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Supreme Court to Hear CIPA Case
Ruger writes "The Supreme Court of the United States will "decide if public libraries can be forced to install software blocking sexually explicit Web sites," according to this article from the Associated Press. US lawmakers have passed three laws to 'protect' children from Internet pornography, but the Court struck down the first and blocked the second from taking effect. 'A three-judge federal panel ruled the Children's Internet Protection Act violates the First Amendment because the filtering programs also block sites on politics, health, science and other non-pornographic topics.'" Our previous story on this ongoing case will bring you up to speed on the issues.
I agree that it's my duty to filter what my child sees. However the one place that should be a safe place to drop the kid off is the library. Do we really want to discourage children spending time at a place where they can learn?
Parents have little enough time - forcing them to spend what they have watching what their kids see at a place that should be a safe haven is going to discourage discovery and learning on the behalf of the kids.
I see absolutely no harm in having tools that slow down teenagers from leaving goatse.cx sitting on library computers as a "joke" that my 5 year old daughter has to walk through.
How about a compromise solution? I'm sure anyone who is all for unfiltered access can certainly agree that there is content that is completely inappropriate for a child to view under any circumstances. So... how about setting up separate banks of computers in the library instead? One could be completely unfiltered, and accessible only to adults, and the other could be in the children's section, with filtered access, and hopefully a requirement that parents actively supervise their children's web-surfing.
In case of fire, do not use elevator. Use water!
free nude xxx teen hardcore.
guess what? most filtering agents would now ban this slashdot page.
filters just don't work that well. I've seen a few spam blockers, but I wouldn't bet my life on them.
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It amuses me that puritanical twits get their panties in a bunch over pornography. So, instead of talking to their kids rationally about sex and what they see (which they will whether you like it or not) in magazines, they want to take the ostrich defense.
It's just sex, people. Why are you incapable of dealing with it rationally? Oh, I forgot - some fairy in the sky hates humans having sex outside of wedlock - my bad...
The library isn't childcare. But if my daughter wants to spend some time looking for books on subjects that interest her while I run a few errands, I won't be able to do that if I'm forced to watch her every activity. I resent the fact that you insinuate I'm just dumping my kids off because it's an alternative to childcare.
The legal stipulation for regulating strip clubs is based upon "community values". You're right, the library is for the community. So maybe we should stop the federal government from deciding what goes in my local library and have a public vote on the issue.
Judging by your opinons i'd say you dont have children.
I have 4 children, and they each have Internet access.
OF course its using a squid proxy server, nat'ed and IPfiltered to block all ports. I have a deny list and an approved list of URLS they can goto. They also use a kid protected email client (web based) that filters out addresses, phone numbers and some key words.
When the kids are about 12 or so, Ill start to loosen the restrictions. I have v-chip on my tvs, and restrict some channels on thier profiles, and block anything above PG. (I had to block MSNBC also, it was for thier own good.)
I really dont want them seeing goatse.cx pics, but they see and hear enough from school as it is. We spend most of our time de-programming them from DARE and other Political Correctness garbage. I want too homeschool them, but both me and my wife work.
Oh yea, reason for having 4 kids, Your own lan party anytime you want. (-;
I worked in a library for about (2) years. We had completely unfiltered internet access. I can't recall a single time that we had a problem with pornography on the terminals. Granted ther may have been a few, but some people like to cause trouble. I have to believe that the majority of the population has enough common sense and decency to not view porn around kids.
There is one thing though that I dont understand about our society? Maybe someone can give me some insight? Why is sex and nudity looked down upon, while violence is generally ignored. Dont get me wrong, I love both of them equally, well more the former than the latter. Its just a little confusing. Take BMX XXX for example. Sony opted to cover all of the nipples, to censor the game. Yet in grand theft Auto Vice City, I can dig a chainsaw into a cops chest, and dance in the resulting pool of blood. Shouldnt there be a balance?
Wouldnt the images of http://www.rotten.com be more disturbing to a child than seeing some playful lesbians?
Instead of phrasing it as "software blocking sexually explicit sites", try this out and run it by your congressperson: "software possibly blocking some, but not all, sexually explicit sites, as well as other content accidentially or intentionally blocked by the software developer." Tell them its not worth spending your tax money on this.
If nothing else, tell them to require that the software developers list all sites blocked by their software, to ensure that the software is actually doing its job. "After all, if the sites are actually blocked, its not like some little boy will use the list to see things he shouldn't" you can say.
Tell your congressperson that there needs to be a process to review sites that are incorrectly blocked and remove them from the list in a timely manner, with penalties for failing to do so. As well as adding sites that were forgotton.
Finally tell your congressperson that if any software vendor refuses these requirements, they don't have the public's best interests in mind, and if the congressperson votes for a measure without these requirements, neither does he/she.
Personally, I don't think censorship is right. If you let your children on the internet without supervision, you should be responsible for whatever psychiatric bills result.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
In the vast majority of libraries that I have been in there are several sections in the library. One of those sections in almost every case is the children's section. Why not have a set of computers in each section for internet access. Have a person physically monitor (in other words be present) while the children are surfing the internet.
We already separate children's books from adult books, why not the computers as well?
What happens when this legislation is upheld and libraries are forced to use filtering software and the porn STILL GETS THROUGH? Will the libraries then be held responsible? or maybe it should be the court's place to punish the software companies for supplying software that _breaks the law_.
The largest problem I see with the internet in libraries is the popup traps so many web pages use now. If i accidently turn up a pr0n site through my browsing will I be able to correct my mistake by clicking on the X before no one notices, or will my screen be filled with so many popups that the librarian will have to assist me?
Popup blockers would be a much better service to have installed on the library computers. Filterware is just technology that doesn't work.
A library card number could be required to search certain terms, the simple traceablity factor would keep most people from searching obvious sexual sites. This is especially true if a notification screen is displayed asking if you want to continue.
YOU ARE ABOUT TO SEARCH ON "XXX" ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO DO THIS (library cardholders name), WHAT WITH THE LIBRARIAN LOOKING OVER YOUR SHOULDER AND ALL?
Yes embarassment, it works. So here we have a filter that serves as a warning to children, but does not limit content. It keeps honest people honest, and it should be noted that nothing will make dishonest people honest.
It should be noted that if all library computers were kept in open view of the librarian this wouldn't be much problem.
No complaining about anonymity on public systems either. If you want privacy, do it in your own home.
Karma: Censored (mostly affected by decency laws)
I agree.
What I find interesting/horrifying/scary-- and much more problematic than this case-- is the situation in my local library, where librarians themselves (usually the people who do their best to protest censorship) are asking for some sort of "protection" against explicit imagery on the grounds that it creates a hostile work environment. So if the Right don't get you, the Left will.
More info on Minneapolis libraries and smut. I find it truly incredible that seeing some pictures on a screen across the room is considered suffering and that such so-called victims require monetary compensation that is more than twice their likely annual take-home pay. I wonder if these folks are compensated for damages if they read any of the filth one can often find in a public library (like Anne Rice novels, the average Harlequin romance, horror novels, the Holy Bible, etc)... heck, just a couple of weeks ago I checked out some Neon Genesis Evangelion graphic novels from the teen section of this library and it had illustrated depictions of unclothed minors in it!
I do not have a signature
It's a good guess, but you're mistaken. You can "automate" the human judgement process though neural nets, like AOL does. There are tricks to this that I can't reveal, but the basic jist of it is to let human beings train the 'net and then let the 'net go to town. You can get very good results with this method, which is, by the way, patented.
Finding God in a Dog
Sorry, but that's just not the way it works. My wife works for the local city library and people are constantly looking at hard core porn there. Their solution? Bury the moniters in the desk so that only the person using the workstation can see the screen.
Libraries don't want to know what you are looking at. Most don't even keep any records of who uses them anymore. What they don't know they can't be compelled to tell the FBI under the Patriot Act.
School libraries might have different policies, but municipal public libraries, for the most part, are not interested in knowing what you do on their internet terminals.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
Now for the sake of arguement, let's assume that web-surfing porn is indeed an expression of free speech. How is this "right" being violated if you can not perform it in a public library? You are still allowed to access your porn,... just not in a library. How is this different from say, banning smoking or shouting "fire" in a movie theater? You still have the "right" to do those things, there are however specific places that you may not.
Bottom line - I don't think this is an end-around of the Constitution. Just a means to limit the government's direct involvement in an act that many consider lewd without restricting access at large.
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
The problem of isn't that they want to stop children from accessing pornography. That is fine with me. The problem is when it steps on other toes and wastes good money. First of all, these programs are by their very nature inneffective. Either they block based on keywords, which becomes overrestrictive. Any program blocking sites with the words porn, sex, or anal, would block slashdot today, any site about identifieng an animals gender (sexing it), and sites relating to proctology. None of these sites are harmful to children (well, they might not like to now about the very probably prostate exams they'll be facing in the next 60 years). However, the other programs underprotect, they block by blacklisting sites. This also doesn't work because the web changes too fast to blocklist all sites. In fact, the legitimate, credit-card requiring sites will be the easiest ones to block. It is "Joe Bob's kewl BOOBS!" that will be hard to catch because the site is only open for an hour and half every morning before his bandwidth runs out. All in all, you look at a lot of library money being drained for programs that do nothing but deny adults their rights as well as block children from porn, or just plain don't work.