Great article. More of a "groundswell" will be required to roll back this draconian legislation because Azeredo has a big social network and is generating support for similar measures the MERCOSUL and among the Northern Tier and Andean nations of South America. Drilling down a bit, the PSDB (his politcal party) though called "Social Democrats" is actually a US-style neoconservative movement with links to Christian Democratic groups internationally who aren't too keen on sharing political power with populist intenet-based groups built like the ones that created the "groundswell" for US president-elect Barck Obama. In spite of Brazil's strong internet backbone, PCs and notebooks that cost $550 in the US are selling for the equivalent of $1250 at big box stores in Rio, Campinas, Salvador and elsewhere, making the "digital divide" a bubbling under issue. As for Azeredo the man, one might want to consider that Senator Azeredo during his student years became sensitized to politics in Belo Horizonte (MG) during an extremely ugly period of Brazil's military regime (late 1960s early 1970s). When the radical American "Living Theatre" led by actor Julian Beck played Belo Horizonte back then the military threw them in prison for a year and the US Embassy did not bat an eyelash. Ditto Heinz Kissinger. The irony of this is that Azeredo's legislation bears the hallmarks of that era.

Hi Eric thanks for your comment. I think you covered a lot here. First, the fact that PSDB is more neoconservative than social democrat. I agree with you. And then you said that in spite of Brazil´s strong Internet backbone the prices are huge. Tax reform is urgent in Brazil and in Latin America. But it is interesting that people spend all they have on computers and for the first time we are selling more PCs than TVs. And notebooks became a fever. Everybody on A and B classes want one -- or have one. A-class people carry Macbooks and iPhones everywhere. We tend to be early adopters and follow the trends we get from the U.S and Europe. And we don´t want to be regulated in "Brazilian-style". I think the Azeredo law will be another (like the many we have) that people will simply not follow and nothing will happen. Our Justice system is so low that will be impossible to check all that goes on online. But it is important to protest. And to be against censorship. We need to grow as a country, Internet can play a key roll in education, poorer people are having more access to information like never before. So we need to fight to change the mindset.

An afterthought... there is some irony in the fact that Google recently moved the administrative HQ of its ORKUT online service from California to Belo Horizonte, the city represented by Senator Azeredo, who is intellectual author of the "Azeredo Law."