Honk for Kosovo
Sunday, February 17th, 2008A funny observation: It’s now 2.40 p.m., and for about an hour now dozens of cars are performing a chorus of horns in downtown St. Gallen where I live.
This is extrordinary: Weddings (an occasion where our Italian immigrants love to do this) take place on Saturdays in Switzerland. There’s no soccer game involving Italy, Croatia, Serbia, or Turkey either. I was wondering until I remembered that Kosovo could declare its independence within the next days. So I checked the online news — and yes, a parliamentary meeting has been scheduled for 3 p.m. in Pristina to formally declare Kosovo’s independence.
What’s remarkable about this from an information point of view is that the 1-bit chorus of horns serves here as a token for a more complex message (”Kosovo is declaring its independence”), and that the internet helps outsiders like me decipher that message.
Like almost everything, this issue involves an interesting question of information law: Honking is of course only permitted as a warning signal in road traffic. When a Kosovar immigrant uses his horn to spread the message of independence, may he then invoke the freedom of speech if he is fined? I’m inclined to say yes, even if this doesn’t change anything in the result, namely that the restriction is certainly justified.
