Geriatric assault on Italy’s bloggers

Here’s an interesting story about proposed legislation in Italy to force bloggers to register with the Ministry of Communications:

Times Online: A geriatric assault on Italy’s bloggers

As so often, attempts to legislate appear to be running way behind the advances in Internet technology and the changes in the way the Web’s used. But particularly so in this case, according to The Times‘s Bernhard Warner, because Italy’s politicians are a good deal older than the European average.

It’s not clear from Warner’s article what the effect of being required to register would be – although it’s safe to guess that bloggers who committed libel would have their registration withdrawn. But it looks as if the potential impact could be far wider, so that any website that used blogging software – including this one – would be caught by such a law. Scary thought!