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UK Column On Location: Bristol—Taking the Fight to the Censors · UK Column Radio

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Right, I'm going to start by asking everybody to put
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: up their hand and watch the UK Column live livestream
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: that we did several months ago.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: That's sort of where we a few some.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: People but not everybody. Sorry, what did we Was it
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: all day? I can't remember?
• 0:28
  Speaker 3: It was called UK Column Lie and it was around Easter,
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: I think.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Well, anyway, I'm going to show a couple of the
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: slides that we did at that point, because if we're
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: talking about what's the future for us, and what's the
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: future for any independent, smaller, independent media organization, we've got
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: to look at the money that it takes to run
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: something like this and what we're actually up against. So
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: we showed this on that livestream and I'm going to
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: show it again because it is important to understand the
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: scale of what we're looking at. The same amount of
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: money that the BBC spends just on their news production
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: three hundred and forty two million pounds a year, Sky
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: spends ninety million pounds on their news production. Gb News,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: which is only about news production, spends forty nine million pounds,
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: and we spend a couple of hundred thousand a year, right,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: So that is the relative that is that's what we're
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: up against, that that level of spending so they can
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: afford to employ thousands of people to do what, in
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: our case have a dozen people are doing.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: Right, So this is this is what we're up against.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: So we need your support.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Now, you all do support your supported us coming to this.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: But it's not just about the money side as well.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: It's about having.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: The army out there that's that's promoting what we're doing,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: that's helping overcome the censorship regime that we're facing on
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: a daily basis, because that's basically what is stopping us,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: and not just us, but others that are in the
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: same space. So what we said at that time was
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: we do need members, but we do need people to
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: share the material. Now, this is sometimes a hard thing
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: to do because maybe people don't want to have although
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: they appreciate the material that we're putting, I don't want
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: to have that material sitting on their Twitter feed or
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: whatever it happens to be. But I think we would
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: want to urge everybody that now is the time and
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: we cannot anymore be reluctant to stand up for what
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: we believe and do it publicly and do it with
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: our own identities as well. I think that is important
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: as well. So in a minute I'm going to bring
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Wilsie from Resistant gp up and the reason is because
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: of the Online Safety Act. Before I do that, did
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: you want adding the thing right? Okay, sorry, you're doing
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: a great brand's lost his voice, so right. The censorship
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: regime that we have in this country, there's multiple legislation,
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: but the Online Stafy Act, of course, is the most
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: recent of it. We've been talking about it in the
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: UK column for a long time. We followed it from
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: the beginning when it was merely a white paper discussing
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: online harms, and we followed its process through Parliament and whatnot.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: And of course there were the censorship side of it
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: was a very important part. But there's another side of
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: it that we were all also mentioning, and that was
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: the idea of a recognized news publisher and the idea of.
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: Well, the other idea is completely following out ahead. So
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: so we'll move on from that.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: But anyway, the point is that if you're watching the
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: news on Friday, we were talking about the new report
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: from Ofcom on how they are implementing the Online Safety Act.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: They have produced this progress update and so they're basically
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: saying that they're now at a point where they're able
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: to start threatening tech firms with enforcement action if they
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: don't do what they're supposed to do. These new duties,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: as they call them NEI. Their new duties are on
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: one hand, censoring content from individuals, on the other hand,
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: protecting mainstream media content or recognize news publisher content. So
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: let's not call it new mainstream media because that'll be
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: a mistake, as you're about to find out. So the
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: other thing that fell out of my head, but it's
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: back in again, is this idea of information of democratic
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: importance or whatever the correct terminology is for it, so
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: that that has to be protected, but everything else has
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: to be censored. Right the next thing, So they were
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: talking about, as I say, ensuring protections for news publisher
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: and journalistic content, but they were also talking about concer
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: consistently applying their terms of service. So one of the
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: aspects of the Online Safety Bill, as it was still
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: a bill, was that they were attempting to claim the
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: right to censor material which they considered harmful but was
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: not illegal. So they produced this term legal but harmful,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: and of.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: Course, as.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: Rachel Or Claire, I can't remember who was speaking about
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: earlier on was saying these terms were so broadly defined
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: that it was impossible to know, you know, what that
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: would mean. At the end of the day, that came
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: up against so much opposition that they had to drop
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: that idea, and instead they've moved on to this idea
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: of consistently applying their terms of service. So if YouTube
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: says that you cannot post a video to YouTube which
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: contains what they describe as medical misinformation, then that YouTube
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: is therefore obliged to consistently apply their terms of service.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: But that is incompatible with the idea of protecting recognized
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: news publisher content because if a news publisher publishes something
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: about vaccines, which if we consider how our YouTube channel
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: was taken down in the first place, where we covered
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: the story of somebody who had been vaccine injured, three
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: or four weeks later, the Daily Mill covered exactly the
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: same story, So there was no consistency in how the
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: terms of service were applied. Because in our case we
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: lost our YouTube channel, Daily Mail didn't have any consequences
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: for that on any platform. So there seems to be
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: a there's probably going to be an issue here with
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: this issue of ensuring protections for news publisher and journalistic
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: content and consistently applying their terms of service. But that's
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: for the future to decide. But we've had a minor success.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: Many of you, if not all of you, may be
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: aware of this, but this idea of news publisher and
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: journalistic content we've discovered applies to us because US and
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: some other independent news publishers, because they have scoped the
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: idea of a news publisher, what a recognized news publisher is.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: It's actually not that hard to do to be one.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: You've got to jump through which wills he can talk
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: about in a minute. We've got to jump through some
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: certain hoops.
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: We have a good friend who is a barrister, and
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: several months ago he said to me, maybe you might
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: like to write to YouTube now that the Online Safety
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Act is on. But he said, you know, it hasn't
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: been implemented yet, so I'm not really sure that there's
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: legal recourse yet that you could actually take. But maybe
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: you might like to just sort of draw a line
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: in the sand and say, you know, hey, guys, we're here.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: This is what you did. It's now no longer possible
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: for you to do that kind of thing. Maybe you
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: want to, you know, get ahead of the curve and
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: put our YouTube channel back up. So we wrote to them.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: We sent it by mail, also sent it by email,
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: and they sent back a very nice acknowledgement with a
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: photograph showing that they'd received the letter, and then they
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: told us to go away.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: Fine.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: So then in the meantime, Kenny was running his UK
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: call him Extracts YouTube channel, which was doing very very well.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: I was running a I had discovered a YouTube channel
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: I've forgotten about years ago, which actually had eight thousand
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: subscribers on it that it was being a sort of
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: a backup channel that we had years ago. I reactivated
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: that and we were running that and those two channels in.
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: Parallel for a little while. But after I.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: Think three or four weeks, we probably had two strikes already,
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: so we knew it wasn't going to last for.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: Very much longer.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: But anyway, what was quite incredible was that YouTube decided
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: to shut both those channel channels dined at five am
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: in the morning on a Friday, right, both channels different
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: email addresses. I mean, Kenny makes email addresses for these things.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: And.
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: Sorry, should shoo shoot, did you shoo, We're not worried
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: about that. There's no point hiding this stuff. I mean
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: they know it anyway. Anyway, the point is both channels
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: shut down at the same time some inordinate r in
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: the morning, right and I said, right enough, not doing
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: this anymore.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: So we thought we would because we'd sent the letter.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: We thought we would go through the appeals process and
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: see what could be done to get the channels reinstated.
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: And what I discovered was that because the situation seems
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: to have changed, so when the YouTube, the original YouTube channel,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: which had just under one hundred thousand subscribers at the time,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: when that YouTube channel was shut down, there was really
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: no particular sensible way to appeel that. But when I
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: went to appeal this latest shutdown, I discovered that I
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: actually had six years to make that appeal. And so
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: when I went back to look at the original channel,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: which is already shut down, suddenly there was this new
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: link that told me that I hadn't because I hadn't
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: looked at this in ages, But this new link that
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: told me I had until twenty twenty six to appeal
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: that channel being closed. So through an act of sharing competence,
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: because I had intended to appeal the backup channel being
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: shut down, I accidentally appealed the original channel, and two
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: hours later it was reinstated right.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: I appealed that on the basis that we are a
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: recognized news publisher under the Online Safety Act, and I
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: made the point to them that whenever Offcom wrote to
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: them and all the other platforms about the content that
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: was going on their platforms about the recent riots, they said,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: we advise you not to wait for our implementation of
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: the Online Safety Act in order to follow the guidelines
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: that we've already laid out. So I made that point.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: Though the Act is not fully implemented yet and they're
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: not obliged to they weren't particularly obliged to do to
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: reinstate the channel, they clearly have and we should see
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: that as a minor victory. The question is what do
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: we do with that channel, Because if we start streaming
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: normal UK column news programs and we've got vaccine related
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: content on there, are they simply going to start giving
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: us channel strikes again? Are they simply going to close
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: the channel down again? We don't know the answer to that.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: So at this point let me welcome Wilsey to the
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: stage because and the reason that I contacted Wilsey recently
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: was because Wilsey was giving an interview a couple of
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: weeks ago on exactly this topic, and so we hadn't
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: spoken about this before. But these guys were obviously looking
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: at exactly the same situation with respect to the Online
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: Safety Act. So I don't know if you want to
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: add something there.
• 12:01
  Speaker 5: Well, what I'd like to say is where the Online
• 12:04
  Speaker 5: Safety Act has sort of come from is a place
• 12:06
  Speaker 5: of censorship. But I think they've sort of snooked themselves
• 12:09
  Speaker 5: in creating this. I think they've made a really big mistake.
• 12:13
  Speaker 5: Because I'm sure some of you will remember that talk
• 12:16
  Speaker 5: radio I believe it was a few years ago they
• 12:19
  Speaker 5: got a strike on YouTube and this was big news
• 12:21
  Speaker 5: because one of the mainstream outlets actually got strike. They
• 12:25
  Speaker 5: actually got censored, and I think this sent the sort
• 12:28
  Speaker 5: of blue team of the Uniparty into a bit of
• 12:30
  Speaker 5: a panic. They went, wait a second, can this censorship
• 12:34
  Speaker 5: actually be used against us? We don't want, you know,
• 12:37
  Speaker 5: one side of the Uniparty dominating the other. They want
• 12:39
  Speaker 5: to keep it at an even playing field. So what
• 12:42
  Speaker 5: you see introduced into Online Safety Act are two specific
• 12:46
  Speaker 5: provisions or actually three. You've got section seventeen, which is
• 12:51
  Speaker 5: the duty to protect journalistic content, and you've got section nineteen,
• 12:55
  Speaker 5: which is the duty to protect democratic content. I may
• 12:58
  Speaker 5: be switching them up, but just like Mike said, they
• 13:01
  Speaker 5: have to apply it evenly now as everyone knows here
• 13:06
  Speaker 5: they're not applying it evenly at all. But this is
• 13:09
  Speaker 5: now UK statute, this is now the law within England
• 13:14
  Speaker 5: and Wales that they have to provide this, So suddenly
• 13:18
  Speaker 5: it's a bit of a double edged sword. Within there,
• 13:20
  Speaker 5: there is also section eighteen, which is the concept of
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: a recognized news publisher, and the idea of becoming a
• 13:26
  Speaker 5: recognized news publisher is basically when you become that, when
• 13:30
  Speaker 5: you become this elite class that they set up, you're
• 13:33
  Speaker 5: protected from most of their censorship. How I looked at
• 13:38
  Speaker 5: the requirement so I went, wait, second, So I need
• 13:40
  Speaker 5: to need a standards code. Okay, I'll type that up.
• 13:44
  Speaker 5: Took me twenty minutes. I need a complaints procedure twenty minutes,
• 13:49
  Speaker 5: an address, okay, Well, I don't want people, you know,
• 13:52
  Speaker 5: knocking down the door and throwing bricks through my windows.
• 13:55
  Speaker 5: But it can be arranged. We can have a business address,
• 13:58
  Speaker 5: and you need multiple people need to do journalism. Well,
• 14:02
  Speaker 5: I think just about every news organization independent news organization
• 14:06
  Speaker 5: in this country can meet those requirements. Further, I think
• 14:11
  Speaker 5: that just about anything that independent journalists like us are
• 14:15
  Speaker 5: going out and doing covering is content of democratic importance.
• 14:20
  Speaker 5: I think this is journalistic content. And therefore, by the
• 14:25
  Speaker 5: laws that they've passed, presuming that we'd be too stupid
• 14:29
  Speaker 5: to actually read it, it seems that we are protected.
• 14:34
  Speaker 5: Now this is yet to be tested within a court.
• 14:37
  Speaker 5: But the problem they have is how do they define
• 14:40
  Speaker 5: between the MSM and US. I mean, really, the only
• 14:43
  Speaker 5: difference between the MSM and US, apart from the money,
• 14:45
  Speaker 5: is that, well, we tell the truth. When you put
• 14:55
  Speaker 5: something into statue, you can't go okay. So specifically, if
• 14:58
  Speaker 5: your name is GOT News or your name is the Telegraph,
• 15:01
  Speaker 5: there's no real way to exclude us. So them dabbling
• 15:04
  Speaker 5: in this it may come to sort of buy in
• 15:07
  Speaker 5: the backside, really, and so I think we need to
• 15:10
  Speaker 5: take advantage of these protections. Obviously we should opposed censorship.
• 15:14
  Speaker 5: But the end of the day, if they have put
• 15:16
  Speaker 5: a duty on Category one platforms, all of the big
• 15:19
  Speaker 5: social media outlets or platforms then we need to take
• 15:24
  Speaker 5: advantage of it, and we need to simply say you
• 15:27
  Speaker 5: cannot censor us. This is of journalistic importance and this
• 15:33
  Speaker 5: is of democratic importance. And frankly, if you're going to
• 15:36
  Speaker 5: censor us, but you're not going to censor there, I
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: say it the BBC, then I think you YouTube, you TikTok,
• 15:48
  Speaker 5: you Instagram, you Facebook are breaking the law. So I
• 15:55
  Speaker 5: think Mike is a bit more down there.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: So we think they are breaking that, they will be
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: breaking the LA all but I think if Overcom's opinion
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: or attitude is correct, they're already breaking the law. So
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: we need to start putting some pressure on them. And
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: so we've had this. No, No, it doesn't no, because
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: in order to be a recognized news publishers will see
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: saying you've got to you've got to be multiple people
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: working for an organization. So you've got to be something
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: with a brand and an address and a structure and
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: a complaints procedure. And so you've got some steps to
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: be considered a recognized news publisher and be protected in
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: this way. But they're not onerous steps, so that it's
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: something that any small group of people could do. We've
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: done it. They've done it right. So so the small
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: victory that we have from YouTube at the moment gives
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: us an expectation the challenging this can work.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: The worst.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: Organization for censorship is TikTok by far right, so YouTube,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: as bad as it is, TikTok, can any many TikTok
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: channels have we had shut down? So we've lost kind
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: of how many TikTok channels we had shut down. So
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: this isn't just about challenging YouTube. It is about challenging
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: every platform. And so what we want to say tonight
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: is that we want to invite every independent news organization
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: in this country, big or small, as long as they're
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: independent and not these corporate model, you know, horrible things,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: to contact us and get involved with an effort to
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: challenge these platforms, using the Online Safety Act as the
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: basis for the challenge. This might result in US attempting
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: some kind of legal procedure because ultimately it may have
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: to be challenged in court, but we think probably it's
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: got to be much better to have a group of
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: us working together on this challenge to see whether we
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: can get the platforms to move with it.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: Needing to take at that next step.
• 18:11
  Speaker 5: And we really do need everyone to come on board.
• 18:14
  Speaker 5: So if you have journalists who you follow aside from
• 18:17
  Speaker 5: UK column, aside from me, who are out there doing
• 18:21
  Speaker 5: journalism that you believe needs to be uncensored, go contact them,
• 18:25
  Speaker 5: ask them if they know about this, ask them if
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: they know about what we're doing, and try and get
• 18:29
  Speaker 5: them on board with us, because the more people we
• 18:31
  Speaker 5: have on side, the more we can achieve. And frankly,
• 18:35
  Speaker 5: I think we all know that the government's got back doors.
• 18:40
  Speaker 5: We all know that there's some sort of shadow banning. However,
• 18:45
  Speaker 5: do they really want to test that in court? Do
• 18:48
  Speaker 5: they really want to, you know, bring out all of
• 18:51
  Speaker 5: their algorithms in court, because if they want to fight
• 18:53
  Speaker 5: this in court, then we can and let's see what
• 18:56
  Speaker 5: comes out. Do they really want us to look inside
• 18:59
  Speaker 5: the sausag factory for their algorithms and all of the
• 19:02
  Speaker 5: things that they're censuring, because we've seen from the Twitter
• 19:04
  Speaker 5: pars we're seen for melon musk that they've been doing this.
• 19:08
  Speaker 5: So maybe if they do want to test this, they
• 19:11
  Speaker 5: do want to fight in court, it could be a
• 19:12
  Speaker 5: very very interesting avenue to go down.
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: Yes, just to add a bit to that, just come
• 19:19
  Speaker 4: back to the fact that the legacy media is saying
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: more and more frequently that they're concerned about their falling revenues.
• 19:29
  Speaker 4: They're all begging for money, and this is because people
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: are simply not buying the product. So there's one level
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: of fear. But the other level of fear is the
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: power of social media. And one of the things that
• 19:41
  Speaker 4: I think I can say over watching this lot over
• 19:44
  Speaker 4: quite a few years, is the overall standard of social
• 19:48
  Speaker 4: media in the core area. The quality is increased. There
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: are more and more people putting out quality information which
• 19:57
  Speaker 4: people are picking up on. And I think our old friends,
• 20:01
  Speaker 4: the legacy media are actually are showing their fear of
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: the newbies on the block. So I think there's a
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: very positive message there.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: Any thoughts, Yeah.
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: Sorry, everyone's heard more enough from me today. But yes,
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: I think I think it's timing it. Now is the time.
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: This is this is really significant and we need to
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: we need to push it. We need to prove the
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: ground and see what's going to happen. And the only
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: way to do that is actually to take to take
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: the action and get on with it, because we need
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: to find out. But it is a it is a
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: massive consideration for us, and I think also it's a
• 20:39
  Speaker 3: time for you know, we talked a lot about sort
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: of unity and togetherness and shared philosophies. Today I think
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: we also need to be very open to dealing with
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: all sorts of people that we might not naturally share
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: space with. And that also is very important because I
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: think if it's seen as being a part of our issue,
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: then that to fail. So we have to be very
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: careful about how we do it, right.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: I just like to comment on that, because you know,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: we've we've made this invitation. There are plenty of independent
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: media organizations out there that I couldn't possibly agree with
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: at any point in time.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: Let's just mention the Canara as one.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: But they are independent and I don't agree with them,
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: but I don't I would work with them on this
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: on this project because because they are suffering the same
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: thing that we are, they have the right to say
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: what they say, whether I agree with it or not.
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: And and we are all we are all suffering from this,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: from this censorship regime. It's time to take the fight
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: to the to the to them and to the front.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: So that's that's what we're encouraging everybody to do.
• 21:39
  Speaker 5: And the thing is we don't necessarily know that they're
• 21:41
  Speaker 5: going to just bend over. We don't know that they're
• 21:43
  Speaker 5: going to just fold to us. However, we do have
• 21:47
  Speaker 5: an opportunity here. We do have an opportunity to end
• 21:50
  Speaker 5: a lot of the censorship, a lot of the bands,
• 21:52
  Speaker 5: a lot of the strikes, a lot of the shadow bands,
• 21:54
  Speaker 5: and possibly have a renaissance in our Internet. And I
• 21:59
  Speaker 5: think that be an absolutely beautiful thing. We've seen how
• 22:03
  Speaker 5: some of the censorship has relaxed now Twitter is in competition.
• 22:08
  Speaker 5: Maybe we could, you know, continue pushing it in that direction,
• 22:12
  Speaker 5: and maybe we could end the censorship for at least
• 22:14
  Speaker 5: a few years. At least a few years, time to grow,
• 22:17
  Speaker 5: time to build a bigger support base, and time to
• 22:20
  Speaker 5: build a critical mass that if they managed to abolish this,
• 22:23
  Speaker 5: even if they managed to get rid of it, that
• 22:25
  Speaker 5: we've got a critical mass to move away to free
• 22:27
  Speaker 5: speech platforms. And I just think it's wonderful that you've
• 22:30
  Speaker 5: got such great journalists here, and it's been wonderful being
• 22:33
  Speaker 5: at this event with you guys, and that you are
• 22:37
  Speaker 5: paying attention to this and leading the charge. So I've
• 22:40
  Speaker 5: got to say everyone, please do support these guys, because
• 22:43
  Speaker 5: you know they're you know, working with lawyers, they're willing
• 22:46
  Speaker 5: to put their money where their mouth is to challenge this.
• 22:48
  Speaker 5: So well done, i'd say to UK column and well
• 22:50
  Speaker 5: done for hosting this fantastic event.
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: So I'd just like to respond to that to say
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: that we are really delighted to have you here with us.
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: And it was what a couple of years ago that
• 23:13
  Speaker 4: the Times newspaper attempted a really terrible smear on the
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: reputation of the UK column myself by branding us in
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: with almost terrorists on the streets, and I'm afraid say
• 23:27
  Speaker 4: you were that man. So I'm delighted to be sharing
• 23:31
  Speaker 4: a platform Resistance GB. You're putting out some good material.
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: You've also got a live product tied in with some music.
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: So I'm just going to gently say to the audience,
• 23:41
  Speaker 4: if you don't really know what they're up to, get
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: online and have a look.
• 23:45
  Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, thank you for the shameless game, shameless plug.
• 23:49
  Speaker 5: We do have an event on the thirty first, and
• 23:51
  Speaker 5: we do a live podcast last Thursday of the month
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: if you guys want to come down and that helps
• 23:58
  Speaker 5: us support our journalism. Oh Finsury Parks the Night Owl
• 24:03
  Speaker 5: the next guest we've got is Kate Chemerani supported by
• 24:05
  Speaker 5: whom by Fire. So we're we've got live podcasts with
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: our guests. You get to ask questions and then we
• 24:11
  Speaker 5: exhibit freedom bands. So it helps fight the cultural war
• 24:18
  Speaker 5: in the.
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: In the nicest bag exactly.
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, Okay, it's arrived. It's that final time now.
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: But before I thank you guys, I had to have
• 24:37
  Speaker 4: a word with the youngest member, who's William. So I'm
• 24:42
  Speaker 4: gonna ask William to come up and receive the UK
• 24:45
  Speaker 4: column gift.
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: Should we be getting off stairs with.
• 24:56
  Speaker 6: So?
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: So just and I'm like, just very quickly, where did
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: we first meet? Because I got a feeling we were
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: walking in a car park or somewhere and we ended
• 25:06
  Speaker 4: up speaking.
• 25:07
  Speaker 7: Oh man, to be fair, I don't know. So the
• 25:11
  Speaker 7: last time I remember seeing you was AV thirteen. Try
• 25:16
  Speaker 7: not to Yeah, last time I remember seeing you was
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: AV thirteen, and I think I remember either you came
• 25:23
  Speaker 7: up to me or I came up to you, and yeah,
• 25:26
  Speaker 7: we just got started talking and you know, just started
• 25:29
  Speaker 7: talking about my experiences and stuff like that. Then I
• 25:32
  Speaker 7: met you at standing the light up in the Lake Districts,
• 25:35
  Speaker 7: which I'd never been to before and it's such a
• 25:38
  Speaker 7: long journey and then, yeah, I guess we've just kind
• 25:44
  Speaker 7: of been talking ever since. But of course, you know,
• 25:46
  Speaker 7: I've been sort of watching UK column since twenty twenty,
• 25:50
  Speaker 7: and you know, like ever since then, you know, I've
• 25:54
  Speaker 7: gone onto protests, I've met so many people. I've met
• 25:57
  Speaker 7: so many friends. Some of those people I know are
• 25:59
  Speaker 7: in here. In fact, Anne, you down there, Yeah, you
• 26:02
  Speaker 7: were in one of my standing in the parks that
• 26:05
  Speaker 7: I joined initially. Yeah, and honestly, it's just been an
• 26:09
  Speaker 7: experience since.
• 26:12
  Speaker 4: Great, now you've said that, but I didn't know you
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: were going to be here today, and I didn't know
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: you're going to be the youngest person in the room,
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: but you were. And let me give you this, and
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: I'm going to encourage you to do a little unboxing
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: for our audience.
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: Stitch up, I think are the words that fit here?
• 26:36
  Speaker 6: It congratulations, right, you might not work it is.
• 26:57
  Speaker 7: Yes, this will be great for the zero records I
• 27:05
  Speaker 7: have at home. So yeah, thank you very much.
• 27:14
  Speaker 4: These were specially these records were specially selected by me.
• 27:21
  Speaker 4: When I took them home, my wife looked at me.
• 27:26
  Speaker 4: So maybe you just read a few.
• 27:30
  Speaker 7: Out Okay, Right, recognize well, very very music.
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: Hands up if you saw this coming.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: Let's see what happens.
• 27:45
  Speaker 7: Okay, So the world of the Yesses okay, uh hot, Hits,
• 27:55
  Speaker 7: I mean there is in the summer sun this okay,
• 28:00
  Speaker 7: deafitely creep and sord Okay, that's a folk Wrenkorge. Let's
• 28:05
  Speaker 7: see here the shadow string of Hits. Okay, there must
• 28:11
  Speaker 7: be something I recognize in here. Okay maybe, although that's
• 28:16
  Speaker 7: amiable but humble dink so you know, yeah, okay, it's
• 28:21
  Speaker 7: proper decent.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: Blenk Campbell.
• 28:26
  Speaker 7: Yeah, okay, let's see here the very best of Barry
• 28:30
  Speaker 7: Man are like, Okay, that's quite good. I'm just gonna
• 28:39
  Speaker 7: and then yeah, there's a few more there, but yeah,
• 28:43
  Speaker 7: I'll enjoy these.
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: Right, you knows you go. That's at least one person
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: coming back next year.
• 29:00
  Speaker 4: Okay, Right, So the time has come where we say
• 29:09
  Speaker 4: to you, we'll finally at the end. So well done
• 29:12
  Speaker 4: for surviving. You've been an absolutely brilliant audience. I've spoken
• 29:17
  Speaker 4: to a lot of people within the best of my
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: limitations today and most of you seemed happy, so that
• 29:23
  Speaker 4: was really nice. But I'm going to say thank you
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: all for coming so much because you are the people
• 29:29
  Speaker 4: that keep the UK Column going and on the basis
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: of what we think is success today, we're going to
• 29:36
  Speaker 4: look at more events in twenty twenty five, so stay
• 29:39
  Speaker 4: with us. And I want to say thank you to
• 29:48
  Speaker 4: Charles Mallett for doing an excellent compare job.
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: Because I couldn't have done that.
• 29:59
  Speaker 4: And I have to say Charles, as I've been talking
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: to people, there have been a number of the ladies
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: in the room that have commented on your shorts and
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: you clearly have got a fan base, so that's really good.
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: And the last bit is to say a big thank
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: you to Mike because Mike does a lot and a
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: lot of things he does doesn't get seen because he
• 30:24
  Speaker 4: does a lot of techie stuff alongside all of the
• 30:27
  Speaker 4: journalism and giving us a hard time on a daily
• 30:29
  Speaker 4: but I'm sorry, I want to say that right So yeah,
• 30:37
  Speaker 4: So with a little bit of collusion between Bob Bran
• 30:41
  Speaker 4: and myself, I'd like to give you a press if
• 30:44
  Speaker 4: you're hard work at this conference, I think you can
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: guess what it is back in bag you bub all right,
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: And lastly, once again a big thank you to the
• 30:56
  Speaker 4: UK column team because we couldn't do it without the fall,
• 31:00
  Speaker 4: so perhaps you give them a random applause thank you.
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: Okay, lovely, there are apparently two people who have not
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: claimed their embossed notepad things, so if you want to
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: drive yourself insane for the next thirty seconds, then flick
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: through your book and see if you can find an
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: embossed thing. Also, there are still goodies over at the shop,
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: and of course Bob still has books to sign and
• 31:30
  Speaker 3: get rid of, so get over there when we're done.
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: Are we done? We are done? Okay, thank you so much,
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: been absolutely wonderful. See you the next one.