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Supreme Court Rules on Challenge to COPA
Publiux writes: "LawMeme is reporting today that the Supreme Court upheld portions of the Child Online Protection Act because using community standards to determine what could be harmful to minors was not overly broad and thus not unconstitutional. Before you stop spreading your 'sexually explicit material' online, a lower court still has to determine if the law is unconstitutional for other reasons." Snibor Eoj submits this link to coverage at Yahoo! as well. Other readers link to AP coverage running at NandoTimes and the decision itself (PDF).
There are some places where liberty of speech doesn't apply, and k1dd13 pr0n is one of them.
Will the FBI try to have foreign parties prosecuted for violating COPA? After all, it works for DMCA and with COPA they only need to have a website that can be accessed from a US IP, they don't need to be offering any services.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
Supreme Court rules that using a law using 'community standards' does not mean its automatically unconstitutional.
That's it. They then sent the case back to the lower court to try unconstitutionality on other merits.
This was a very limited ruling, and the government is still barred from enforcing the law.
This isn't much of a news story...
-
Before you mod me down, read what I have to say. True, it deviates from the standard sheepbot formula, but I'm trying to reason through this objectively.
First, our right to speech is granted (i.e., it is not presumed) by the Constitution, a document that has weathered the test of time and provided the foundation for the civilized modern world. Therefore, this speech is colored by the other contents of the Constitution, including the possibility of limiting "Such Speach as may be Found Hurtful to the Citizens of the Nation." I think this falls into the "hurtful" category pretty clearly.
I'm not going to argue against this. Our children are too precious to sacrifice them at the altar of free speech.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
So now that an abominatoin like COPA is practically enforced by the highest legal authority in the land, what hope is there that DMCA and following draconian legislation will be ruled unconstitutional?
The owls are not what they seem
Does this mean that if there exists an enclave of ultra liberal, free thinking perverts who firmly believe that everything should be accessible to everyone, that is alright worldwide?
I smell venue shopping suits to follow! Salem, MA, watch out, they will be after you for Witchcraft next...
So just to check: I can still post whatever pictures I like here in the UK, so long as they're legal under UK law?
What about if I holiday in America? Will I get kidnapped like Skylarov did?
It's a sad day when only companies with credit-card processing equipment are allowed the freedom of the press.
So the Supreme Court thinks that "free speech" means "free if the majority of the populace likes it or agrees with it" (community standards). Isn't the First Amendment sort of nullified by a reading like that? If you're not allowed to make a statement or produce an artwork (including photographs) that the general populace doesn't agree with, then your speech isn't really free. It's just allowed or banned under the will of the government, which is the sort of situation that the original constitutional amendments were meant to put a stop to.
It's interesting to see how poorly understood the Internet is to the justices. The terminology is the same as if they were using "local community standards" to determine if a strip club should be allowed. That works when you are talking about a place with physical presence, but are we now going to apply the "local community standards" of some enclave of rich religious puritans to every internet user? I'm a member of a church who's "community standards" would reject most PG-13 movies (and in fact has specially edited versions of popular movies made to prevent the members from fleeing to R rated movies and "corrupting" themselves).
Let's hope that subjecting those who did not agree to a strict "community standard" themselves to the harshest that can be found turns this around...
Sig under construction since 1998.
I think that the judge's here (regardless of you personal opinion on censorship) are facing a rather tough challenge. The majority of people do NOT support child-porn, no matter what the circumstance (thankfully). However, it is not really within the realm of judges, IMO, to decide what constitutes offensive material.
The crux of the problem lies in just how much "censorship" they should support, while at the same time retaining some amount of control over what is morally acceptable. If they censor too much, they set a dangerous precedent which future generations of pro-censorship "moralists" may use as a weapon. If they don't support it at all, you leave some portions of the populace (children, in this case) defenseless against a heinous and perturbing crime. Worse, because of its ambiguous nature, any substance akin to child-porn is under fire. Not only must the judges weigh in the protection of children and censorship issues, they must ensure that no solution is too extreme.
My point? This is a tough call, so one should not rant to vigourously against the judges. I am anti-censorship but also anti-childporn...where does the line get drawn?
----------rhad
Slashdot needs to interview Natalie Portman.
I just love living in a country run by a bunch of uptight crybaby Christians, don't you? Child pornography is always going to be online. Passing laws against it and throwing people who happen to have a few cached or saved images into prison helps NOTHING.
While we're at it, let's throw some more drug users in there too!
I guess what most of these issues come down to is something I keep having a hard time with.
The internet isn't our little playground anymore, and we can't continue to use it like we have been.
I guess we really need to give up, and realize that Ashcroft and his men really do run things now. The internet has become not a tool of geeks, a place with Code rules all, but a corporate vehicle, to be regulated, and policied by whatever is popular at the moment, by whomever is in power, and we can't do a damn thing about it. There just aren't enough of us.
The internet is a victim of it's own success. The more people who use it without understanding how and why it works, the less it will be useful to those of us who liked having out own place to play.
We've already lost this fight. Viva La Freenet!
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Someone who doesn't *need* a cop just to tell him what to do.
KFG
Basicly the supreme court ruled against the ACLU's argument that the "community standards" were unconstitutional, but left the rest up to the lower coutrs to decide. This may bounce back to the supreme court at a later date, but for now it's been repremanded back to the federal circuit.
The injunction is still in place which means that the law cannot be enforced currently.
- H.R. 4239, which makes it a felony to distribute any kind of sexually explicit material to a user who does not register with a government-sanctioned age verification service (like AdultCheck).
- H.R. 4551, which outlaws the creation and distribution of "electronic burglary devices" such as system cracking scripts and port scanners.
- H.R. 4608, which taxes all sales of goods over the internet that originate overseas.
- H.R. 4277, which requires all ISPs to keep 6 months of records of all user activity and give law enforcement access to the records without a court order.
The list goes on. Naturally most of these will never become law, but statistically at least a few are likely to pass and make the internet that much more repressive. It's high time to vote Libertarian and try to preserve the few remaining liberties we actually have in this country.In particular, we know that there have been strategic efforts to prosecute purveyors of "adult" materials in the "least tolerant" communities.
Since it is technically impossible to know what community a web visitor is in (thanks to AOL and other proxy servers), the end result is simple: nobody can offer ANY "adult" materials to anyone in the world, unless those materials are acceptable under the community standards of the most conservative community in the United States.
The real goal, of course, is not to prosecute violations of this law -- it is to create a system that strongly deters creation or distribution of ANY adult content online. By imposing an impossible standard to prevent access by minors, the law effectively closes off access to everyone.
It would be interesting to see an analysis of the current minimum costs associated with starting an adult business, even ignoring the cost of legal advice and any costs associated with harassment by local law enforcement. I suspect the costs are quite high, especially for a firm producing original content. The bottom line, in my view, is that our government is imposing the moral views of a few to strongly discourage and often prevent access to adult materials wanted by the majority.
-- http://www.MarkWelch.com/ Pleasanton California
The COPA has nothing to do with child porn. It restricts *adult* material that *may* be viewed by a minor. In other words, " dirty pictures."
By applying " community standards" bikini pinups could be all that is needed to invoke prosecution under COPA.
It's the disturbing sort of law that makes it illegal to distribute the sort of material it's perfectly legal for the intended recipient to possess, even under the standards of the supposed "community."
KFG
Steven's dissent is interesing, he seems to believe that the majority was wrong in saying that community standards don't make the staute overbroad, which is what the Court of Appeals said.
Heh, so much for freedom of speech on /.
A story related to community standards and someones [sensible] opinion is modded down to troll. That just about says it all about american "Freedom of Speech": It's okay, as long as you dont offend anyone.
So how do we contribute to Judge Steven's election campaign, and get rid of the other 8?
Oh, wait, they're appointed. Rats. His point on how this means sites would have to cater to the least permissive denominator is darn insightful.
Clearly, in most cases there's going to be a lag between internet-saavy judges and reality, even moreso with politicians (as politicians cycle through quicker than high-level justices).
A.
The united states is also like 20 times larger in population. You need to do per capita statistics, not gross statistics.
This is not about kiddy porn... it is about regular porn that kids *might* see.
Yes, if you choose to vacation in the USA, you could be arrested and prosecuted if your adult content was viewed by someone in the USA and your web site did not comply with all the requirements of COPA and other laws of the United states. (Prosecution under COPA is not permitted currently, but if the law is upheld, you might later be prosecuted under that law. Prosecution under other laws, including local obscenity ordinances, could happen any time. If you are an adult webmaster in the UK or elsewhere, and if you think there is any likelihood that you might be prosecuted, I would certainly suggest you avoid Tennessee (and probably the entire Southern and Midwestern USA) on your next USA vacation. However, even if you chose to vacation only in a decadent USA city like Los Angeles or San Francisco or New York, you would still potentially be subjected to arrest and extradition to Tennessee (though the cost of extradition is so high that it's quite unlikely for this kind of alleged offense).
-- http://www.MarkWelch.com/ Pleasanton California
wtf duz that mean?
I'm about to make a big admission here: I work in the porn industry. I have a wife and 2 children that I have to feed and provide for for the next dozen years. These laws are totally misguided and are simply based on the will of a Christian fundamentalist minority that controlls Congress and wants, no, needs to see me out of a job and my family starve. This is just simply wrong, not to mention bad science.
Bad science how, you ask? Well, take my family for example. I can remember several occaisions where I have caught my 7-year-old daughter or my 11-year-old son watching some of the pornographic videos we have laying around the house, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with them! They were enjoying it! The only reason the governement passes these laws is because they want to keep us from expanding our market to children, for some misguided moralistic crusade. I envision a day when we will be able to distribute our videos at a special low rate on the playgrounds of America. And frankly, my kids' future college educations ain't getting any cheaper.
"I don't know that atheists should be considered citizens, nor should they be considered patriots." - George Bush
Clearly, you have no idea what "average age" means. sheesh.
Average age was 30 because of a high infant mortality rate! if you calculate average age based from the age of five, are average age has only increase 4-5 years!
a 13 year old has the same "mental capacity" now as they had 5000 years ago!
yes, I know i'm exclaiming a lot! it my attempt to get people to buy a clue!
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
FYI, COPA specifies "...in interstate or foreign commerce", so yes, I think you'd still potentially be held liable if the law is upheld in the end.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
And what exactly is that?
Welcome to legal arbiterariety (arg... spelling)...
Cheers...
Irregardless what the gov't decides what is best for their peasants, we're staying free and open until our servers are smashed to bits by military personnel. We'll move offshore if need be. Long live free speech. Long live free porn.
COPA = Child Online Protection Act
COPPA = Children's Online Privacy Protection Act
Get it?
Got it?
Good.
"The cup... the drop... it's a YES!"
So we can talk freely only with people whose identities we can prove we have verified. And anything I might suggest (involving a Coke can and a Justice) here could land me and/or the proprietors in jail because some kid might read this in a jurisdiction where it's only considered proper to use Pepsi, and perhaps even one so backwards that only bottles are acceptible.
BTW, don't we now know that the great trove of old paintings of eroticized, crucified saints and Jesus lead directly to sexual abuse of children by priests? Should these images, too dangerous even for priests, be allowed before children in any context?
This Court should be impeached for its conduct in the last election. Then we need a tolerable president to appoint a new one.
___
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
"First, DMCA is about protecting copywritten digital content"
I wander how they implemented such a wanderfull thing as a crypted copyright in the first place...
That is one thing that, in all this threads and news, nobody explained yet...
Cheers...
jurors will not consider the community standards of any particular geographic area, but rather will be "instructed to consider the standards of the adult community as a whole, without geographic specification."
Yeah, that will work. When exactly is the entire adult community getting together to write up these standards? I know I haven't gotten my invitation yet. If this law survives long enough to be enforced (which it probably won't, due to the countless other possible challenges), the jurors on these trials are going to have lots of fun. "Ok, heads it is harmful to kids, tails it isn't..."
Of course, the courts have a long history of upholding community standards requirements in cases where there is no specific community to use as a standard, so this shouldn't be surprising. The major flaw in all of this, regardless of community, is that what is considered to be harmful to children and what actually is harmful to children aren't usually the same, and this varies from child to child.
Too bad we can't just make parents responsible for raising their kids... Oh, right, I forgot that porn sites automatically pop up whenever a parent's back is turned, completely unrequested by the kid at the computer. And porn sites hypnotize kids and force them to look at explicit material whether they want to or not, permanently corrupting them no matter what the parents do.
Believe it or not, constitutional rights are not extended to all U.S. citizens. For example, children in juvenile court do not have a right to a jury trial (McKeever v Pennsylvania.)
Until a child is an adult, parents are responsible for what the children are allowed to do or not do. In the absense of parental discipline, society has an established parental role (parens patriae.) Just as liquor stores can be barred from selling to minors, porn sites can be barred from distributing to minors.
If you produce porn, this Act doesn't bar you from distributing it. The Act simply requires that you take reasonable steps to ensure that minors are not in your audience while you exersize your free speech. You're mostly free to say what you want to other citizens; however, since children are not citizens, parents and society can decide for them as to whose speech they can listen to.
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
Do I dare to come in for my postdoctorate in the US if I have been threatened by the MPAA lawyers for mirroring the DeCSS?
This spring I decided: I don't.
The owls are not what they seem
Before I get flamed to a complete toasty crisp, allow me to briefly clarify my position. The intent of my post was to debate the bill as a whole, not necessarily the specific article. Furthermore, I feel that it is fruitless to debate that anti-censorship must be a conviction which is all-encompassing. Child-porn is a crime that preys on those hapless to defend themselves. It is not censorship in this case, but protection. My statement "I am anti-censorship and anti-child-porn" is not a contradiction, rather it is a distinguishment between the fundamental right of free expression and the protection of innocents.
For those of you flaming me mercilessly with regards to my apparent disregard for subject matter pertaining precisely to the submitted article, get over it. The article (yes I did read it--thank you) was fairly dull. I am not being "offtopic" by remarking on the bill itself (COPA), specifically because my point was that the judges are pretty much stuck between a rock and a hard place. Anyhow, thanks to you guys for making me write a virtual disclaimer for my opinion, I find nothing more disgusting.
For the sake of argument however, I will remark briefly on the submitted paper now for continued clarification: It is silly. The constitution is designed not to protect the majority's viewpoint, rather it is designed precisely for the opposite position! You cannot have a sheep and four wolves vote on what is for dinner...
Thanks for the replies, and I invite more...
-----rhad
Slashdot needs to interview Natalie Portman.
Parents/communities can then block out .sex access.
I'd also go one step further and make it illegal for sending unsolicited mail that includes sexual/adult references/images/links. I can't believe that it's legal for these sex spammers to send links like this to email accounts that might be used by children.
I find the actual text of the decision to be suprisingly readable. It's not just a bunch of legal obscuritanism, such as I've gotten used to out of lawyers by reading too many EULAs.
I find that the justices do understand the technology pretty well. They understand the difference between web and email. They understand that you can't determine geography on the Internet.
The key to the decision seems to be that they feel that the material covers a narrow enough range of stuff that the definition of "community" is not problematic. Art, for example, would be considered to have "serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors" and is therefore OK, no matter what it depicts. The CDA lacked this clause, and that's why they struck it down.
In a sense, they want to define a "national community" where the really obscene stuff can be restricted. Obscenity has long been considered to be unprotected speech, and even if they rule against COPA it won't change that. It's just that the Web for the first time gives us the opportunity to be obscene on a national scale.
Of course, now you just get off into a definition of "art". Like most law, despite pages and pages of text, at the root it seems to be up to a judgment call by a judge and/or jury as to what is acceptable. So it may well still be considered overbroad, and that is the real news today: this one attack on the law is invalid, but there are plenty of others.
If you object to the decision, I highly recommend Justice Stevens' dissent, at the tail end. He finds the explanations I gave above unconvincing, as do I.
Well, IMHO:
If it is digital,it cannot be evil or bad, and should under no circumstance be regulated. Period.
Information, eg bits, cannot be "Good" or "bad", only "accurate" or "inaccurate". All the data that exists or has ever existed is MINE, and belongs to all members of H.Sap.
Call it the ultimate anti-censorship position, I don't care; Information is, to me, sacred, good and should NEVER be restricted. There is an arguable need for personal confidentiality (e.g. credit card numbers), but I'd rather be in a all cash world if the choice came down to freedom (yes, that INCLUDES the right to yell FIRE in a crowded theater- go and see for YOURSELF if there really is a fire; it was a stupid case a ruling if you look at the facts).
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts."
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
"Congress." The First Amendment does not guarantee you a forum. It does not guarantee that anyone will listen to, or even care, what you express.
It certainly does not guarantee that you won't be shouted down by other citizens with the same right to free speech that you enjoy. It never did.
gm
Ad luna, Alicia! Ad luna!
Oops, I meant to write "MovieMountain.com" instead of magic. Quite different places.
-- http://www.MarkWelch.com/ Pleasanton California
You also have to take into effect that if you make it hard to get guns, that doesn't mean violent crime, including murder, will go away. You will however reduce murders involving guns. You also make it harder for people to defend themselves. In urban areas, the police may have decent response time, and they may be able to do a decent job of protecting you. In rural areas, the police aren't going to show up until after the issue is resolved. If you're attacked, you're on your own.
Statements like this one are ridiculas trolls.
If you support the fascist conservatives who oppose gun control, these deaths are on your head.
Those deaths are on the heads of the people who killed them. Simply taking away all the guns doesn't prevent violent crime. Murder existed long before guns were invented. A gun is a tool that can be used to assualt or defend. It's the person who uses it that's to blame for how it's used, not the gun.
I would have laughed at Ashcroft having the statue of a "topless" woman representing justice covered up, were it not for the fact that nobody has ever covered her up before. That means that your Secretary of Justice is the most conservative Secretary of Justice since the statue was erected (30s?). At least when it comes to nudity.
Or maybe he was uncomfortable promiting his shady agenda under her direct, righteous innocence.
Stop the brainwash
So who decides what's pornographic? Do bikini shots count? How about Madonna's "sex" book; should amazon not be allowed to sell that except from a different site, Amazon.Sex?
.kids domain, and make it illegal to host pornography there? There's still the question of what constitutes pornography, but by intentionally registering and operating in the .kids domain, and company or individual could be said to be buying into the restrictions on that domain.
Suggesting that the entire internet should be legislated to only kid-friendly content is stupid and reckless.
Rather than limit what everyone else can do "to protect the children," why not go with the
I'm with you on the spam, though, but I'd say just make unsolicited email in general illegal. While porn content may be more offensive or inappropriate for some people or children, the root problem is not the content but the delivery method; fix that, and the content problem goes away.
Cheers
-b
Someone mod this guy troll. His sig's offensive and a spoiler.
Even Jesus hates listening to Creed.
Solves Nothing.
"Adult Content" isn't just porn. It could be a site that uses "fuck" too many times. How much is too much? I guess it's up to community standards.
And no fucking way and I going to support any kind of law that requires the content provider to request exemptions to the "sex-only-goes-here" rule.
Why don't we lock everyone in jail and have them submit a form if they think they're not criminals?
By utilizing agreements on appropriate content within the domain agreements, new TLDs could create a child and family safe area on the Internet leaving great swaths of area appropriate for adults.
.sex isn't a solution as no one operating from a foriegn area can be forced to segregate themselves there.
US or any country's laws can not reach all Internet providers, so the agreement has to be made at the point of registering the domain.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
Ok, so here's the real deal on what the court said, taken right from the ruling:
[quote]
"There is a very real likelihood that...COPA...is overbroad and cannot survive such a challenge." (From Justice Kennedy's concurring judgement, PDF page 32)
[/quote]
Basically what happened today was the Court said that the appeals court used the wrong reason to justify the injunction put in place by the district court. That's all.
As is said by Kennedy later, "[O]nce it is accepted that we cannot strike down the Act based merely on the phrase 'contemporary community standards,' we should go no farther than to vacate and remand..." (PDF page 39)
Assuming that the ACLU et al. can prove that the law is unconstitutional in other respects (and I believe that they can) the Court is basically saying that they'll treat that as a totally separate issue. In the meantime, the law's still not in force, and I believe that the Court will eventually rule that the law is indeed unconstitutional, just not for this precise reason.
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The parent post wishes to censor the original poster for expressing an unpopular view. Please mod him down for attempting to stifle discussion on Slashdot.
No, that's the COPPA. (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act). Very easy to get them confused.
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
(n/t)
The idea is interesting, and could solve a lot, but you have to think about who would be regulating it? Are you going to trust some "qualified" person to decide which goes to .sex? When he blocks the wrong thing or doesn't block the right thing, who is going to edit his judgement? I am guessing it would be some guy lost in the bureaucracy, and when he gets asked about the memo concerning a site, he says "it's on my desk" or "I'm looking at it right now" and making no actual consideration.
Parents/communities can then block out .sex access.
.sex segregation would only be used to keep minor children away from pornography, it would probably work. The problem will be when an employer, university, or isp decides to monitor or block .sex addresses--people will (reasonably) create gateways, etc. to get around these restrictions, and kids will be able to use them, too.
If we could guarantee that the
It's a nice idea, but really not workable; as long as people try to limit adults' access to content innappropriate for children, it will be impossible to effectively limit children's access.
--
Benjamin Coates
Besides this not being about child pornography please provide us with an exact definition of what constitutes child pornography.