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CIPA Before The Supreme Court
Jim Tyre pointed out the excellent collection of links on censorware.net to coverage of yesterday's oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court about the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), as promised by this story last month. There's also a link to the place where transcripts of the oral arguments will show up about three weeks from now.
The law says nothing about filtering software.
But it creates liability on the providers for knowingly allowing minors access to pornography, which is something that lacked before.
It should be just as illegal to allow kids to download a bukkake mpeg off the internet as it is to rent one at the local video store.
Naw, that would make sense, better to have a third party to blame/sue when your child turns out to be a mass murderer/cult wacko.
This is not the sig line you are looking for... -- Old Jedi Sig Line Trick
Kids will always be able to get to something that is available to their parents....
The best way to handle questionable content is for parents to take an active role in their kids' upbringing, and teach them how to handle material that they will unquestionably come across online.
It really is a problem that nobody can really devote the time and effort needed to making a 99.99% effective method that will remove ONLY things harmful to children. Because of this, other content and other sites will suffer, and even then, the smut that our nation is trying to protect children from still gets through. Company's like CyberNanny and SurfPatrol will benefit greatly from this act, but at what cost to the sites and people on the Internet that are now wrongfully blocked? Perhaps with the money that these companies will get from this, they can actually develop better ways to filter out the inappropriate material while not blocking any material that should be viewable. Who knows though? Only time will tell right now.
Yeah, I agree. Kiddie porn and crashing planes into large skyscrapers are a God-given right.
You're missing the point. Kiddie porn would be on the internet, and the internet is not supposed to be censored. Killing people/other terroist actions are still very much illegal and so is having sex with a minor. Building a website telling people how to make a bomb isn't illegal.
Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey trousers.
This is a much underappreciated tactic. Who is going to look at anything that resembles pr0n when some girls you may know, or want to get to know, may wonder by and see?
Stuff like this isn't done in the open unless by the hard core addict.
A kid or some teen isn't going to do that in public while supervised by parents / administrators.
robi
I'd rather they see sex on the street than killings on the street. We don't prevent kids from seeing over 7,000 violent acts on TV by the time they're adults (including rape and murder).
Actually, this (sex on the street) happened on time ... a couple parked their convertible, with the top down, in front of my sisters' place, and started screwing. It was lunch time, and my niece came in and told us about it. We went outside and looked, and the couple only a pair of socks between them.
Was my niece traumatized? No, she couldn't stop laughing about it. I'm sure that if it had been a killing, it would have had a much worse effect.
So what did we (the adults) do? Told them to get a motel room (after we stopped laughing).
What ever happened to .kids.us? Make a section of the internet, require review and control to allow ppl to register .kids.us and then all the censorware you'd need for your kids would be something that only allowed access to domains in .kids.us? I'm sure ppl like Nickelodeon and Mattel would buy in w/in the first month.
.kids.us DNS entry.
That's it, problem solved. If it's safe, it applies for a
DONT PANIC
Child porn is not free speech. The child cannot make 'adult' descisions about sexual acts (at least they shouldn't have to). And before someone argues that photoshopping images to make it is okay. I argue that its not, what if that image with that person's face on it gets out. That person's rights were still violated if he or she is stigmatised for the image even though it wasn't really them.
Child porn is not free speech because it violates the rights of the child.
The Anti-Blog
...the state of the art. Isn't it part of the point of the Internet that you can be heard without having to persuade a librarian or publisher that you're worthy of reaching his/her patrons?
I venture that I don't need 90% (at least) of the books in any given library. Want to solve state budget crunches? Shrink libraries and staff to 10% of their size, and include only the "important" books.
What? You don't agree with my definition of "important"? Sucks to be you, I guess.
..At least we don't as some see it.
I can't yell 'FIRE!' in a crowded theatre, because it'd likely do harm.
Why should people be able to download porn (which is, AFAIK, restricted by age in most states) in a public place, such as a library?
Frankly, I'm all for filtering such things. If you want to wank it, buy your own computer, or start a Library of Porn. (Hmm, new Slashdot measurement? LoP?)
The problem, of course, is that filtering software blows chunks. First of all, it will never be able to block all of the porn all of the time. Second, it's an easy matter for some nutjob on the extreme left, right or even center, to add a bunch of sites that he or she doesn't find acceptable to the list - pages about Republicans, Democrats, the Green Party, et cetera. Now *that* damages the idea of free speech.
The idea of free speech, as set down in the Constitution, means I can't have a certain acquaintance of mine placed up against a wall and shot every time he spews idiocy such as "Bush is evil! Oil oil oil! Waaaaaaah!" Okay, sure, sometimes I'd really like to see him shipped to Siberia.. But I think we can all generally agree on the fact that people aren't shipped to Siberia for not referring to elected officials as 'our beloved leader!' is a *good* thing.
And that's what 'Freedom of Speech' means. The right to have dissenting opinions. It doesn't mean you can say whatever the hell you want, whenever you want. It doesn't mean you have a divine-given right to browse porn in a library.
It means the country won't turn into a Nazi Germany. A Soviet Union. A North Korea. An Iraq.
Filtering systems being installed in libraries, while at first glance, a noble idea - are simply a dangerous thing lurking under the surface. It'd be far too easy to block access to dissenting opinions due to the general craptitude of filtering software.
Compared to some of the things legally allowed on the streets, what harm is a little sex?
The United States is founded on the idea that the most hate filled, selfish, racist, sexist, asshole is free to collect up few hundred friends and march through the streets to spread their message of hate. I just fail to see public copulation as beign nearly has harmful to kids.
My biggest concern would be for the poor couple. Wouldn't the asphalt be a bit... chafing?
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And before someone argues that photoshopping images to make it is okay. I argue that its not, what if that image with that person's face on it gets out. That person's rights were still violated if he or she is stigmatised for the image even though it wasn't really them.
By that notion, something like a Final Fantasy-style kiddie porn movie would not be illegal as no actual child was involved. The usual arguments quoted is: KP promotes more KP, or that the burden of proof is too heavy (prove that this is *not* a photoshopped picture).
By the way, here it's illegal to give the appearance of being underaged. This goes both by having people above legal age play younger, drawings, photoshop cut-togethers, whatever. Probably means something like Lolita (the remake, with the older stand-in) is illegal here, if you follow the letter of the law.
Kjella
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