Over the year this blog has followed the long-running and heated net filtering debate.
This week Senator Conroy announced that testing of the blacklist filter was 100% accurate and that legislation would be drafted to force ISPs to block illegal (Refuse Classification) websites such as those showing and promoting child porn, bestiality, and sexual violence against women.
The Australian Christian Lobby welcomed the announcement saying "it is an important step forward in making the Internet a safer place for children".
"The success of the ISP trials in showing that blocking Refused Classification material is entirely feasible has highlighted the misleading nature of the campaign against Internet filtering," ACL Managing Director Jim Wallace said.
However the ACL went further saying that the "technological principle can be extended to deal with other harmful X and R-rated material on the Internet".
There are currently no device-level filters on mobiles meaning there is no protection without ISP level filtering.
Libertarian lobby group Electronic Frontiers Australia was less optimistic about the technical results, saying the trials raised more questions than answers.
As I outlined in previous blogs, the transparency of the classification system for online material - both at the level of the independent Classification Board and ACMA - is both problematic and absolutely critical in ensuring public confidence in any future mandatory filter. Given that publishing the urls would completely undermine the whole point of the exercise, its not yet clear how checks will be built into the system.
Some Christians are rightly concerned that a mandatory filter could be used (in a future context) to undermine religious freedoms online.
Reporting the whole story?
Nevertheless, from the point of view of media analysis, one of the most disturbing aspects of the debate is watching the Sydney Morning Herald morph more and more into the leading cheer squad for the libertarian movement.
Throughout the entire debate the Sydney Morning Herald has been relentlessly one-sided in its coverage. Now it doesn't even appear to be trying to give the appearance of objectivity.
The report the day after the announcement, the Herald said the trial was a censorship smokescreen and the final policy a censorship plan.
But much worse no one in support of Conroy's plan is given a voice. "Reporter" Asher Moses quotes a swathe of critics: the Greens, EFA, media academics. And to take the most extreme example: the Sex Party is quoted; while the Australian Christian Lobby is not.
Asher spent each day this week highlighting any critic of the policy he could find - first academic Bjorn Landfeldt then former High Court judge Justice Kirby - writing copy that was no more than thinly disguised mockery of Conroy's policy.
Any attempt to even suggest there may be another perspective or voice? Nope. Not one.
Whatever your view of the issue, surely we can all see that this level of journalistic bias from a serious broadsheet is not helpful for informed policy debate in a healthy democracy.
In contrast the coverage from the Australian is far more evenhanded. The headline still uses the emotive word 'censor' but the illegal sexual nature of the material the Government is seeking to block is foregrounded in both headline and lead.
The main article quotes anti-filter lobby Get Up, but the overall coverage also includes the perspective of a Christian mum, an even-handed comment from Childwise which is seeking to stop child porn on the net and another negative comment from EFA.
This isn't a complaint about liberal v conservative media. It's about being 'fair' and accurate in reporting by ensuring the overall coverage reflects the scope of debate.
Despite its conservative critics, the ABC regularly demonstrates that a liberal media body can provide quality, objective reporting.
Indeed in regards to the net filtering announcement, the quickest, sharpest and clearest overview came from the ABC's flagship current affairs program PM.
