists because if the public know then they might try to also have their voices heard.

Protesters take to the street targeting ACTA

Over the last three weeks Dublin has seen many protests and debates on the dangers of ACTA, but still most people on the street don’t know what it is or what affect it could have on business and privacy. I made sure to attend and photographically cover as many of the protests as possible so feel free to head on over to flickr and check out my collection of photos. We all have to do our own part to educate others on what’s going on behind their backs, I hope in some small way I did mine.