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Canadian TV Now V-Chip Ready
nitemayr writes: "The Toronto Star, along with many other publications, report that many Canadian broadcasts are now V-Chip ready. The V-Chip (which I'm sure you will remember) allows viewers to filter television based upon ratings imposed by others. This is a boon to lazy parents everywhere (In Canada) who can now safely lock their 'kidz' in front of the tube without having to worry about them seeing violence or mayhem, unless they watch the news, or a documentary, or almost anything on the CBC (Candadian Broadcast Company)" " Invisible to viewers, the rating code triggers the chip, which turns the television screen to black if the rating is too high." Really.
This allready exists. The FCC regulates what can be shown when. You will not find nudity on prime time, the brodcast licence requires conforming to certain laws. You cannot argue a technology will cause unwilling censorship when it allready exsists. If anything (unlikely) this will lax laws on decentcy on television since parents have a personal censorship system.
Blockbuster is a bad example, that is corperate censorship. Corperate cencsorship and government cencoship are two totaly different things. Not showing pornography at 5:00pm is government censorship; Not showing a bad review of a business that a network might own is corperate censorship.
Municiple laws really would have no conciquence on national television, it's beyond the scope of a municipality. Often even local cable stations are beyond this scope. You do have the right to write a letter to your local government, changing municiple laws is FAR easier to change than any other law.
Movies are rated by average people. 15-20 people watch the movie and fill out a survey. I assume most non-time critical television would be handed the same way.
There's one major difference in that comparison. Kids under 18 don't stay that way forever.
If you're black or a woman, you're going to stay that way for the rest of your life (Micheal Jackson not withstanding). Thus it may not matter to you if it takes twenty years to get a marginal increase in rights - after that you still have 30 some years of your life to enjoy those gained rights.
Not so with children. After about 5-10 years they are no longer young anymore, and get all the rights and privaledges of an adult. Martin Luther King Jr. was a great man, but if you sat him down and said to him: "Look, you can fight this, and be persecuted, laughed at, mocked and belittled, and possibly not make any progress, or you can just quietly wait five years and you and your friends will get everything you want, just five years later than you might have hoped." Being a rational man, I bet he probably would have chosen option B, because, in the grandsceme of things, five years is a relatively short period of time.
The only caveat I can think of to this is the argument "Why do black people have to wait while white people get them immediately?" And you'd be quite correct. The analogy breaks down there. In fact, it entirely tips on its head. There is a strong "Well we had to do it, so everyone else should too!" mentality in established cultures. This is even evident in Slashdot: witness the "need to learn the CLI"/"need to be able to program in C"/"you're not a real programmer unless you've debugged the kernel" posts that frequently pop up around here. "It was good enough for us, so it's good enough for them!" -> "We had to spend 12 years in abject servatude in Catholic grade school through the depression, so a little disapline will be good for you too. And don't complain because we had it ten times worse!"
It's rather depressing, really. I remember a few years back there was a news segment about a 14 year old boy (who was in school above his level) lobbying to reduce the voting age for teenagers (IIRC, there was some aptitude test involved, so it wouldn't franchise everyone under 18). The rest of the segment completely escapes me now, but the part I remember clearly is this old congressman looking at this young boy and saying "Now you do realize that if this law ever passes, you yourself would be too old to take advantage of it?" - I can't remember how the boy responded, but I do remember thinking that for most people, that would be a fatal argument. Why bother if I can't benefit?
It's happened to me too. In Middle School they were restructuring the way the student body councel was arranged. Basically, eliminating any representation for the younger grades. I spoke out about it, even though I was in the highest grade in the school, and the plan was not even going into effect until after I had moved on. I remember some of my classmates talking to me , wondering why I even cared, as it was not even going to affect me.
Recently too. I'm at a University now, and the administration wants to close down one of the entertainment venues on campus to turn it into more classrooms. I was relating this to my father, who off handedly said "Oh well, you'll be out of there before they start construction, so it really doesn't matter for you."
And it doesn't. But what about all the people who come after me ...
Chances are it will last until the parental-units find something they want to watch blocked. They may remember to reset it to the "block" state the first few times, but will quickly disable it once it becomes a hassle (the third or fourth time). Chances are that anyone who would want to block content all-the-damn-time probably already set their tuner to the "Lawrence Welk Channel" and ripped off the knob.
In any event the possibilities are definately much more frightening than the probability.
- A.P.
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* CmdrTaco is an idiot.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
*Both* Mr. Rogers and Captain Kangaroo have condemned it as being bad for children and devoid of content. OK, maybe it has a bit of political indoctrination, but that's hardly something I want my kids exposed to. The creator is *proud* and *boasts* that there is *nothing* in there for anyone over four . . .
hawk
If it scored by your criteria, you could get the programs you are more likely to watch early in the listings, and not have to wade through dozens of screens hunting . . .
If you're going to show violence, then show it for what it *is*, and show it the way people would react to it.
That should make gore films all right.
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Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
"...Discovery Channel...-- it's educational and interesting and thought-provoking"
Two words: Shark Week.
(for those who don't have Discovery, this is the reasonably regular week where Discovery show nothing but programs about Sharks attacking people in cages, and people telling the story of how they are attacked. You learn one valuable fact from this week of programming - don't go near shark's mouths.)
To be fair, I have seen some quite nice stuff of Discovery too, and UK Horizons (which is a UK cable channel mainly re-running BBC documentaries).
"don't fall into the fallacy of believing that Perl can solve social problems. Maybe Perl 6 can, but that's a ways off"
It doesn't necessarily have to be that way. Blockbuster in the UK does carry 18-rated films, lots of them, but not porn. Mainstream cinemas also show 18-rated films. Those films are probably all R rated in the US, but different standards on where the "adults only" boundary should be doesn't alter the fact that a "not porn, but still adult only" category can work. (Then again, if we had a direct equivalent of R here, 18 might drop out of mainstream use).i nes?OpenFrameset).
(UK ratings http://www.bbfc.co.uk/website/Guidelin.nsf/Guidel
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rant
Welcome to the mid-90's: V-Chips are a USAian invention, are standard because the US gov't deemed them nec. Canada just said sure, what the heck, we'll use 'em. Thus Canadian TV is now rated but it's not native technology, it's US stuff. The not-really newsflash is that all Canadian networks now use it thtoughout the programming. It is *supposed* to be in the US to but it's spotty. Here Global, CanWest, CTV, CBC (all Canadian networks) apply it on all of their programming. I presume Bravo, A&E, Discover, TLC, Showtime, HGTV etc. (all based in Canada) are also rating their programs. Finally, Canada uses NTSC same as USA, that's why so much programming gets sold back & forth across the border.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
V-Chips technology was invented at SFU.
However it was the US that took the technology & ran with it. Had it remained Canadian it would have sank without a trace.
Nonetheless we have the fine folks of BC to thank.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
The obvious next step of course is to staple peril sensitive sunglasses onto your face so you don't have to find out where they have already installed the V-chip...
Paul
Oh, you mean how the US Goverment interferes less with the motion picture industry now that MPAA ratings are in place?
Don't kid yourself.
There are more important questions here, however:
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
(Incidentally, though I have a cable modem for Internet, I don't have cable TV, mostly due to the fact that I object to the content on many of the channels. I just don't want that kind of stuff entering my house. Yes, there's plenty of crap on the Internet, but I'm working on that too.)
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Your Servant, B. Baggins
This now means that canadians now enjoy the best of both worlds.
Parents no longer have to feel that irrational guilt that the programs their children are watching might cause them to shoot up their school, or do something equally embarasing to the parents.
Children will discover the joy of learning, as they reprogram the chip (I doubt its much more difficult than getting past a "child-proof" cap, but its still positive reinforcement). They get all the sex and violence as before, only now they don't need to worry their parents might be checking up on them!
So everyone is happy! Until they discover that TV still sucks.
Americans are being sold cars with daytime running lights? Hallelujuah! Saving a helluva lot more lives with that than with airbags.
I remember reading endless flames on an auto newsgroup back when DRLs were first being proposed and, later, put through in Canada. All the hysteria turned out to be unwarranted, and the improvement in driving safety is marked.
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Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
namely COMMERCIALS!
Ugh, most shows aren't too bad(except Cindy Margolis/Howard Stern Radio Show Program). Many commercials show nearly naked chicks for everything. I mean breasts are used to advertise: bras, tires, beer, computers, movies...
Why would I want my kids exposed to such filth in between otherwise acceptable shows. I mean commercials don't get ratings yet are designed to provoke and shock. These are what should have the ratings, not the shows. At the very least, commercials should be rated.
You don't exist. Go away. --SysVinit Halt
I'd rather see television shows come with some sort of classification tag, so I could build custom filters to screen out the truly offensive programming on television:
The sad thing is, this kind of selective filtering would be a beautiful feature to have (especially if it replaced the commercials with a nice screen-saver).
The fun thing is that I can see something like this being rigged "ad hoc" when/if programmable TVs come to the masses (be it TIVO-style, with a separate box managing content, or integrated into the television set, or by using a computer with a tuner card instead of a TV). You could figure out what's playing by taking the time of day and your location, or a "signature" based on a hashed few-second excerpt of the show, or both, and firing them off as an anonymous query to a CDDB-style database to find out if it's something you've told it you want to watch or want to filter.
Then have a coding contest to see if you can write a filter that can automatically distinguish between a commercial and your show...
Heck, I even see an easy way to automate public and private database generation and commercial filtering, given a signature-generating algorithm. This is a really nifty problem.
Funny enough on my tv anyone old enough to know how to read can turn off v-chip support in 15 seconds. There is no password feature or any other way to keep someone from changing the rating or turning the option off. I just laughed to death when I saw the way it worked. The tv company gets to say their tv has vchip support and nobody is hurt by it's use. Any teenager could easily turn it off. :)
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Right on man!
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Sig Return: 204 No Content
First point: censorship is when somebody else tells you what you may or may not experience... when you do it yourself, and can change your mind at any time, how can it be censorship?
Second point: the original poster suggested that instead of just having a simple flag accompanying a broadcast, that the broadcasters include enough information to do meaningful filtering... maybe you don't mind seeing the "violent" content in an action-adventure type of movie, but excessive gore or depictions of of domestic abuse disturb you.
Which brings us to the third point: with extra information and classification of the broadcast, you could tune it to avoid elements you, personally, find distasteful or disturbing. Instead, with the default implmentation of the V-chip, you have to rely on some central authority (a government agency or review board, I'd guess) to decide what content is "good" and what content is "bad".
I'll agree with you on the fact that the V-chip is an attempt at implicit censorship; if you want to use the V-chip at all, you have to buy into the idea that someone else is making your decisions for you. If the capabilities of the V-chip were expanded to allow custom filtering, though, it would be providing the tools that you would need to build a content firewall for your television. It probably wouldn't be a perfect firewall, but it would more accurately represent your desires and preferences than those of some beaureaucrat-for-life.
"Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgement." Job 32:9
I'd rather see television shows come with some sort of classification tag, so I could build custom filters to screen out the truly offensive programming on television:
Ultimate control would be hooking this up to a Tivo, and specifying that any blocked content would be replaced by something with greater entertainment value, like Plan 9 From Outer Space.
"Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgement." Job 32:9
In the last election, actually, I noticed a rather tremendous sympathy for the Conservatives on the CBC (at least, the radio, and This Hour has 22 Minutes, which is pretty much all I see of the Mother Corp's teevee).
I hate that sort of silly argument. You need evidence that the CBC is, in fact, so influenced. In my view, the CBC news does not seem unduly biased in favour of the government: it sure gave J.C. and his merry group a hard time over the pepper spray, for instance. Just because the government could do something does not mean it does. Appealing to the bogeyman of funding is not an argument.
PBS, in fact, takes advertisements. It just doesn't call them that. And it is nothing so much as low-brow highbrow commercial television. Now that A&E has proven it can do the same thing without government money, the reasons for PBS are completely opaque to me. I'm sure the need of YAPPMRC (Yet Another Peter, Paul and Mary Reunion Concert) does not justify PBS.
How exactly is this "censorship"?
As near as I can tell, NO ONE is squashing the publication or distribution of any content with the v-chip -- except individuals who decide they want to use the thing for themselves and/or their children.
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Tweet, tweet.
If there's a problem with any of the above, then it's with local laws, not with the fact that there's a rating system. Not with the fact that sometimes, people make decisions NOT to air content they find offensive or think their audiences might find offensive. Not with the fact that people might choose to use v-chips.
Ratings are just information that people can use to make decisions. The v-chip, right now, is just a technology that automatically carries out a decision, if you decide to use it.
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Tweet, tweet.
"Invisible to viewers, the rating code triggers the chip, which turns the television screen to black if the rating is
too high." Really.
Has anybody made the obligatory comment about the danger blocking sunglasses from HHGTG?
Reality -- with a rating code!
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Tweet, tweet.
Keep in mind that having the v-chip in your TV gives the government one less excuse to control what's being broadcast.
-Chris
...More Powerful than Otto Preminger...
The only people who will impose these ratings on you are your parents, otherwise known as 'those who own the tv and pay for the cable'.
If you have an issue with the ratings, you should talk to them, no? They are the ones trusting the ratings.
And if you are a parent (I'll guess you are) then from the sounds of it, you simply won't use it.
Many cable boxes in the US, and all satellite receivers have ratings; TV is just the last to follow. Many many people simply never use it. The v-chip was simply a way to encode the rating in the existing signal cheaply.. nothing more.#
The V-chip takes away NO rights and NO responsibility of parents...parents are not obliged, or even pressured, to use it. That's not taking away anything. It's a choice, like most other thigns parents do.
Move to just about anywhere in europe.
It's not like there's hardcore porn, but that's somewhat a different issue. Naked people abound, even in commercials. It's no biggie here.. no biggie at all. People get more worked up about violence. As it should be.
The TV is actually better here...
My seven month old son gets his chubby little hands on the remote and uses all of those features I've never looked at and can't figure out how to undo. If we had this, we would be stuck watching Blue's Clues and nothing else.
What if the sight of their television screen suddenly turning black makes them think about death, nothingness and the futility of human pursuits, and they take out the family pets with a homemade potato cannon?
The first thing I'd want to turn off is the most damaging - the adverts and the shopping channels.
What chance of that ?
And I'll just somehow magically hide the "OFF" button while I'm at work until 6:30pm and my kids get home at 2:15.
You obviously don't believe your children are disciplined enough to watch the television programs you have deemed suitable while you are sbsent, so I must ask, who is supervising your children during those four hours? If you have a sitter, then obviously they're the one that must magically hide the "OFF" button. If you don't have a sitter then your kids could do a lot worse than sitting down and watching four hours of tv. If your kids aren't mature enough to watch tv responsibly by themselves then you're failing in your duty of care in not providing alternative adult supervision.
skribe
Blog
I bought my TV in July '99 here in the US and it has a V-Chip in it (I haven't figured out how to use it, nor do I intend to). The big news here isn't that the V-Chip is in TVs - it's that the TV stations are sending the signals needed to fully use it.
This also means that we Canucks can air nudity, swearing and full on violence during prime time. Most movies run on national stations go on un-edited a-la HBO anyway (Most Canadians will agree on this one, check the latet blockbuster on CTV or CityTV) the broadcasters can now plead innocence on what they air and when.
"What do you mean your children saw nudity and cursing at 8:30PM on a Monday? Didn't you set your V-Chip? You asked for it, didn't you?"
I say bring it on! I'd love to watch Rated-R movies at 9PM on a national network without being "Edited for content". V-chip set to full censor, no problem.
Imagine the possibilities. No more of this "What about the children" crap, just use the V-chip and your kids won't be able to watch Ginger Lynn in her new 1 hour sex drama - "Sex, Lies, and even more Sex", (Tuesdays on CTV, Rated XXXX - the extra 'x' is for eXcitement)
Get over it folks. Nobody is telling *you* what you can and can't watch (unless you still live at home with mom and dad in which case you can suck it up for a few more years). This isn't about "lazy parents" or "mind control" as so many of you seem to think. The facts of life are that parents can't be around their kids 24/7. The vchip gives the parents *some* control over what their kids watch. IMHO, there's a lot of crap on TV and YES, parents SHOULD have a say over what their kids watch. It IS the responsibility of the PARENTS to pass on morals and values, not the GOVERNMENT. This just gives the parents one tool to help them do their job. The /. attitude that adults should have no control over their kids is disgusting. Any time censorship that affects kids comes up (e.g. video game ratings, vchip, school newspapers, etc. etc.) you all start whining. That leads me to believe that most of you are 1. not parents or 2. still kids or 3. all of the above.
Well I think it's a good system, the only things that worry me are that they might bundle some extra "goodies" with the vchip tvs. Like all that DMCA stuff that would prevent me from taping copyrighted shows (maybe a nice little ability for the tv to do that god awfully annoying fade from light to black thing that some DVDs do during "copyrighted" shows).
I also wonder if they would offer to let parents just screen out one show or so, or maybe allow a few shows. I know my parents (back when I was 5 or so) had selective ideas of what I should watch. They'd much rather say "no, you can't watch MTV" (I was five) than "no, you can't watch shows on the discovery channel that use the word 'sex'".
why is this so bad? im a swf, 24... i don't have kids and even if i did, I wouldn't use it or any type of filtering software on the home computers (I'd expect them to hax0r it anyway) but this could really be a good thing. :)
I go to a lot of movies... because there's a certain entertainment value to movies that I cant get from TV. I like sex, drugs, and swearing. But unfortunatly, theres too many restrictions on suitable TV content. Now here comes the V-chip. Affordable, and maybe one day mainstream. This is good news... they can stop worrying about the content on TV... hollywood can go all out.. and those of us who are old enough to wipe our own butts can watch whatever we want to, because parents who dont want it in their homes shouldnt be subscribing to the channels to begin with, or should be using a chip. yay.
perhaps this is being too optimistic, relying on the governments to relax the "content" laws, but it's a step in the right direction to personal responsibility. We can't even say 'fuck' or 'shit' on the radio up here in canada. I want violent, filthy entertainment dangit.
You have paid for a total of 0 pages and so far 0 have been used up (0 today).
It's called the "OFF" button.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
Can someone please tell me what could possibly be wrong with this device? As far as I can tell, it's a tool that lets people filter out TV shows based on their content, if they want to.
(And I won't accept any arguments like "next thing you know, they're going to take away your right to x" because that's just silly.)
I'm waiting for the inevitable 2.0 release. Instead of merely blanking the screen duing offensive content, the V-Chip XP (Does 'V2' still have too many Nazi connotations?) will intelligently extrapolate and render kid-safe content out of whatever's actually happening in the broadcast. Until the 2.1 release, the V-Chip will naturally do this in a very kludgy and amateurish fashion, leading to many many quality viewing opportunities for those who like to get high on psychedelics and watch 'Debbie does Dallas' or the SRC (CBC French edition) art film night --- translated 90 degrees into constructive social commentary on the value of Safe Streets and Happy Families.
- undoware.ca
Heck, as a college student, I can see the flaws in his argument. We had similar posts about the Microsoft X-Box and its content restriction mechanism.
To all the people that beleive that kids do exactly what their parents say, and would never *gasp* watch television their parents told them not to, you are very very far out of touch! Kids are mischievous, curious and don't actually follow instructions! Does no-one else remember being a child?
It's an unfortunate reflection on today's society that parents are at work rather than at home, and I do feel that where feasible such a situation should be avoided, but I'm sure you all have a good enough grasp on reality to realise it isn't always possible!
Could people please get this "You only need content restriction if you're a bad parent" delusion out of their head, and look a little harder at reality?
Who cares about Cannadians, eh?
How are you getting the idea that telivision has caused the school shootings. In reality, you are just as ignorant about teenagers as we are about being parents. I have not done a lot of research into all of them, but I can tell you this. All the ones I have heard of have been caused by one thing alone, the other kids at the schools.
Lets take a look at one of the San Diego shootings. This is a classic case of a teenager that has been picked on his entire life. One day he gets sick of it. He goes to school to end his problems.
I know your thinking that violence would not solve his problems. I can tell you this from personal experience, after YEARS of being picked on, ANYTHING to make it stop is the answer.
Seeing how I am writing this from my school, I will say now that I would absoluteley NEVER do this.
Anyway, to make this relate to the V-Chip thing, I personally think it is a good idea. I am a teenager and have watched every type of disgusting television there is. As a guy that sees himself as a parent, I can honestly say that I would probably use it. I really doubt I would use it to the extent of turning it up very high, but I sure as hell don't ever want my children to be watching Rambo and Invasion USA (still my fav movie but what the hell).
Anyway, my fingers are becomming very numb.
Before anyone gets any ideas about you are some stupid little kid, I am 17. While that may not be a "mature" level for you, I can tell you as a fact I know a lot more about my friends and others my age.
No, the proper answer is, "If you don't like the V-chip... don't buy one -- and let the people who want one pay the legitimate market price for it, not the subsidy price generated by forcing it on anyone who buys a new TV."
Face it, you have your hand out just like those folks on welfare you mutter about.
/.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
Wah Wah F*cking Wah.
Yeah, man, I get your point. But there *is* a reason things like this exist. It's so when I turn on the TV in the morning I sit down to the inane drivel of the morning show, instead of hardcore porn. You have to realize that one extreme is just as bad as another. If I had kids (and we even allowed them to watch TV), I would want to know for *damn* sure that there wasn't going to be stuff on during the times they'd be watching that I'd not want them to see (regardless of whether I "approve" or "disapprove" of it myself). So, yeah, maybe that means I have some chip in the tv that helps me prevent steaming piles of bullshit to be fed to my kids brains. In some European countries, they don't even allow *advertising* during any kids shows. Call me fascist, but I sure would like to outlaw that brainwashing crap at least during *kids shows*. The point is, it is a balancing act, and one has to draw the line carefully. Don't think I don't know or am not disgusted with moral supremicists tell me what I can or can't (or should or shouldn't) watch. It's just a matter of drawing the line correctly. Nothing is black and white. Here's a question for you: would you rather have optional ratings that you could use in combination with some chip to opt out of programs, or would you rather, as you describe, have TV stations themselves decide what they will pump to your TV? I'd rather have the former.
Anyway, there is an easy solution to all of this. Don't watch TV (or use your VCR and give the middle finger to DMCA, etc). Don't buy Hollywood hype (um, isn't that the evil MPAA *anyway*?).
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
"I wonder about people who teach their children that a medium is inherently bad."
Ok then: *American* television programming is inherently bad. It's a bunch of mindless, consumerist corporatist drivel. It's great that you get all that nice stuff up in Canada, but in the US $20 basic cable just gets you the basic pop crap. The only thing I watch these days is PBS (and CSPAN, god help me), and PBS is going corporate more every day.
"what's the message you're sending to your children then? Reliance/trust in technology and government ratings over developing their own critical viewing skills?"
The message is: I will not let you become a brainwashed consumer zombie until you develop reasoning skills. I hope they really declare TV as a risk for Alzheimer's (I think there is a study going on)...it is really soul-robbing mindnumbing shit (oh, unless you can shell out $50+/mo for quality programming).
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Let's all remember that the V-Chip was enthusiastically endorsed by Bill Clinton.
Remember also, that the Blank Tape Tax was passed as the result of a back-room deal between the RIAA and Tipper Gore's little band of NAZI mothers, trading the tax for "warning" labels on CD's.
I hope this will dispel any illusions anyone may hold that Democrats give a flying fuck about freedom of speech.
If you value your liberty, vote Libertarian.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Parents have been dumping kids in front of TV sets for ages... this way there's some rating, which is better than none (as far as little kids are concerned). I doubt that parents who have watched tv with their kids are going to be the ones who use this... it will be the parents who ignored what their kids were doing. So at least there'd be some restriction as to what kids get to see.
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I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest.
Content is already censored. This chip really only allows parents to be more flexible. I will use in "allow" mode rather than deny mode, allowing unlimited viewing of discovery, history, a&e, weather, news tln, and other such channels, so my kids can watch tv when I am not around, and maybe learn something.
Depending on the story, that's true...
Did you know that Slashdot is censored? It's true. People who you have never met in person are controlling which stories you can see on Slashdot.
(in case you don't get it and decide to label me a troll, I'll make it obvious: CmdrTaco can reject any story he doesn't like)
FWIW, my parents shielded me more than I would shelter my own kids from the realities of life, but I don't regret that they did so (with the exception that I wish they had introduced me to money concepts much earlier).
No Laughing Allowed!
Why is the V-Chip worthless to me? For the same reason that movie ratings are worthless:
- I may (and probably will) disagree with the ratings applied to any given item
- I have no control over what content will have the rating applied.
What it comes down to is that, as a parent, I still have to make all the same parenting decisions whether I use the V-Chip or not. If that's the case, then there's clearly no benefit. And if there's no benefit, what is it for?!Thus, I steer my children to books (and physical activity, what a concept!) and limit their TV and movie watching. Even "kid movies" are often subjected to pre-viewing by my wife or I, or at least a very trusted relative, because a lot of the "kid movies" are full of garbage that we don't want to become part of our kids' world views.
No Laughing Allowed!
"Deplorable violence is okay as long as people don't say any naughty words."
I personally don't believe TV is bad, but I have to disagree with your statement:
And why have you taught your children that television isn't good for them? Soemthing to do with all the violence? Well, if that's the case, you should go into their school and force them to stop learning history. Because the world's history is filled with it. Hell, you should go into their English classes and stop them from learning great works of literature like MacBeth and Hamlet because they are filled with violence as well.
Of all the history and English courses I took, not one of them made violence into something glamorous. Discussing war is nothing compared to visualizing someone being blown apart and having the hero standing proud for his/her accomplishment. I would want my children to learn the truth about war as opposed to what Hollywood portrays.
I do not have children. When I do I will also censor what they watch and do, until I see they are old enough. What that age is I can only guess as different children develop mentally at different speeds.
Do you seriously think you can be with you children (to be :)) 100% of the time? What is wrong with having control over your own TV set? As long as people and not the government have the ultimate control over the chip, I do not see a problem.
No, the proper answer is, "If you don't like the V-chip... don't buy one -- and let the people who want one pay the legitimate market price for it, not the subsidy price generated by forcing it on anyone who buys a new TV."
Of all the arguments against V-chips, this is the only one I can agree with. I think all shows should have a rating, but I don't think TV's should be required to have this chip. It is a feature that I will probably buy when I have children, but I see no need to make it mandatory.
I think that most people, even fairly libertarian ones like myself, would be able to put forth a pretty strong argument that a literate population is a public good. My life and yours are made better on a daily basis by the fact that the slack-jawed yokel at the gas station has at least a minimal ability to read and count change. Therefore I believe that investments in education produce the public good of citizens able to function at at least a minimal level in a modern society.
_____________
I don't want free as in beer. I just want free beer.
I have to agree with you here. When used correctly "saftey" devices are an effective aid to good parents. It isn't beneficial to childern to be fully supervised 24x7 by their parents. Tools like this make it possible for parents to allow children to learn to make decisions for themselves in an environment where they are less likely to make a "wrong" decision. Being a good parent isn't about making all of your kids decisions for them it's about showing them how to make the right decisions on their own. Using a V-chip gives the parent the ability to let their children choose which programs they wish to watch and learn some independence while still making it difficult to make bad decisions.
_____________
I don't want free as in beer. I just want free beer.
Parents cannot hang over their children 24 hours a day, so we fall to the "tribe" mentality of watching our kids: The tribe puts signals stating the level of violence/nudity/profanity/etc
This statement is really pointing out the core of the issue. I agree with you, the V-Chip is an excelent tool for parents. Here's my problem, these raiting are being set by some ratings board somewhere. We have deemed these people to be our tribal elders so to speak.
These people are so out to lunch it makes me sick. Here's an example, I watched a story on The Power Rangers a little while ago, (I think it was on Newsworld) they had a couple of 8 year old boys sit down and watch an episode of the show. Almost instantly they were praticing the super cool kicks they had learned, aiming roughly at eachother's teeth. Now boys will do this, I did it enough when I was a kid but I also got hurt a few times. I think this is a bad thing.
The example you give above of the overweight naked women illustrates my point. I would be a whole lot happier with kids watching that than I would Power Rangers or WWF. You can be damn sure I can't configure my V-Chip to lock out stuff that I think is inapropriate, I am delegating this resposibilty to people that I personally think are twits. That scares me.
Well, I am in your target group (26, no kids), but you know what? I still don't like the idea too much with the V Chip.
Why? Because as much as I understand your reasoning, I think the original poster has a point as well. People here (Toronto) SEEM to be too busy to actually CARE about their kids. They hand them off on masses to Nanny's and Baby Sitters and are off. That is PERSONAL observation, not hear say.
If you teached your kids that TV is a bad thing, than Kudos to you because quite frankly I think that TV to 99% IS crap, but a chip won't fix this. And I don't like the idea to give people even MORE excuses for NOT looking after their kids.
One day I might have kids, but quite frankly I hope that when I do I do it in a way that I am involved with them, and if that's the case I don't need a V-Chip or anything like that to educate my kids.
Just my 2 cents.
If you want to e-mail me, use my PGP Key.
Quite frankly I don't want to be hawking over my kids 24/7... Instead I want to be able to be sure that I have given them the right values / ideas of life.
:)
No clue yet how to do that though, as such... No kids yet
Michael
If you want to e-mail me, use my PGP Key.
You can't watch over your children ALL the time. Yes it's your responsibility to filter what your children are exposed to. Children don't have enough experience to be able to make informed decisions or to know that many things that are interesting have serious downsides. But it's not reasonable to expect parents to watch over their children's shoulders all the time. The technological ability to limit what can be displayed on the TV in your house can let responsible parents have a couple hour break, and give their children some freedom of choice within a limited spectrum. This assumes the children are old enough to be left alone in a room for an extended period of time, and the TV isn't used as a babysitter for long periods of time.
I don't see this working with the internet. There's no way to rate the content and filter it properly. Parent's are going to have to supervise their children. They are also going to had to do their best to raise them right and give them increasing responsibilities and privleges as they mature. I've seen too many kids grow up in extremely sheltered homes, hit college and nearly self destruct. They hit 18 and can't think for themselves. That makes them extremely susceptable to peer pressure.
As kids mature, you need to give them some responsibilities. You still need to limit that responsibility, guide them, and keep them from making bad choices. However, you can't control what they do all their lives, and it seems to work better if handing over that responsibility is a gradual process. Doesn't it make sence that there comes a stage where you want to be able to hand your kid the remote, but still limit their choices?
No, the proper answer is, "If you don't like the V-chip... don't buy one -- and let the people who want one pay the legitimate market price for it, not the subsidy price generated by forcing it on anyone who buys a new TV."
I have two different views on this. I agree that the people who want this and benefit from it should pay for it. This means that parents have to spend a bit more to get this feature on the TV their children are allowed to watch.
The other issue is that if V-chips are put in every TV then TV manufacturers can't gouge consumers for the added feature. Once the chips reach the volume of one in every TV, they become very cheap to produce. The development costs get spread out over a much larger number of units, and it ends up costing less than a buck for the manufacturers to add the feature.
In the end is there enough benefit to society to having this ability for parents to limit what their children see? I guess Congress gets to decide if they add a couple dollar tax to the price of TVs for this purpose.
I don't have kids, I don't watch the TV much, and a couple bucks extra on the price of a TV won't make much difference in my life. There's still an incredible market for programming that is inappropriate for children, so I don't think that programming is going away. I just don't see the free speach issue here, so I think it's a good thing.
Hmmm... I'm a kid.. I don't watch anything but the weather channel, occasionaly maybe discovery or the history channel, but... I don't live in Canada anyway.
--TheOrangeSquid Is it any wonder things seem so awry? We swim in a sea of confusion and don't have to think to survive
Obviously, the truly scary thing about this is the large scale big brother type of manipulation of information.
But I guess it doesn't really matter anymore since AOL-Time-Warner owns EVERYTHING including your ass!
And the other scary thing about this is that people don't care or even know about this type of thing. My X girlfriend's parents had a TV with a big V-Chip sticker right on the front proudly displayed that they never thought twice about.
Don't forget people, we live in a country where almost half of the voting population thought Bush should be elected. That alone is terrifying enough. I don't know if there's any hope left for this country.
http://www.hyperpoem.net
hyperpoem.net
Spoken as a highschool senior, without kids, still a kid myself. I personally believe that kids should be allowed to watch what they want to watch as long as parents also parent -- thats their number one priority, not their careers, not their selves. As my parents tell me everytime they have to put myself or anyone of my siblings before their own immediacies, when you have kids your life is no longer your own. Reading your response though, you dont seem to really have a problem with anything I say excepting my 'flippant' remarks and my fear of when can be done if the chip is misused or places in parents a false confidence that may lead them to use television as a substitute for real parenting.
--Ks9
From the people who brought you content filters for china, now presenting:
Canadian Television for Parents who are too busy to be parents. Seriously,
the possibility for abuse of such a system by those in control of it far outweighs
any perceived gains. In reality does it do anything more than allow a parent
to ignore their children just that much more? Gosh, I didnt know johnny was
building pipe bombs, i thought he was safely plastered to the tube with nary
an evil thought allowed to enter his innocent little head, eh. What we need
isnt content 'safeguards' what we need is parents to sit down with their
children and teach them right and wrong. Dont expect little sally to get her
morals from 90210 reruns, and fashion tips from britney spears.
just my $.02
--Ks9
Really? I don't think so. The more people there are who use it, the more screwed up it will be. Ten million people will not be able to agree on something more than one million people will.
--
Lord Nimon
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
i live in Canada, and while i have no kids to worry about, i'm wondering: can you use an inverse V-Chip? that is, can you get a set that will only show you which programs are showing porn at that time? it would be great to limit my remote to only those six stations.
- j
Are ads rated? When I was working at the Satellite TV company that Must Not Be Named, one of the questions that came up was if ads in the stream were rated. Dilbertesque Manager Type #1 didn't think they were. If course, this would mean that if you were watching, say, the "Live Goat Porn Channel" (Channel #533, kids) you'd get all the porno ads from the advertizers on the stream, though the shows themselves would be locked out. Dunno if they ever figured that one out, but that was the least of the product's worries at that point.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This article is pure flamebait. I am just shocked by the statement dubbing parents who want to use a V-chip to control the content that their children see as "lazy".
The writer of the comment is probably a 19-year-old living in mommys basement resentful at his parents having to work fulltime to support him. People have to have jobs in order to put food on the table. Television is not necessarily bad. Growing up I watched a fair bit of it. There were some great shows on TV that I learned a lot from. Luckily for me, and my parents, I grew up in a country where the content on TV was fairly limited and almost entirely non-violent and non-sexual.
However, a lot of popular programming on TV projects a vision of reality which is far from the truth. Shooting people dead and blowing buildings up are made to seem like routine everyday incidents in several of those shows. If I were a parent, I'd like to screen this crap from my children until they are old enough to realize it for what it's worth.
Mmmm.. Donuts
What I see is that with a near universal acceptance of the V-chip, bariers to what could be broadcast will be dropped, movies can be aired at prime time uncensored because the VAST majority of people will have their tv's set to view all and they won't be blocked from viewing. Another note would be that TV stations fearing a high rating for already censored content (traditional edited for tv ratings) will show the content uncut to attract people and not worry about getting a higher rating. This would also probably be do beacuse most people will probably either set their tolerances to 2 out of 5 for children or not set it at all.
Critics of sex and violence on tv will now be shown that people WANT sex and violence on TV and are alowing their kids the ability to watch by not setting the chip to block. How many kids get taken to the movies to see R rated content? I remeber as a kid seeing plenty of boobs and ass kicking at the movies. I remember seing that panther get spooked by the lightning and turn into the restricted sign. If it got too bad, my parents told me not to watch.
Now we're going to have that on broadcast tv, all the prudes can set their vchips to 1/5 and we can all watch what they don't.
A side note: In Canada its fairly common to show on broadcast tv movies uncut after 11pm. And on basic cable, I remember Showtime used to play uncut very explicit movies (Last Tango in Paris, Emanuelle etc.).
I haven't seen any public references to this information, yet. It started showing up a year ago on a few stations, but now its on almost all of them. Its on some american stations, too, like TBS and some PBS stations. The only hardware i have that detects/displays it is my VCR (Sony SLV-679HF). I don't know anybody else at all that has something that allows them to see this info. Note that this information is not something i've programmed into the VCR myself - it has taken all this information exclusively from the television signal. (my guess is it is encoded somewhere in the blanking interval)
It's really great to have that info, especially when you're flipping channels ...and
especially late at night so you
can immediately see the title of "Paid Programming" and keep flipping. As i write
this, one offair channel sending a test pattern actually has the info "OffAir".
Sometimes the info gets screwed up and lists garbage characters, and sometimes it just
says puzzling things.
--
Demonstrant's Open Source Tools
(although on canadian tv non-T&A is getting hard to find ;-)
--
Demonstrant's Open Source Tools
More sex, less violence was the way they went. If you ever saw the season three episode, "Boomtown", which was pretty much a big orgy episode complete with lots of nudity, you'd know what i was talking about. :-) [all the episodes eventually aired on a usa network, but they were heavily edited]
Three cheers for canadian TV! :-)
--
Demonstrant's Open Source Tools
How presumptuous.
I bet the author is something like 21 with no kids and some wacko idea of what it is like to be a parent these days. Slashdot is so sickingly liberal, and is inhabited by people who, for the most part, are kids in college or young adults who don't have kids of their own.
That means most of you do not have any clue what it means to be a parent today.
Trust me *boys*....the older you get the more conservative you will become, and all of the nonsense the higher educational system imparts on you will quickly fade.
TV is bad. It is mind numbing entertainment and in this house it is on for about 1 hour a day. Both of my kids have been taught that tv is not good for them.
But to say that the V-chip is bad just because some outside organization rates a show, and you might think that a 13 year old should be exposed to just about anything for the experience, or, probably so you can win some sort of dysfunctional free speech argument, I only need to point to a few infamous locations here in the US to dispute your argument....lets start with Columbine high school in Colorado. Lets then move on down to San Diego. You know...thats where teenagers are blowing other teenagers away faster then aDuke Nukem can say "Damn I'm looking good".
If you don't like the V-chip...turn YOURS off. Leave MINE alone you hypocritical free expression at all costs liberal! Hollywood is fascinated with violence and it is simply not good for our kids to be continually immersed in it. If the phone rings and I am out of the room for 15 minutes, I would appreciate a TV with a V-chip and you can bet I would have it dialed down pretty low!
I'm still working on a clever footer.
"... but when I'm not there, there's nothing wrong with leaving the kids in front of the tube instead of playing outside or reading a book ..."
".. but the sad truth is that parents *choose* to let children watch a lot of TV, likely because they themselves were brought up wathing a lot of TV and can't get outside the system long enough to see how ludicrous is all is..."
"And no one would deny that simply blocking a whole ton of content by encouraging mindless tv watching over the various means children have a amused and educated themselves over millions of years without rhyme or reason is wrong and no excuse for parenting."
"So I'm not gong to let my child go through life with blinders on, everyone else watches 10 hours of tv a day, so I'm going to do my part to make sure my kid watches 10 hours a day to, so he can have the same blinders as his peers, and in fact myself..."
"But when he's seeing the violence, gratuitous sexual content, and drug users and thieves being glorified, and cops being made out to look like idiots, then I want to be there to legitimize the notion that his amazing machine of a body is made for nothing but sitting down and pressing buttons on a remote."
Will you also mention that people who sit around watching tv all day eat more junk, get alzhiemers (sp) disease more often, get less excerise and die of an early heart attack while dripping kfc down the front of their shirt, eyes focused tightly on the 60hz flicking image of the celebrity of the moment?
I may have been trolled, but I'm sure enough people think like this anyways. Turn off the TV, open your eyes, and walk outside. If you don't like what you see, start walking and don't stop until you do. Take your kids with you. We'll all be better for people waking up from their media induced comas.
Good luck.
Well, I have eliminated TV from my life, except from the odd Discovery channel show I watch with a friend of mine in the building, or maybe a movie now and again. You're right - it's here to stay, but it doesn't take that much effort to break the habit and life is so much better without. I encourage everyone to try.
I used to be ambivelant about whether prospective roommates of mine had tv's or not, until I realized that with a tube in the house, I became a total addict (CNN/Discovery/TLC etc). So I went cold turkey, and I won't room w/anyone w/a tv, and I don't miss it.
l8r
When I'm sitting there with my son, I can explain what's wrong, or even sometimes what's good, about what's happening on the television. But when I'm not there, there's nothing wrong with doing what little we can do to block what may be questionable content. At worst, we can not let him watch something, record it, and watch it together.
No, I don't want my child learning everything from TV, but the sad truth is that kids watch a LOT of TV. Kids get home from school before you get home from work. Kids get more vacation days from school than you get from work. And no one would deny that simply blocking a whole ton of content without rhyme or reason is wrong and no excuse for parenting.
This is not an all or nothing argument, it is not black and white. There are parents on either extreme that fall at the ends of the bell curve, but most parents fall in the middle. We want our children to learn right from wrong, and they can do that when we are there. They can't do that watching 90210 reruns, as you so aptly pointed out. Television does not equal real life. So I'm not going to let my child go through life with blinders on, but when he's seeing the violence, gratuitous sexual content, and drug users and thieves being glorified, and cops being made to look like idiots, then I want to be there to explain the difference between real life and fiction, right down to the fact that the cool guy smoking the marlboros died last year from lung cancer.
So while your flippant remarks about "Sally" watching 90210 and "Jonhny" making pipe bombs may get you karma from all the high school and college students, those remarks are far from the reality of what the chip CAN do when used as tool and not as a substitute for parenting.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Of course, doing that is like having the chip blocking ALL channels. What's worse?
Stupid sexy Flanders.
That's not the point, and anything taken to an extreme can be made to look like a bad thing. If anything, I'd refute his argument this way: most of the time my son is watching TV (which won't be a whole lot), I or my wife will be there. However, as he gets older and more independent, he'll have access to the TV while I'm still at work, while mom's making dinner or doing the laundry, while mom's out but dad's cutting the grass, whatever. I'd rather block questionable content than let him see it without guidance.
In the worst case, he can say "Dad, why can't I watch like all the kids at school?". At that point, I can make an effort (change the time I cut the grass, or do the dishes later, or whatever), and watch the show with him. If I don't find it objectionable, I can change my schedule, or tape it for him (better, speed through commercials which are the biggest problem on commercial TV).
I would even say that even if I DO find it objectionable, I can explain what and why, and still let him watch the show. At least he'll hear from me that the criminal is actually doing something BAD, and that the bumbling cops are not funny or realistic.
The best point is that I also don't think the people rating the shows will have the same exact opinion as mine, to which I can only shrug and say that it's better than nothing when I'm not available to watch with him. No, it's not a perfect solution, but neither is letting your kids just do anything they damn well please. Any PARENT arguing you need to watch your kids 24/7/365 who ACTUALLY DOES THIS, please let me know...but over parenting can be just as bad.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Something that would let you select channels, hours, and total duration of viewing, would be a lot better.
Before anyone jumps on my case, I consider this another tool in the parent toolbox - a tool to handle the changing times. It's not an alternative to parenting, as so many kids (so it seems to me) keep suggesting.
I would be a lot happier, though, if I could just filter out commercials. If anything is contrary to reality, more misleading, more influencial (in negative consumer ways), it's commericials.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Instead of not letting my kids watch television AT ALL, I'd prefer they watch it in moderation. If that means that I can't be there every second they are watching TV, then so be it.
My point is there is nothing inherently WRONG with the v-chip. It might be better to just eliminate television from your life, but since that's a fantasy, there's nothing wrong with the v-chip (except there could be much better solutions).
Stupid sexy Flanders.
The fact is that, while I spend a lot more time with my son than most fathers, you can't be with them every second of every day they have access to the television. It's not that I want to see him grow up blind to reality, but that I want to be there when he sees stuff on television so it can be discussed.
The problem is that kids get home from school before you get home from work. They wake up earlier on weekends, they get a lot more time off for vacations. Now, I'd prefer my son not watch a lot of television, but he is going to watch some amount of television, and some of that will be when neither parent is available.
So why can't I choose to enable the v-chip to block questionable content when I'm not going to be there? There are also channels that very young children should just not have access to, and I certainly wouldn't want one popping up accidentally while channel surfing.
V-Chip does not replace parenting, and there are few parents naive enough to think that their kids won't have access to questionable material (be it on television, the web, magazines, or whatever else comes along), but shouldn't we do what little we can when we can do it?
I know I'm on the older side of the slashdot readers, but I also want to add that there is a lot of parent slamming that goes on here. A lot of parents deserve it, but the vast majority of parents are a lot smarter than kids give them credit for, and most of them are reasonable - it's not a black and white, all or nothing argument (like netfilters). It's a gray issue - with most parents falling in the middle of the bell curve. Anyone who enables a v-chip blocking for all the channels and never turns it off, or those who don't mind what their kids see on television at all fall at the extremes. Sometimes it might be appropriate to use, sometimes not. No one says, and most would agree, it's not a substitute for parenting, it's just another tool to help teach our kids. No, not teaching by blocking content, but teaching by enabling us to be there when the content is viewed so it can be discussed, if need be.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
That being said, it shouldn't be a substitute for parenting.
But it's nice to have the option.
--
Free Mac Mini
I use the V-Chip on my TV to block TV-MA programs from myself. Garbage in, garbage out, right? No evil enters the mind, no evil is acted out. Why is it so important to preserve degrading content in our homes? Wickedness is the root cause of all poverty and misery. If the worst of it disappears from the "air waves" (or coax cables), then good riddance.
What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul?
Choose now...
at least this type of censorship is activated at the consumer level, not the broadcaster level. Besides, most parents won't even use it, either because they're too inept to program a vcr or, if parents do manage to operate the vee chip, because no self-respecting kid would allow such a curtailing of their rights to violence on tv.
Back in the days of those big monster dishes that sat in your back yard, you used to have parental controls built into them so that you could lock out certain channels, usually the porn channels. These channels were typically locked out with a secret code consisting of 3 or 4 digits.
My friend's cousins (about 10 years old) sat for an entire day systematically trying different codes until they found the right one, and poof, let there be porn. Their parents never knew the difference.
The bottom line is that if they want it, they will get it. If they don't decide to crack the code, there are other avenues... going to a friend's house to watch TV for instance. Or watching on an "old" TV which doesn't support V-chip. If they're really desperate, they can shoplift R-rated movies from Walmart if they really want to (or buy them... I'm willing to bet 99% of cashiers won't give a rat's ass).
Mechanik
Advertising in all it's forms, including stuff disguised as children's shows (Pokemon)
Religious brainwashing, my little brother once was crying over the fact that I'm not going to heaven as I am not a member of a church
Violence that is potrayed by most of the American tv shows...
But I guess it will just block nudity and violence.
Any American giving up his/her personal responsibility to think and act to some governing body should be deported to the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
So this allows people to avoid watching highly rated television programming... what's new about that?
I'm glad I'm not the only one who had a vision of Cartman getting fried when he read the articile headline :-)
---
James Sleeman
NZ Electronics Enthusiasts: Check out my Trade Me Listings
But that's too complex for people so we have to go LCD. Well, that's not really acceptable to me.
Rich
Whereas the North doesn't need this of course, already having managed to convince people that the civil war was about slavery and not state rights.
People, the civil war was about an imperialistic federal government forcing it's agenda on and over the constitutionally protected rights of the individual States.
The losers in the civil war were the citizens of the United States of America, the winners was the federal government. Remember which side was which next time Washington DC tells your state to install content filters in your libraries.
Rich
Disclaimer: I do not support slavery in any way or form
that's the scary thing. We haven't. They have deemed themselves to have opinions so important that the rest of the world should abide by them.
Throw a few random Joes and Joans in there and it would probably be a bit more reasonable. Unfortunately, we're getting the extremists.
Rich
It's the old forbidden fruit thing. When kids are told not to do things, it raises their curiosity. Now, I don't advocate giving a two year old a gun to play with to get it out of their system but you have to wonder.
For example, I myself am 30. Last week, I was going to get a chance to handle a chainsaw for the first time. Now, I've played doom, all that cool destructive power and loud as well. Well, comes to it, you pull the trigger, it saws through wood. No big deal. But the point is that my expectation way exceeded the experience. I think we forget this when we tell children not to do things which seem mundane (if slightly dangerous) to ourselves.
Rich
Here's the thing--broadcasters have been loosening up on censoring continuously for 50 years. Nearly every year has brought out something that couldn't have been shown previously. This chip certainly isn't going to reverse that!
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
Suppose the chip does increase parents' confidence in television content; kids will probably watch more TV. They'll be exposed to more ads. And they're going to nag their parents to buy more chocolate-coated sugar bombs and Barbie dolls.
The truth is advertising affects everyone (much more than we admit too ourselves), but kids are more susceptible because they haven't learned to criticize their environment.
I find Barbie advertisements much more offencive than most television programs. I would be more horrified if my daughter asked for a Baribe, then if she asked why all those people are being mean too each other on the news--at least I would have the chance to explain the latter.
V-Chips shouldn't replace parents, but they will.
True, but they carry "unrated" versions of films, which may or not be the equivalent of NC-17. Some are foreign and never rated anyway. Blockbuster is not stupid enough to turn away income.
The original Robocop was rated NC-17.
I'm too lazy to look this up, but I'm pretty sure that the addition of the NC-17 rating by the MPAA was added well after Robocop was released.
--
dman123 forever!
--
dman123 forever!
Filtering out the -1s and 0s since 1999.
Yeah. Speaking as a parent, I know that I'd much rather read them stories. Lets see what we have here...Ahh yes. Goldilocks; the story of a headstrong young girl practicing the arts of home invasion, theft, vandalism, and stupidity, who then gets away scot free. Ok, how about Hansel and Gretel, the story of two abused children who are kidnapped and almost eaten? Ahhh yes, Little Red Riding Hood, who not only is pursued by a wolf, but gets to watch said wolf get vivisected, and then Grandma pops out. I stopped treating my toddler as a toddler the day that I noticed that she'd manifest a bad habit within a few days of having a story designed to stop said bad habit read to her. Also, they week that she watched Starship Troopers with me without batting an eyelash, but went into full blown hysterics when on a Thanksgiving special of Winnie the Pooh, poor Owl's house blew down in a windstorm.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Hey! As a proud Canadian, it would be nice if you could at least get the proper name of the CBC right: "Canadian Broadcasting Corporation". Any Canadian knows that.
Of course it goes without saying that most kids will easily find a way around the v-chip. If parents are too lazy to look after their kids, why would they bother programming a chip, especially when they want to watch those shows later?
icqqm [ICQ:11952102]
Last time I checked, CBC was the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, owned by the government!
The parents who lazily embrace the 'v-chip' solution are the same ones who won't provide the guidance to their kids in front of a naked TV.
I don't think the arguments about how the 'v-chip' relegates 'parental intelligence' to a third party hold much water. The influence still comes from the parent, whether they choose to employ the 'v-chip' or to ignore what their kids watch.
-ben
myselfmusic
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
I'll say. I seem to recall Eddie Murphy's RAW being rated "For All" (equivalent of G) in Quebec while being "Restricted" (NC-17) in other parts of Canada...
Less cultural tight-assedness about swearing, or a language barrier at the Quebec ratings authority? Not sure which one was responsible, but it sure as hell was funny...
Never play leapfrog with a unicorn.
My 6-year-old is not ready to see Saving Private Ryan, and I will be censoring him with regard to that and many other movies for several years. As he matures, I will relax my restrictions, and provide as much guidance as I can. By the time my son is grown and on his own, I will have done my best to prepare him to make good adult decisions.
So parents, censor away! It is your right, and your obligation. Just remember you have a deadline for getting in all the education you can, after which your grown kids will be on their own.
"Rub her feet." -- L.L.
My ideal would be to have zero government expenditure, at all levels from city to federal, that is not truly a "public good." On my short list of public goods are national defense, roads, courts, police and fire services, and...well, I can't think of much else right now, but I am sure there are some more. Oh, and I am willing to entertain any arguments that we could get along without even some of the ones I mention.
"Rub her feet." -- L.L.
That leads me to to something another poster said in this thread, but which is worth repeating. The problem is not the V-chip itself, but the mandating of the V-chip. I wouldn't mind having another tool in my parenting efforts, but others should not have to subsidize my parenting by buying V-chips they don't want.
Hold it right there, partner. It is a bit of a stretch to blame TV for animals who blow away innocent human beings. Those shooters had other problems, some including parents who didn't notice they were making pipe bombs in the garage. I challenge you to show that a V-chip would have made one iota of difference in any of those cases."Rub her feet." -- L.L.
Well it could be a forerunner to the real technology they want to deploy.
1. Forcing the chip to block any content worse than an MPAA "R" Rating. They can make it illegal for Canadians to broadcast such material, but that won't stop US broadcasters, some of whose signals can be picked up in Canada.
2. Log how many shows watched are "bad", and a history of what the rating threshold has been set to. If there is ever a custody fight or allegations of bad parenting, the courts can come and take your children away if they see a lot of "bad" stuff being watched or the rating threshold being too high.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Horror of horrors! What's this world coming to?! (This is supposed to be a bad thing?)
--
Have fun: Join D.N.A. (National Dyslexics Association)
Note that this is in Australia, which has slightly different regs.
Over here they did an experiment where they took a random cross-section of the population and asked them to rate a selection of movies to be shown in cinemas. This was then compared against the official Bureau classification.
In almost all cases, the audience asked for a rating at least one degree lower than the one given by the Bureau. However, the audience was much more lenient about sex and drugs, and much less lenient on violence.
My personal view is that censorship of any form is wrong. It's far better to educate and let children (or anyone) choose for themselves than to attempt to regulate.
Now when are they going to put a chip in TV sets that automatically blocks commercials?
This would come in especially handy when recording shows. No more wasted tape to fast-forward through, more 'useful' information per tape, etc..
Keep your V-chip, but I'd pay extra for a C-chip...
Windows is not the answer.
Windows is the question.
The answer is "NO."
Shut up. Just shut the hell up. This is such a tired comparison.
Of the couple dozen PCs I have purchased for myself and others over several years, not a single one of them has had Windows preloaded. Looks like you need to find a new retailer.
So, I have it turned on to acceptable levels and then when it pops up I can then override it if I want to. But it's a nice way to help prevent some of the crud from ending up in my face.
I think this is a good technology if used right. I don't think that using it as an end-all be-all filter to decide what your kids would be watching is a good idea, but at least it gives you an idea of what type of show it is, so you can be informed.
There are other and better ways to learn about the world if your afraid some poor child will miss some important documentary about the Holocaust or something, it's called a book.
That's true, but see, most kids today only read Harry Potter-type books. While there's nothing wrong with this, kids just aren't going to take a few days (weeks) to read a history book when they can just vegitate in front of a TV for an hour.
--
--
#nohup cat
I have a shotgun, a shovel and 30 acres behind the barn.
1q2w3e4r5t6y7u8i9o0pqawsedrftgthyjukilo;p'azsxdcf
I'm glad somebody finally said what needed to be said. Lazy parents indeed. Nitemayr, you obviously don't have kids. Run along now or you'll be late for class.
1. Censorship
The V-chip is not causing censorship. It would be censorship if the decision to block programming was made by somebody other than ourselves such as the government or some other organization outside of our direct and voluntary control. The only censorship issues caused by the V-chip are between the parent and child. To the chagrin of many children everywhere this is still a consititutionally acceptable situation.
2. Quality of the programming
Defenders of the V-chip say t.v. is crap anyway and the kids aren't missing much to be desired. Opponents of the V-chip say there is quality programming like PBS and the Discovery Channel that may me at risk of being filtered. This is irrelevant. Quality is subjective. The chip will black out programs, if told to, based on certain criteria like offensive language and sexual and violent content not the quality of the content. Really, how often does PBS or the Discovery channel air programs with 17 MA ratings anyway?
3. There is no cause and effect between t.v. and behavior
While I cannot definitively say yes there is or no there is not a connection between what kids (or adults) see on t.v. and their behavior, it's wrong to think the V-chip should go away simply because you're on the side that thinks t.v., movies and video games have no effect on a person. Leave the V-chip option there for those that do believe there is a connection and want to be proactive in reducing the amount of those influences in their children. The chip in no way affects your ability to watch violent, profane or sexual content.
Basically, many opponents of the V-chip claim that this is further step onto a slippery slope of government (or some other control group)sanctioned censorship. I don't understand this since nobody but the t.v. set owner controls the operation of the V-chip.
However, the V-chip is a tool for parents to slow the descent of their children on a different slippery slope - the slope of moral decline we've been on for many years now. Come on, do you think Temptation Island you last two seconds on air back in the Fifties?
The V-chip is a tool not a conspiracy.
, I had a pretty good idea what was 'appropriate' for children (at least in my family), and just didn't watch anything else. Why? Because my parents raised me to not just absorb the outside world, but to process it as well. What is appropriate for children, is IMO appropriate for everyone (the two are interchangable). I saw Total Recall when I was ten and I'm neither a rapist nor a homocidal maniac. Sure this doesn't prove a great deal, but as far as I can tell I don't have any psycological problems from the many 'arnie' type movies that me and my cousins regularly watched back then, from ages 6-15 or so. If one can be 'harmed' by something, then one has to be able to understand it. And if one can understand it then they are old enough to view it. A few hundred years ago kids (teens) were introduced to war and soldiery early on, and yeah it was a different world, but murder and other such crimes were still unacceptable. And I know it is not great analogy, but it illustrates a point. As for sex, young boys regularly engaged in sex in Ancient Greece (homosexual at that! may the devil take the pagan bastards!). These grew up into Platos and Aristotles. Now hold your horses there! I'm not saying I want my kids involved in sex before their 16, but I know that is because of a set of morals imposed on me by society. I don't particularly mind them, they don't hurt anyone and it makes me and most others feel comfortable. But, it is impossible to say that just because someone views material our society deems objectionable for a certain agegroup, at this certain age, that they will be psycologically damaged. So what I mean to say, is that if a kid gets their hands on mainstream violence and sex in movies, it wouldn't bother me at all, because I did the same and I can differentiate between reality and fantasy. I wouldn't supply my children with hardcore videos, but if they somehow got a hold of one, I wouln't be bothered, because it just isn't going to fuck them up!
// It had been Fat's delusion for years that he could help people. --Philip K. Dick, Valis
My TV came with the chip.
The remote that came with it has a little button on it labeled "V-chip" (read "press here Timmy").
Now, what could mummy's passcode be..?
Can I use this to ensure that I only have to search through the most vile and disgusting stuff to find something worth watching.
This would sure be an improvement over having to to surf through all the 100+ channels
134340: I am not a number. I am a free planet!
I think it would be much more efficient to implant the kids with a chip and just have them shutdown if anything happens around them which is to high of a rating. Much more logical!
If I were a parent, I'd prefer to have a mechanism that locks out certain channels, rather than the V-chip. I would find it much easier that way, to keep track of what shows my children have access to.
Seems like an obvious thing, so I wouldn't be suprised if such a TV exists, but then, I've never seen one.
--
Accountability on the heads of the powerful.
Power in the hands of the accountable.
I fully expect TV to do the same. It'll start off slowly, e.g., no TV-MA programs allowed on the air before 9:00pm, then it'll be no TV-PG or higher rated programming during "kids time slots", then some things will be restricted to 2:00-5:00am only. Then, "since no one is watching this" and "it's no longer profitable to the TV station", programs with too strong a rating will be dropped all together, by the TV station's choice. Then, once people are "used to this stuff not airing", it won't be hard to pass legislation to keep it from ever returning to the air waves.
You wait and see. This is how it goes. Why isn't any asking who is doing this "rating" anyway? DOn't you wonder?
I think you can get 99% of the functionality by just disabling channels and time slots. For my young kids, for example, I'd just turn *on* the 3 PBS stations, the CBC station (during most hours, anyway), and Disney before 3PM, when it changes from little kid drivel to teenager drivel. Everything else would be turned off.
Also, it would be great to have a timer so the box would go off after an hour or whatever the limit is. That would save a lot of arguing.
During lots of shows the worst offenders are the commercials - mostly the trailers for the R-rated movies that are due out in the theaters. Will the v-chip block that?
Call me crazy, but nobdy FORCES you to use the chip. Perhaps you could complain about having to pay for it in every TV you buy, even if you don't intend to you it - but it's still not censorhip!
I can't be karma whoring - I've already hit 50!
SIG: HUP
U talking about Teletubbies?
This could be inspiration for a new generation of young hackers. Start small, hacking away with their television set, then gradually move them up to kernel-hacking! It's a natural evolutionary path!
Although I really don't like the idea. I would much rather have a v-chip in my tv and have regular stations broadcasts movies uncensored then have to watch censored movies and have someone else judge what is appropriate for me to watch. But will broadcasters loosen up on the censoring of shows when the v-chip comes out? If they do then I am all for it.
I'm assuming that Canada uses the same television standard as at least one other country. Many manufactuers likely would consider it less expensive to put these chips in *all* of their televisions rather than making specialized additions for Canada.
As a case in point, consider newer automobiles which have their headlights on all the time. Only a few locations (all of Canada and the state of Florida I believe) require headlights to be on continuously. But instead of making specialized vehicles for these locations, automobile manufactuers added the feature to most if not all of their lineup. To consumers, having headlights on during the daytime is advertised as a "safety feature." You see dozens of these cars during a trip on any major roadway in the United States.
When one country accepts these televisions for their additional functions, it allows any other country that wants this technology to easily lap it up. Only the broadcast end of systems will need to be changed. It becomes real easy for someone to turn on things "at the flick of a switch" when the masses already have it in front of them.
(Personally, I believe parents should watch what their kids are doing, and not rely on any regulatory or industry body to do so. Rating and censoring products should only be used as tools, and parents must be able to disable these quickly should said products go astray from *their* beliefs, not the original rater's!)
What's with all the armchair "parents" with their opinions on responsible parenting? (More likely 15 year olds fearful that they might have to live under their parents rules) Parents cannot hang over their children 24 hours a day, so we fall to the "tribe" mentality of watching our kids: The tribe puts signals stating the level of violence/nudity/profanity/etc. and we, being responsible configure our television to block it. I completely fail to see how this could be irresponsible, and presuming that this is in lieu of proper parenting is absurd: It's yet another parenting tool. It isn't the cure for Columbines nor will it ensure a better generation, but if you can give parents that control and they're the one's paying the bills and running the show, so be it.
Television (esp. with cable) has gotten much more risque than it was 15 years ago. The other day I was flipping through the channels and City TV (a Toronto station that single handedly changed Canadian standards) was showing full nudity of 300lb women. I'm sure there are a lot of GoatSexers out there who would love that, and I'm not even saying it's bad from a moral or teaching perspective (i.e. I personally have no problem with shows like SexTV and think inevitably your children will seek out this info as Sex is a rather basic human instinct), but parents should have the ability to monitor and control if the technology does exist. Don't brand them as irresponsible because they want this ability.
Invisible to viewers, the rating code triggers the chip, which turns the television screen to black if the rating is too high.
Not unlike Microsoft's Windows code, which turns the computer screen blue if the performance is too high.
Tongue-tied and twisted, just an earth-bound misfit, I
Tongue-tied and twisted, just an earth-bound misfit, I
Learning to fly, Pink Floyd.
Spoken like a non-parent (yes I'm guessing here). Do you really think that you can spend all of your time with your children?
I'm waiting to hear the stories of the parents with the VCR flashing 12:00 who now can't watch ER after the kids have gone to bed.
No, I would display it in the Library of Congress as a symbol for what the advancement of freedom of speech and anonymity on an open forum on the internet has brought to mankind.
A good picture says always more than thousand words...
It is extremely important that we take these efforts to keep the Candians glued to their TV, you understand, so they won't react quickly when we finally decide to send the Marines across the border, plant the Stars and Stripes, and declare Canada the 51st state of the Union. (Everywhere except Quebec, of course, since nobody wants to deal with a bunch of secessionists :-)
Mmmm, excuse me while I go extract my tongue from my cheek...
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
Lest you think I'm disagree, I concur that parents should have "the ability to monitor and control" what their kids watch. My parents did this many years ago without a v-chip: If they didn't like what I watched, they turned off the set.
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
More options - yes. If used properly this V-chip will help parents control what shows their kids watch (to reenforce values on right/wrong). But if parents use it as a replacement for talking to their kids, it will cause more youth violence, or at least not help reduce violence.
People would start to realize - not if trends are the same as in the U.S. After a school shooting happens, parents demand more controls. After all, those deranged sickos must not have had the V-chip turned on in their TVs. And the internet must be corrupting them too. Let's ban that also. TV, movies, internet, music, what's next, books? The V-chip will not be attacked until every "unprotected" communications medium is controlled.
It's not like anyone under 18 has rights anyway - and it will stay like that until people under 18 start demanding their rights. The same was true for racial minorities and women in the US less than 50 years ago, albeit on a larger scale.
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Do any of you still watch TV? Before 199x, I used to turn on the TV for news or entertainment; now I get most of my news from the net or printed media (yes, Sally, I've gone back to reading newspapers) and for entertainment I turn to games or other forms of interactive amusement. Better still, I do most of all that with other people, and the good thing about surfing the web with friends (in the same room) is that you don't get the "shut up, I'm trying to listen to the TV" stuff...
So really... TV is taking another step to its ultimate demise. Stand back and applaud.
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free the mallocs!
If they can put a "V" chip in a Tee Vee, they sure ought to put a "C" chip in there, too. "C" in this case means "commercial". If there's a pernicious element to current Tee Vee programming, it's those damn commercials, teaching your kids to be sluts like Britney Spears, promoting unrealistic values, increasing soulless, godless consumerism.
Mother *BZzZzZzT* *oW!*
Blame Canada!
To teach is to learn.
-Krnl
http://krnlpanic.com
Dr. Vozknocker: Ok, now try this one, "Big floppy donkey dicks!"
Cartman: NO
Dr. Vozknocker: Success, the child doesn't want to swear!
-If you don't get it, should you really have mod points?
Does this mean that the networks will quit chopping out the best parts of movies.
I think he ended up calling the cable company out to reset the box.
You've taken the example to a ridiculous extreme to prove your point (which is referred to as "straw man" tactics), and made a factual error. To prove my point, try taking your 16-year-old's car keys away so he loses his after school job. Do you think the police will care about that? Of course not. How about telling your child he can't watch television, or go to the library, or leave the house? No, no and no. Take away any possession not deemed a "necessity" by law? Not a problem. Tell him how to dress, or force him to go to a particular church? Does your argument stand up to this? Not likely. To say that anyone under 18 has the same rights as an adult is just silly. If you think that the right to physical safety is the only right afforded to you, try going next door and telling your neighbor what he can watch on TV tonight.
There are few laws designed to protect kids' rights, because there are so few rights afforded to kids by the law. The V-chip is designed to make parental control of TV content easier (which is all too much a demonstration of my point to begin with), based on the assumption that parents will do this limiting with their children's best interests in mind. Note that the law doesn't care (and doesn't check) whether the parent really does have that best interest in mind, except in cases of gross abuse (like your example).
Next time, try making a valid argument instead of using foolishness to back up your point.
Virg
To think that the moderation of news by peers may upset or surprise the /. community is quite entertaining to say the least. Now if Canada's Vchip would implement a moderation policy as well --now that would be a trully positive turn for the better. Wouldn't it?
Let's see V-Chip, ratings for video games........OH MY GOD COMMUNISM is right around the corner!
If people want the right to limit their childs viewing habits then what's the big deal?? This could always be done by blocking certain channels anyways.
There are other and better ways to learn about the world if your afraid some poor child will miss some important documentary about the Holocaust or something, it's called a book.
The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him. --Robert Benchley
This is a good thing.
and hypocrisity, not because of TV and Internet. ALL high-profile school and shooting accidents that happened in Canada in the last couple of years had bullying as their main cause.
i.e. not for kids under 14.
Why? Because when those lazy parents bitch to their gov't that tv is corrupting their children's minds, the gov't can finally reveal those parents for what they are; LAZY. They were given an opportunity to control what their kids watch and they failed to utilize it. Therefore, those parents are the ones corrupting their kids by doing nothing!
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. -Friedrich Nietzsche
Personally, I think people need to take more responsibility for their own actions. I have nothign against the V-chip personally. I have no need or use for it (I'm 22 years old, single, no kids), but since it doesn't add more than maybe a buck or so to the cost of a TV, and since it's in EVERY TV, then it's no big deal.
Actually, I think it's a good idea. Let us censor our OWN viewing. I personally don't need anyone else to tell me what I can and can't say.
It's all those other idiots in the US that think the right to free speech is also the right to shoot their mouth off whenever they damn well feel like it. Nobody seems to realize anymore that A: With rights come responsibilities, and B: that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. In other words, we need to watch what we say and do on our own, and not let the government slowly take away our rights with every liberal ass-wipe who wants to add another law to the books.
I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that you're an idiot!
I don't think it uses any kind of OS at all. It's probably just a simple logic chip or an EEPROM or something like that that's designed only to pick up an incoming signal, then send a message to the rest of the TV to stop the picture and sound until the channel's changed.
I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that you're an idiot!
Well, I am opposed to the enforced use of the V-Chip, but I am not opposed to broadcasts putting hidden ratings on tv to trigger the chip.
If TV networks want to broadcast this extra information and add a service to their broadcast for the use of consumers, that's fine.
I warn all the slashdotters that want to quash this technology that in many other cases you are fanatically supportive of including more information in media. "Information wants to be free."
The screening technology is not very accurate right now, or maybe it doesn't reflect your libertarian social mores. But the more people use it, the more refined it will be.
Multiple ratings systems using a variety of rubrics might be useful. Christian groups can develop ratings systems based on their beliefs, and Muslim groups can develop theirs. This gives viewers more control over what they watch, not less.
Goat sex free since 2001
Sounds to me like a good comprimise. The government can satisfy demands for a rating system while still allowing "violent" and "offensive" content to be chosen or blocked by the consumer. What's wrong with that. If you don't like V-chips, buy a TV without one. If you don't want to block the channels on your own TV, don't. At least you can still watch what you want (unless you're a child whose parents chose to protect you from the over glamourized Oscar's)
Reading the comments hre on the V-chip. And i find this one about a parent how is bashing slash dot readers saying we are young and don't know anything. Will granted I am 20 years old, and don't have children of my own. So my opinion will not mean much to this person. But then maby I should use the opinion of several parents I know including my own. My parents and several other parents thinkk the V-chip is for parents who are "lazzey". My parents in pitular beleave there is no sence trying t hide your kids from violence, sex and all that other stough out thee. But tht you should teach your kids what is right and wrong. So to who ever wrote the "lazy parents everywhere " (Score:5, Insightful), i think its greatt hat you want to teach your kids what is rigth and wrong, but realize that a v chip is a waste of time. and again i state "V chip is for lazy parents" my 2 cents plus 2 more
Ok...I'm a parent, I live in Canada, my spouse and I both work and abandon our kids to babysitters before/after school, I censor my kids stuff - videogames, TV shows, etc. Guess how I do it? I turn shit off!!!! I surf with my kids!!! I PLAY with my kids!!!! So, do I like V-Chip. Nope. It's stupid - about as stupid as Net filtering software. It's an opiate for middle-class parental guilt. HOWEVER, I think parents who want a V-chip should be able to have one. I can get call display for my phone, so why can't I get 'content-display' for my TV?
CrazyLegs
"Pork!!" said the Fish, and we all laughed.
So sure, the kidz can't get their fix on the TV, and there's not much of a way around the V chip. but surely they can still get on the internet, type in a URL such as goatse.cx and get past any type of parental controls that way??
:)
where there's a will there's a way, and kids are very ingenious when it comes to violence and sex
The "volunteers off the street" rating system must be an American one. As far as I know in Canada, the ratings are given by a panel of selected reviewers. I'm assuming that the people on this panel were chosen/elected for their proven abilities, training, or their educational experience. There are different rating classifications here (as described in the article) than in the US, so it makes sense there is a different system for rating films, tv and video games. Any Canadians out there who have more information on this, please let me know.
I know for a fact that Muchmusic does a similar type of panel for music videos they will air. They review potential videos for extreme violence, violence against women, and unnecessary sexual content. The US equivalent, MTV, generally only scans for nudity and sex. An example is a Duran Duran video from about 3-4 years ago. It featured a robot woman who serviced the band's fantasies. Both music stations had complaints about the video and requested the band clean it up. But while Muchmusic was concerned about how women were portrayed in the video, and what message it was sending viewers, MTV only wanted the woman's ass covered up a bit more. It just shows the major differences in attitudes between Canada and the US when it comes to media ratings.
Perhaps it's called the violence chip because you will beat the crap out of your television when you forget the override code.
So does that mean we won't be getting any shows about Canadian beaver?
The C-Chip blanks the screen at any display of the christian coalition
The L-chip replaces Microsoft adverts with Linux ads
The M-Chip swirches the channel to CNBC each time Maria Bartiromo appears on the floor of the NYSE.
The O-Chip does nothing
The S-Chip censors anything to do with the Spice girls
The W-Chip turns to another channel whenever the Florida Fraudster shows up
The X-Chip causes subtitles to be displayed explaining why the plots of the X-files are based on junk science.
That's enough chips - Ed.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
you people! doesn't ANYONE think that little kids watching stuff like Terminator is bad? or wrestling? YES! no kidding! little kids like to emulate what they see. IRL on on TV... so if you're a parent and you're not around, you should damn well have the ability to stop this kind of thing! WTF is the problem with this????
>
Some parents actually sit with their kids and watch TV. They could enable the V-CHIP to allow the kid the maximum control while making sure they didn't stumble onto anything inappropriate. It doesn't mean they're lazy.
And the V-CHIP isn't censorship. At least, I don't consider keeping a five year old from watching a sex channel censorship.
And I hope you all don't, either. It isn't as though the V-CHIP is telling us what we can or can't watch. It's only letting the owner of the device use it as they wish.
Do you like German cars?
The quote that I was gonna include at the top:
"This is a boon to lazy parents everywhere"...
Sorry about that!
Do you like German cars?
I have nothing against the V-Chip. The problem with it is, it add a couple extra bucks and adds a feature I don't want. Unfortunately, I'm most likely to get one and pay that extra buck or two because the US government has said that X percent of TVs must have the V-Chip. The chip itself should be optional and not forced by law in any manner.
You stupid bastard, you don't have no arms left. It's just a flesh wound.
1. I watched an evening documentary a few weeks ago that placed deactivated handguns where children could easily find them, left them unsupervised and watched to see what would happen. The results were hardly surprising. From the kindergarten kids who had a class teaching them not to touch guns to the teenager who had lost a good friend because of a shooting, the results were the same. They picked up the gun and started 'play' shooting, pointing it at other kids, etc. I realized that these kids were just modelling what they had seen. They never saw people using guns safely and responsibly, just as an instrument of violence. My theory is that kids learn more by what the SEE and less by what they HEAR. At least, that explains why my kids don't listen to me.
2. You are entirly correct in your critcism of ratings boards. But what is the alternative? None at all would be completly irrisponsible, despite bleatings to the contrary. At least a ratings board provides an avenue for complaint, someplace to write to and say 'You guys screwed up on this show - get it right next time'. Unless we as a society are going to allow parents to stay at home to provide 24x7 care, and allow then unrestricted access to the media for previewing, some kind of rating system is mandatory.
Just like the movie ratings in the 60's allowed R rated movies to become mainstream, the V chip will allow even more radical television to become common, since "you can block it if you don't like it". Don't get me wrong, I LIKE it. It's funny how trying to suppress something just makes it more available. I think the V chip is the best thing to come along in a long time. ERROR 407: SIG NOT FUNNY!
Those of us that can think for ourselves, and are well over 18 and therefore not going to be influenced by this chip directly, still have problems with it. Look at it this way: do we honestly want an entire generation of children raised who have all their entertainment/information censored the same way? I remember Catcher in the Rye (considered to be a true literary classic nowadays) being banned when I was in school, and the line back then was "It doesn't affect you, we're saving the children, butt out". Sorry, but parent or no, I have an obligation to society to make sure we don't tread the same path that historically we've walked so many times before.
Book bannings, TV censorship, Internet filtering, 'adults' sections in the library, 'appropriate for women' topics of conversation, segregated schools.... Sorry, but 1790 or 2001, I don't see much difference between any of this. And this isn't just some 'information wants to be free' rant. However, when we choose to restrict it, suddenly we're all relying on a select group of people's opinions to dictate our own?
Not to indulge in hyperbole, but 1984 was based in the UK, and was not really an anti-communism rant like so many people take it to be. Orwell's entire point is that this could happen to us, and we're as likely as not to invite it in ourselves.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
What I am really looking for is a F-chip that I can switch on that will replace all the 'feminine cleanliness product' ads with basically anything with teen chicks in it (who aren't rollerbleeding at the time).
I don't understand what all the outrage about the "V-Chip" is. This seems like a positive step, it gives a parent more options in terms of monitoring their childrens TV usage. It's not like anyone under 18 has rights anyway... I don't think it's very effective of a tool, but it's not bad either.
Besides, in two years or so when people realize that teen violence hasn't gone down as a result of this device, people would start to realize that it's no replacment for just talking to their kids. It's one of those things that'll just need fail before people realize it won't work.
But, original point being, no harm is done to anyone by trying.
Don't you think you're over reacting a bit buddy? Man, you need to calm down and take a deep breathe. The world isn't ending.
;)
Besides, there are *dozens* of more reasons to be ashmed to be associated with canada than the V-Chip..
I agree with the v-chip in PRINCIPLE, but not in PRACTICE. It's nice that parents do have a tool. however, there are several issues with how the v-chip is implemented: The ratings system: It is still someone else's standards being placed on me. I have vastly different ideas of what constitutes an "R" rating than the MPAA. Most of the movies i watch would at worst hit "PG-13". Until it allows me to actually select content i don't want my kids to watch and doesn't block stuff that i wouldn't mind my kids watching, then I'm not for it. Personally i think that the rating system the MPAA uses is good for a guideline for some people but it should not be forced upon everyone. And what if there's some movement and suddenly something like Pokemón ends up being Rated 'R'? What then? censorship will still be around: i'm not naive enough to think that censorship will go away after the v-chip comes to town. in fact, our cable networks will probably still vigorously censor material even though they don't have to, since parents actually have a method to block their shows if they don't like them. So, the v-chip in its current form just takes away the right of responsibility for parents, and still doesn't solve the problem of censorship. Until they solve both these problems, i will never be for it.
Got Freedom?
Thinking?
Is this at implemented like BIOS on the hardware implementation? Can you remove the battery to reset all parental blocks and password? If so, I can't see that it would be too effective for anyone with kids over the age of 8.
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Bow before my sig, for it is good.
Here's my take on TV censorship... What if I can't watch ZZZ (replace ZZZ with your favorite vice) on TV... so what? Have I lost THAT MUCH? Here is a thought for you.. on American TV, we can watch murder, shootings, people run over by cars, decapitated, and killed in any number of impersonal ways. We can watch people denigrate, curse, abuse and treat others in the most heartless ways.... YET... We are not allowed to watch people make love. Think About It.
"All my life I wanted to be someone; I guess I should have been more specific." -- Jane Wagner
No one said you had to use it, nor was that the argument. The argument is that parents who are lazy and don't attend their kids see using the filter as a method of being good parents while really what is "offensive" is determined by a 3rd party.
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WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
When will people learn that censorship is not an alternative to responsibility. I wrote a 13,000 word essay for an ethics course on just this topic (don't worry, I'm not posting it). In this case I was discussing 'net nannies', but a v-chip follows the same principle.
The problem with censorship is who decides what is in and what is out. Child pornography? 99.99% of the population would agree that this is objectionable, but the dangers lie at the boundaries on objectionality. I am sure that is some parts of the southern U.S. a v-chip would soon enough screen out programs that delt with religiously controversial issues, or the history of slavery, the list goes on... I'm not beating up on the south, every culture has its problems. We (in the west) like to point at communist countries and scream "Big Brother", but we may allow the same level of information control to develop under our noses.
What is needed is a level of maturity, and responsibility on the part of parents and guardians. We wouldn't let our young children wander through an x-rated or brothel district unescorted, yet we seem to think that when the media is electronic, 'content control' becomes someone else's problem. Parents should be prepared to either supervise their children, or deal with the fact that kids are going to discover things we might want to hide from them.
We almost deserve v-chips - it is the price we are paying for 30 years of parental laziness...
-- Coding is art, I'm a surrealist
...just like that other relic from the 1980's, Ronald Reagan. I suppose we should be grateful: it was the threat of the V-chip that brought the Cypherpunks into existance and was indirectly responsible for the creation of PGP and the EFF. A little dose of fascism can do wonders for freedom.
[Insert the usual disclaimer here]
If I had a dollar for every time someone argued that restricting constitutional rights was good so long as it was "For the Children", I'd have enough cash to buy a cheap suit.
[Insert the usual disclaimer here]
Put down your crack pipe and just think for a moment. The end result of implementing your suggested plan will be a lowest common denominator system where we'll end up with most everything being censored: most everything offends someone. What about kids who have religious nutballs for parents? Will they have to suffer because of the idiocy of their parental units? Censorship is a Very Bad Thing. Building a tool for censorship into a ubiquitous device such as a Tee Vee is a Very Very Bad Thing.
[Insert the usual disclaimer here]
We can't let this happen. I fear for the availablility of great Canadian music! *whimper*
Why bother.
All right! Now parents can pay even less attention to their kids! No more need for baby-sitters, just sit your three-year old in front of the TV and go run that errand or go to work, because now your child will only turn into a violent psycho-killer because of neglect and not because of the violence they see on television.
why not take this chip, give it to slashdot and make users and moderaters prevent ME from watching to much crap? I'd definetly like to see a small box poping up in the upper right corner of my tv-screen saying "score 5: Funny", read "5 of 586 comments" and the like.
I can just picture it: you can buy the Television and the /\-chip fix seperately, or you can just buy a T&/\ set.
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City TV (a Toronto station that single handedly changed Canadian standards)
So... What were they doing with their other hand while they put near-porn on TV?
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Instead of being told by the government what is suitable for children of different ages, I would prefer that TV shows simply be numerically rated in various categories (e.g. violence, language, etc). That way I can decide what level I am prepared to accept in each category.
There is one very strange thing about the Canadian ratings. They are different for english and french programming.
For english programming the ratings are: Exempt, Children, 8+, General, PG, 14+, 18+.
For french programming the ratings are: Exempt, General, 8+, 13+, 16+, 18+.
It's funny when kids know how to use the v-chip and their parents don't. Have it block out Jerry Springer before you go to school and see how your overprotective white trash mom likes it :)
Es ist nicht leicht ein Gott zu sein. www.woofcat.com