After the biggest protests a government led by Viktor Orbán has ever seen, Fidesz announced that it is open to modifications of the proposed internet tax. This means the tax would remain but it would have a cap. What this shows is that the governing party clearly misunderstands what the tens of thousands of people attending the demonstrations throughout the country are demanding. A HUF 700 tax alone could not have brought out this many people to the streets. What really enrages the crowds is that they realise they are being deprived of a freedom in a way without precedent in Europe. Taxing the internet is the first step to limiting the free flow of information and the freedom to express one’s opinion. In Hungary the World Wide Web became a symbol of this freedom overnight, and a lot more people than the government may have expected found this freedom important enough to go to the demonstrations. And this time there was no need for mini-vans to bring people to the city, as in some demonstrations in the past.
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