MSN Cuts Unmonitored Chatrooms Around the Globe

letxa2000 writes "According to MSNBC, Microsoft will be shutting down its unmonitored chat services in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and much of Latin America on October 14th--the day before MSN Messenger will lock out many 3rd party clients. Interestingly, the European manager of MSN is quoted as saying 'This is a decision based upon consumer experiences, child protection and our strategic investment to build up MSN Messenger.' It's starting to become clear that Microsoft is starting up the IM wars again and that the 3rd-party lockout indeed isn't so much about security as it is about marketshare."

Comments

yeah

[bongobongo]

they'd probably like to shut down all unmonitored humans too.

bravo microsoft.

Re:yeah

[twilight30]

Bugger [pun unintended] - submitted this as a story three minutes ago.

Guess I've been trolled, but you should lay off the 'Microsoft == evil' lines, they're getting really dull. This kind of comment is flippant, and actually pretty irresponsible. What would you do? What would you have them do? Give an answer of 'We're not people's censors' and leave it at that?

This is a perfectly understandable reaction on their part, and you will probably see similar reactions from other popular, unmonitored, visible chat providers. We can bitch about subscriber lock-in all we want, but the PR flack had an undeniable point -- subscriptions mean accountability for both the provider and recipient. When you provide a visible, accessible service like this, you have to decide if you want to allow this kind of crap on or not.

Hey, you want to see loads of junk, you can still go to IRC or read Usenet - it's your call.

Re:yeah

[mlush]

they'd probably like to shut down all unmonitored humans too.

No no, just the ones that can't be authenticated by some sort of cryptographc signature... of course to be useful, such a signature should be prominantly displayed (the forhead is the prefered option). Such a signature would be of great value to the user as it would enable them to buy and sell when non-authenticated individuals are unable to.

Re:yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

"Give an answer of 'We're not people's censors' and leave it at that?"

Yep. You say `if you`re worried about what your children might see or do online, then only let them use the net in your presence, log what they are doing, talk to them about the dangers (and don't let them use the net if they aren't old enough to understand)`.

I don't care much about this instance, as I don't use Microsoft stuff if I can avoid it, and there'll *always* be a way of discussing things online with strangers, whether the government or big business likes it or not. I don't want accountability - I want to be able to talk about what I want with who I want, which includes strangers. It's easy enough to ignore idiots, catch bots and spammers etc. If someone wants to sit and watch rooms for perverts etc then fine, do it. I don't have a problem with that.

It's not exactly hard to monitor a room and look for words relating to `phone number` or `address` or `age` or whatever.

Re:yeah

[Hognoxious]

Bugger [pun unintended] - submitted this as a story three minutes ago.

So did I, but my article included the fact that MS wants to move to a subscription based service.

Thus one can conclude that the problem isn't kiddy fiddlers, it's free (as in beer) kiddy fiddlers.

PS,OT, is anyone else having problems with /. headlines by email?

Re:yeah

[twilight30]

Well, I avoid Microsoft as well, but we're not the targets of this kind of action.

My point is not that MS can stop this kind of thing from going on - as you rightly point out, people will always be able to find ways around this kind of limit. If that means that people leave, and take the spammers and pervs with them, so much the better for Microsoft, no?

If Microsoft discovers its services are being abused and finds that it can at least control or stop that abuse from continuing, don't you think they'd want to try it? And yes, I fully realise that this argument can easily be transmuted against Linux users or anyone else MS doesn't like. But in this case, again, I have to ask: what would you do?

Re:yeah

[scambaiter]

omg, now we will have hordes of MS Comic Chat users pouring into irc channels... (and tons of kickbans i guess;))

Re:yeah

[gl4ss]

**Give an answer of 'We're not people's censors' and leave it at that?**

yeah, exactly. they're not peoples censors chinese goverment is, microsoft shouldn't be.

unmoderated/selfmoderated chat has been sort of baseline on internet chats all along, the chatters themselfs can and do moderate as much as they can if necessary.

Re:yeah

[Dot.Com.CEO]

Oh no! Now IRC will be suddenly full of immature people using some kind of weird form of English! Oh wait...

Re:yeah

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

I, for one, shed no tears for this bogus loss!

One more thing for people NOT to use from MS? That sounds like a fair situation. I was tired of blocking this *rap at the various firewalls anyway.

This is obvious PR cover for them retracting a service. I hope this sets a precedent for them withdrawing altogether... I can dream.

Re:yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

So did I, but my article included the fact that MS wants to move to a subscription based service.
Thus one can conclude that the problem isn't kiddy fiddlers, it's free (as in beer) kiddy fiddlers.

Of course it is. If a subscriber tried to use chatrooms for nefarious purposes, you'd be able to track them down via the credit card details they used to subscribe with. Only freeloaders are potentially untraceable.

Re:yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

Problem is, just because they're limiting it to a 'subscriber base' does not mean that they intend to take any responsibility, or actions, about the goings on on it.

Re:yeah

[TiggsPanther]

Damn! There goes my unique IRC characteristic. :-/

Re:yeah

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

If Microsoft discovers its services are being abused and finds that it can at least control or stop that abuse from continuing, don't you think they'd want to try it? And yes, I fully realise that this argument can easily be transmuted against Linux users or anyone else MS doesn't like. But in this case, again, I have to ask: what would you do?

Does it really make sense to make a public service a payed service in the US, and to take it down completely in other parts of the world? What about the people using this service in those 28 countries, are they all spammers and porn-mongers?

The article hints at something interesting:

"It's a signal that some of the joyful early days of the Internet have moved on a bit. Chat was one of those things that was a bit hippyish. It was free and open. But a small minority have changed that for everyone. It's very sad," Sutton said.

It is really an interesting question on how far you're willing to go taking away freedoms/openness from your customers because a small minority does something illegal/unwanted with it. Sutton is playing the 9/11 card very cheaply, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I read this. Are you really buying into this?

Re:yeah

[Ronin Developer]

Monitoring sounds well and good. Parents can try their best to keep their kids safe. But, parents are fallible. Case in point - 13 year old girl is out with her friends last week. Parents tell explicitely to wait for them to pick her up. She gets into a car with three older teens she didn't know and ends up dead when their car crashed.

At some point, parents have to allow their children to grow and hope they make the right decisions for themselves. Unfortunately, deciding when that's a good time is getting harder every day.

Microsoft is simply putting accountability on those that use their system. In the US, our right to freedem on speech is protected right up until the point where you commit a crime. Pedofiles and sexual predators will not be able to hide quite as well...at least not within the MSN system. I'm certainly not a proponent of Microsoft. In this case, however, they may be making the right decision for, maybe, the right reasons.

I am painfully watching my best friend go through hell because her husband thought that 13 year old girls were equal partners and able to distinguish a healthy relationship from an unhealthy one. Yes, he met the girl on the internet...in chat rooms. In the specific case where he got caught, the young lady didn't have any parental guidance (she lives with her brother..parents live overseas). And, yes, it seems he made attempts at other girls (supposedly unsuccessfully). The bugger is up for sentencing next month and will probably walk despite having plead guilty to a mere three of the hundreds of charges (the rest were dropped). Money talks. He will be probably be back on the street in 2 years at most. Will he be cured? Or, will he do it all over again? Scary thought.

Also, keep in mind, that MSN owns the facilities which run MSN. MSN is not a birth right. It is a commercial service meant to draw customers into their service. They are now marketing towards a safer environment (much like AOL's parental controls) and are seeking to attract AOL customers and regular internet users alike.

If MSN's strategy is flawed, they will lose customers and either change their plan or pricing structure. I think they realize that those who use and actually pay for the service want the perceived image of added security for their kids. People are sick of pedofiles and spammers (I lump them in the sentence because they are both scum of the earth) and welcome opportunities to curb them.

But, there's a dark side...MS has also been selected by the Dept. of Homeland security. I still have to wonder how much of this decision to provide accountability and tracking is based on the needs needs of this new client. George Orwell's "1984" was set to take place almost twenty years ago. You can only delay the inevitable.

RD

Re:yeah

[twilight30]

Again, I'm not saying I support Microsoft, at all, but they provided this as a service, free. If they decide to restrict it to the US, it's probably because they know the legal situation better there and can start there first. Over time, if they see that they can make a profit from it, they probably will roll it out to other territories.

It is an interesting question, and I for one am glad I don't have to answer it. The 11 September issue is probably the more interesting area that isn't addressed in the MSN propaganda, for obvious reasons. I do recall in the aftermath seeing various UK-based Saudis (opponents of the current regime, but not part of Al-Qaeda, for instance) communicating via the Internet using the various Messenger / Chat programs.

I don't think I buy into it, but have you an alternative?

Re:yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

Case in point - 13 year old girl is out with her friends last week. Parents tell explicitely to wait for them to pick her up. She gets into a car with three older teens she didn't know and ends up dead when their car crashed.


IF she didn't obey her parents, it is because her parents didn't teach her to listen to them. If you teach your child to listen to you, they will. Just like 'if you teach your kids algebra, they'll learn algebra'. If your kids don't know algebra, it's because they weren't taught. And if they don't know to obey you, it's because they weren't tought.

Re:yeah

[rifter]

"If Microsoft discovers its services are being abused and finds that it can at least control or stop that abuse from continuing, don't you think they'd want to try it? And yes, I fully realise that this argument can easily be transmuted against Linux users or anyone else MS doesn't like. But in this case, again, I have to ask: what would you do?"

Does it really make sense to make a public service a payed service in the US, and to take it down completely in other parts of the world? What about the people using this service in those 28 countries, are they all spammers and porn-mongers?

The article hints at something interesting:

"It's a signal that some of the joyful early days of the Internet have moved on a bit. Chat was one of those things that was a bit hippyish. It was free and open. But a small minority have changed that for everyone. It's very sad," Sutton said.

It is really an interesting question on how far you're willing to go taking away freedoms/openness from your customers because a small minority does something illegal/unwanted with it. Sutton is playing the 9/11 card very cheaply, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I read this. Are you really buying into this?

Honestly, this is just a sign of things to come, and fits right into Microsoft's business model, worldview, and plan for the world. The new world order is one in which corporations enforce their own censorship, violate rights, and pass their own laws without any pesky constitution or democratic process to get in their way. Bill Gates bought into the cyberpunk future and made sure he was at the helm of the most powerful corporation in the world therefore.

Now Microsoft is in a position where no government in the world dares to challenge their authority. Even Bush, who is ready to fight the whole world and cares not one whit for international laws or what Europe has to say is afraid to do anything about Microsoft.

The only hope is to undermine them through the very capitalist process itself. But even then we have not resolved the issue that governments have ceased to govern and protect the rights of their citizens, that civil law has replaced criminal law, and that multinational corporations are indeed the new government, beholden to no one, and ready to stand as our new masters.

Re:yeah

[bheerssen]

No, I didn't RTFA. But I'll share my opinion anyway ;)


The article hints at something interesting:

"It's a signal that some of the joyful early days of the Internet have moved on a bit. Chat was one of those things that was a bit hippyish. It was free and open. But a small minority have changed that for everyone. It's very sad," Sutton said.

Heh, that small minority is Microsoft. After all, it's Microsoft that is closing this service, making it no longer free and open. I have no doubt that they would do that to the entire internet if they could. It is very sad.

Re:yeah

[Archfeld]

err WTF ?!?! "The new world order is one in which corporations enforce their own censorship, violate rights, and pass their own laws without any pesky constitution or democratic process to get in their way.

It is a FREE service they have been providing, no laws involved, no right to chat that I know of, and last time I checked they did not need constitutional or congressional approval to alter the terms of a service you offer for NO COST.

I personally won't use it, won't allow it on my network, and block it at the firewall, but it is M$'s business to do with as they see fit...Not some god given right ensured by our forefathers...

Re:yeah

[E-Rock]

You also failed to note that once they go subscription ALL chatrooms with be MONITORED 24/7. That's what your fee gets you.

Re:yeah

[Nordrick Framelhamme]

What a load of rubbish!

If M$ was doing this for "child protection" motives then the result would be consistant across all MSN "service" providers. It is not. There are a number of them who will be providing unmoderated chat room FOR A SUBSCRIPTION FEE. It is nothing more than a cynical ploy to try to make money in areas that haven't been looked at in the past now that they are starting to feel the pinch on other profits.

Re:yeah

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

If they decide to restrict it to the US, it's probably because they know the legal situation better there and can start there first. Over time, if they see that they can make a profit from it, they probably will roll it out to other territories.

If there is one nation in the world where the likeliness of being sued for promoting pedophilia/spam/whatever as an owner of a chat server is high, it would be the US. The states could prove a very expensive testbed for payed chat services.

It is an interesting question, and I for one am glad I don't have to answer it. The 11 September issue is probably the more interesting area that isn't addressed in the MSN propaganda, for obvious reasons. I do recall in the aftermath seeing various UK-based Saudis (opponents of the current regime, but not part of Al-Qaeda, for instance) communicating via the Internet using the various Messenger / Chat programs.

Yeah, but still they try to force their customers in 28 countries out of the more anonymous IRC style chatting and into the more easily identifyable forms like IM. So either they are building market share in IM, or there really is something spooky going on; the anti-spam/pedophilia argument is crap, you just can't generalize this way without offending the customers you keep out.

I don't think I buy into it, but have you an alternative?

If, you're going to shut down services because they allow a certain amount of anonimity, the internet is going to be a very dull place soon. If you care about your corporate image, put in some more operators, listen to your users, ban the abusers. It's not like MS hasn't got the money to afford it, and if they put a little media pixiedust over it, they could regain some goodwill ("Our chat service is FREE of costs, spam, pedophiles, ...").

Re:yeah

[Zan Zu from Eridu]

Freedom? What freedom?

The freedom Sutton is talking about; the freedom to use a more anonymous chatting system.

It's a service they're paying for. They can stop offering it for WHATEVER REASON THEY WANT.

Correct. But if you stop offering it completely to some, make some pay for it and continue to offer it for free to others, you look like a jerk.

Why the hell does everything here turn into an argument about freedom.

Probably because the internet was built as an open system without restrictions, and people like it to stay that way?

Re:yeah

[rifter]

err WTF ?!?! "The new world order is one in which corporations enforce their own censorship, violate rights, and pass their own laws without any pesky constitution or democratic process to get in their way.

It is a FREE service they have been providing, no laws involved, no right to chat that I know of, and last time I checked they did not need constitutional or congressional approval to alter the terms of a service you offer for NO COST.

I personally won't use it, won't allow it on my network, and block it at the firewall, but it is M$'s business to do with as they see fit...Not some god given right ensured by our forefathers...

And I bet you thought you were being insightful saying a thing like that. You are simply proving my point. Corporations get carte blanche. "After all, it is their service."

Well what happens when all the corporations decide to do the same thing and there are no alternatives? That's right, people get screwed. Microsoft has decided to curtail free speech with the claim that "it's just business." But everything on the net is "just business."

Basically what you are saying is that corporations can do whatever they want. That is exactly my point.

Re:yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought MS indemnified all it's paying pedophiles.

Only Chat not Messenger

[jolyonr]

Note that this only affects public chatrooms and not the MSN Messenger service - I say this now not because it's not obvious to those who read the article, but that because this is slashdot and people won't :)

Re:Only Chat not Messenger

[Anonymous Coward]

You're absolutely correct. Indeed, the first idiot post was only seconds after yours!

Re:Only Chat not Messenger

[Anonymous Coward]

total bullshit you better read BBC's report on that and see that all of 'em are closing in Europe for instance.

once again MS people here defending them ,, ahhhhh

Re:Only Chat not Messenger

[Jucius Maximus]

Just an FYI for those worried about the Messenger cut-off even though the article is talking about chat rooms.

Trillian 2.0 (for win32) uses the new MSN messenger protocol so I can still talk to people over MSN even though I didn't install microsoft's client.

Re:Only Chat not Messenger

[Anonymous Coward]

To be more clear : http://chat.msn.com

Re:Only Chat not Messenger

[agallagh42]

The free trillian client has also been patched with the new protocol. The version you want is 0.74E. Works a treat.

This is a good thing

[Kevin_ap]

All the Kids who used to chat on msn will now find "cooler" chat rooms (perhaps IRC) and they might start trying out other non Microsoft products...

Re:This is a good thing

[Chris_Jefferson]

Nooo!! For a while now, IRC has been one of the few places where I could (mostly) avoid

"wher cn i get quake warez?"

"u r a faggot!"

"This person used their CD-ROM drive as a cup holder LOLOL!!!111"

I don't want them all coming back :(

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

They might end up using non-Microsoft chat and messenger services, but to expect them to use, say, non-Microsoft operating systems is a bit far-fetched. And quite undesirable on their part, I should imagine. Unless they're using Macs.

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

I find that that behaviour is common on IRC too. Also common on IRC is people being so up themselves they won't talk to anyone outside their little clique.

Personally, I prefer to go to places outside my computer room and talk to people face to face.

Re:This is a good thing

[REBloomfield]

no, this is a bad thing for that very reason (the irc thing). All the other providers will follow suit, because naive parents will think that the service they are using doesn't care about their kids. their kids will then go and find somewhere else to hang out, that will be completely unmoderated, and is likely to get them into worse situations... this is all because microsoft doesn't want to risk it's repuation and stump up some cash for proper policing of safe chatrooms.

Re:This is a good thing

[gl4ss]

well, that depends on what channels you hang on(duh!).

it's kinda hard to hang around face to face with friends i made during the time i was in army for example..

but yeah surely we don't talk to anyone outside our little clique if that means we don't answer people who come in on our emulation channel and ask for ROMMZZZZZZ in polish and wait for 30 seconds before leaving(!) so we even couldn't answer. also what might seem strange to some outsiders and accustomed to commercial nonsense chats is that people stay online even if they're not even on the machine, so they come up and see lots of people and then make the conclusion that they just don't want to talk to the outsider(when in fact they're not talking to _anyone_ because they're not around, and fyi, getting inside that little clique in most circles is pretty easy, just hang around for enough time and don't be an idiot, if you're idiot then the problem obviously isn't them but it is you).

if ms likes to act like it is responsible for the content on it's chats then it's fine by me, but imho it's really stupid because the next thing is that they deem they're responsible what sites you can visit from their msn service too.

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, I prefer to go to places outside my computer room and talk to people face to face.

dood, but then the ppl your talking to know your a pimply little boy with a clapped out old car. Online your a rich hansom guy who drives a porche (or a hot chick depending on how you feel)

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

cash for proper policing of safe chatrooms. what's dangerous about a chat? (or at least more dangerouse than TV?) the only thing I can think of are the cases of children meeting up with "bad guys" online and going out into the real word to be abducted. Well how many Kids are that dumb? Not many and the ones who are deserve a nommenation for the darwin awards.

Re:This is a good thing

[REBloomfield]

what's dangerous is the content of the chat. If kids are forced to go elsewhere, they could end up in the middle of anything...

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

IAAK (=I am a kid; 14 to be exact)

content isn't dangerous.
(cars and guns are dangerous and i can legally drive a car and buy a gun befor i'm allowed to buy a movie that has extrem violence in it)
Beiing exposed to diverse content allows us to form our own oppinons.
br but it dosen't help our abbility to spell :-)

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

I've got better things to do than sit in front of my computer trying to get in with cliques of people I can't see, like go outside and hang out with real life friends in real places.

Re:This is a good thing

[REBloomfield]

okay, imagine a ten year old ends up in a room concerned with extreme methods of amusement in the bedroom. what if some of the terms confuse them, and they go on to google to look for them... it's an extreme unlikely example, but driving kids underground for chat isn't the way to go about it. Those that want to go looking for stuff they shouldn't can and will, but twe need to protect those who just wish to talk to their peers.

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait; remind me again when parental responsibility was abandoned as an effective form of protecting a childs development?

If the kid is in a chatroom, alone, and the others are talking about sex then tough. The parents of said child should have been there with them.

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Ten year olds should know about sex. This would be an ideal opportunity to provide them with the sexual education they require.

If people were more aware about sex I bet we wouldn't have such a high teenage pregnancy rate and shit like that.

Re:This is a good thing

[REBloomfield]

true, but it would be nice if big corps like MSN could stand up and say, here are chatrooms for kids, that are moderated, but that can be used freely. you shouldn't need a subscription. As for limiting it to US, that's just ignorant.

Re:This is a good thing

[Kevin_ap]

it would also be nice if MS rereleased its old Windows (like NT, 98) under the GPL so we could play with them.
or if they started writing bug free software
or if the riaa let all its lawers go and hired a bunch of techies to create a working alternitive to its current distribustion system.
the list goes on and on

Re:This is a good thing

[BlueLightning]

I assume you've never been to bash.org...

Re:This is a good thing

[blibbleblobble]

"All the Kids who used to chat on msn will now find "cooler" chat rooms (perhaps IRC)"

No, please don't let those people on IRC.

Re:This is a good thing

[Roofus]

You've obviously never been to the 2600 channel.

Re:This is a good thing

[dan dan the dna man]

You could avoid this on IRC? That's the kind of attitudes I came across there and forced me to end a serious 5 year IRC habit.
I've not touched IRC in 3 years now and I don't miss its stupidity one bit. aMSN and yahoo IM's now provide my lameness filter to the chat world - I much prefer it that way.

Re:This is a good thing

[gl4ss]

** I've got better things to do than sit in front of my computer trying to get in with cliques of people I can't see, like go outside and hang out with real life friends in real places.**

like, being on slashot as an ac(meaning you won't probably care enough to even read responses you get)?

thing is, irc doesn't step in to the timeslot that you would use with the friends you can see in real life anyways, i find it quite hard to code while a friend is around talking bull, however i can participate in irc conversation still while coding quite well because nobody cares if i answer 5 minutes late to important question.

Re:This is a good thing

[bluGill]

Depends on the clique. I have plenty of time to wait for someone from my church, but in a different state or country to come around and chat. I have no time at all to wait for some random person to want to chat.

Note though that just because I'm on irc and at my computer that doesn't mean I'm nessicarly interested in gossip. I hang around the channels dedicationed to my church (unofficially dedicated) when I'm doing something else on my computer. Interupt my hacking session with gossip about nothing and I'll be mad. Interupt my hacking session because you need some serious religious help at 3am and don't want to wake a local friend and I'm happy to help. Want a deep conversation on Sampson and I'll be happy to join. Want a "deep" converstation on who is dating who and you will find I'm gone. Part of that is the hacker nature in me, part is objection to gossip in generation.

Re:This is a good thing

[conan_albrecht]

And how many kids do you have? As a father of 3 small girls I welcome reasonable protections for them. My wife and I can't be everwhere. We do our best, but sometimes a few protections are helpful when we can't be.

Yes, I agree we should trust our children. But at what point do they become responsible? 18? 15? 12? 10? 6? Different ages warrant different levels of trust and responsibility.

Re:This is a good thing

[dswensen]

Please. You're being so unfair....

They spell it "fagot."

Re:This is a good thing

[Fulcrum of Evil]

imagine a ten year old ends up in a room concerned with extreme methods of amusement in the bedroom. what if some of the terms confuse them, and they go on to google to look for them... it's an extreme unlikely example,

Whaddya mean? I was 12 when I first found out what watersports were. After that, I left that whole branch of usenet alone.

Re:This is a good thing

[IMarvinTPA]

Sounds like you can do both. You go to the chat room that you want to join. Sit down, be quiet, go outside and see friends. Come back a few days and you're *IN*! Ok, maybe you'll need to visit your computer now and then and say hi to anybody that happens to be there too.

IMarv

Re:This is a good thing

[Stanwalters]

There is no "age" at which they become responsible. We've all seen on the news, 12 year olds calmly handle disasters and we all know 22 year olds that we wouldn't trust alone for a weekend watching our houses. I can say with certainty that I woudldn't trust Microsoft to determine any facet of what is 'reasonable' for a 6, 10, or 12 year old child.

And if Microsoft's chat content filtering works as well as their hotmail 'spam filters' you're going to have some highly educated children, in ways you can't imagine.

Re:This is a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

you could always log your childs conversations, and grep for anything offensive, maybe even write a quick parsing script to see what your child is doing. I dont use windows, so i dont know how to do it in windows, but in linux, a quick bash script and basic utilities on every machine could do it.

as for you and your wife not being able to monitor your children, i think that is a sorry excuse for bad parenting, you monitor them till their raised up properly, and then you trust them, instead of running msn protection. sorry to go off topic, but thats the whole its responsible to have sex if you use a condom spiel...

IRC is next

[pork_spies]

There is a real moral panic underway in the UK about this now - and the attack is on all unmoderated "chat" - so even the development channel you use is at threat.

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, and it mainly stems from the recent paedophile panics. Huge overreactions and all that. Reminds me of the Brass Eye Paedophile Special whenever I see some rubbish like this.

Re:IRC is next

[TwistedSquare]

This made the main story on the front page of the Independent in the UK today (http://www.independent.co.uk/). Chatrooms were always a waste of time anyway imho...

Re:IRC is next

[Komarosu]

Yes, with Carol Vorderman on the Goverment's side i wouldn't be suprised if they outlawed chatrooms and irc servers in the UK, it will be a dark day when this happens...

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't have people talking to each other now can we? Next for UK data retention, every citizen to be required to wear a microphone so that all verbal communication can be logged with GCHQ, sign language to be criminalised. Keep paying your taxes because it's all for the public good.

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a moral panic as in the newspapers are sensationalising a moral panic when there previously wasn't any. And you know how guillible most people are when it comes to what they read in their favourite paper ...

(Daily Mail readers probably being the most irritating by far.)

Re:IRC is next

[ez_TAB]

But irc isn't unmoderated, we have botnets and generally (outside of the occasional EFNET DOS) have pretty good control over our channels.

Oh you meant THEIR control...

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

Chatrooms were always a waste of time anyway imho...

Thats nice, but there are plenty of us who disagree. My wife & I met on IRC (Actually we know of four couples and soon to be couples who met each other on IRC). That certainly wouldn't have been possible if IRC had been restricted or banned.

Re:IRC is next

[Oddly_Drac]

"There is a real moral panic underway in the UK about this now"

Oh, do give over.

For one thing the UK *is not* the tabloids.

They try to foster a particular opinion as being national whether it is or not, and the Sun recently dropped the ball bigtime with their 'Bruno Bonkers' headline that they had to reprint because it was insensitive trash.

The whole deal with 'peadophiles' in the UK is that we don't have the association with 'Terrorism' that the US has. We've had terrorism for so long that it doesn't affect us. Kiddy Fiddlers, on the other hand, are this scary lurking menace that haunt the internet, street corners and *live in your town*.

The Brass Eye Peadophile special nailed this concept completely, and the flak that surrounded it was indicative of the PR value of this kind of fear.

The British public, generally speaking, have a bit more cynicism.

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

I dont use any Micro$oft development channels.
I guess I might use Micro$ofts buglist tho..?

Re:IRC is next

[AKnightCowboy]

But irc isn't unmoderated, we have botnets and generally (outside of the occasional EFNET DOS) have pretty good control over our channels. Oh you meant THEIR control...

Are you insane? You can't just have unmoderated instant global communications networks without SOME kind of government regulation or corporate oversight. What do you think this is, 1995? It would be anarchy! IRC channels would be filled with child molesters and pedophiles, copyrighted material would be sent back and forth without the owners' consent, and the government would be unable to effectively monitor your communications for terrorist activity.

Re:IRC is next

[Hogwash McFly]

The backlash to the Brass Eye programme you mentioned really struck a chord with me. All of a sudden the 'caring parents' came out and protested the programme as making a mockery of a serious issue (which indeed it was but the complainers grasped the completely wrong end of the stick). I forgot who the famous comedian was that said something along the lines of that when a subject becomes such a taboo that it can't be made fun of, well that's the day that comedy is dead.

I mean a paedophile dressed up as a school (and we are talking a massive school 'suit' several metres squared here) to attract children does not make me reach for the phone to cry out in anger, it makes me laugh.

If these parents would reroute all of these resources that are getting them red in their face while their kids spend 8 hours a day chatting to random people then they could be a tad more productive.

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

• Are you insane? You can't just have unmoderated instant global communications networks without SOME kind of government regulation or corporate oversight. What do you think this is, 1995? It would be anarchy! IRC channels would be filled with child molesters and pedophiles, copyrighted material would be sent back and forth without the owners' consent, and the government would be unable to effectively monitor your communications for terrorist activity.

LOL. For there to be true freedom you MUST allow some thing you don't agree with. Free speech doesn't work in a pick-and-choose model, where you allow what you deem 'good' and ban what you don't.

Nice troll, tho. You got me to bite.

Re:IRC is next

[jsmyth]

Chatrooms were always a waste of time anyway imho...

Horses for courses :)
From the Jargon file:

Hackers who don't indulge in Usenet consider it a huge waste of time and bandwidth; fans of old adventure games such as ADVENT and Zork consider MUDs to be glorified chat systems devoid of atmosphere or interesting puzzles; hackers who are willing to devote endless hours to Usenet or MUDs consider IRC to be a real waste of time; IRCies think MUDs might be okay if there weren't all those silly puzzles in the way.

Re:IRC is next

[TwistedSquare]

Heh-heh - good quote! Maybe I should have my own category - the hacker who only really hangs around on /. and thinks everything else is a waste of time...

Re:IRC is next

[TiggsPanther]

I'd like to see them try to stop access to IRC. I simply don't think there's a way of them being able to do that.

Even if they got all ISPs to start blocking the standard 666x range of ports, servers would just open using different ports.
The real problem would be that most of these other-port servers would be the predominately "pr0n & wareZ" channels.

Re:IRC is next

[nneb]

as a guardian reading, brass-eye watching, technically literate male I agree, but you're misguided if you think the rest of the UK entirely shares your cynicism.

it's worth pausing to remember that most people are not like you, and there is a great deal of concern among many parents. i'm not saying they're right, but you can't dismiss it as purely tabloid scare mongering.

Re:IRC is next

[mdwh2]

I'd like to see them try to stop access to IRC. I simply don't think there's a way of them being able to do that.

They might not be able to do it technically, but I'm not sure I'd be so eager to go on IRC if it was illegal, and I faced prison for my unlawful chatting.

Re:IRC is next

[TiggsPanther]

There is that, but how they could prove that me nattering about the day's radio shows with a group of friends was really potentially harmful.

As soon as they say "using X-type software is illegal" they get onto very shaky ground.

Re:IRC is next

[Oddly_Drac]

"you're misguided if you think the rest of the UK entirely shares your cynicism."

Okay, we'll both agree that neither of us are barometers of public opinion, but seriously, is the UK going through a moral panic?

No.

"can't dismiss it as purely tabloid scare mongering."

Can and will. Like so many other things, when you actually get into the detail of looking at figures, you start to find that some stuff that was always there suddenly jumps out at you...the problems arrive with the scaremongering which has and will take place. Nottingham Social Services 'satanic ritual abuse'? The 'flesh eating bug scare?' Anything that promotes Jordan?

Re:IRC is next

[Oddly_Drac]

"All of a sudden the 'caring parents' came out and protested the programme"

That was the main point; they generally didn't. The MPs and celebrities came out and proclaimed that they'd been duped, rather than ask _how_ they were duped. This is usually indicative of 'personalities' because they're generally not in environments where they're told they're wrong.

My brief foray into TV-land left me hankering after a wirebrush and dettol.

It was harsh and directed satire against the type of programme that is _still_ being made.

Re:IRC is next

[mrtroy]

Undernet allows the federalis to sniff their servers/hubs and view channel conversations without being in the channel!

Altho they use this to track those crazy haq0rs, not so much the pedios.

Re:IRC is next

[jsmyth]

Maybe I should have my own category - the hacker who only really hangs around on /. and thinks everything else is a waste of time...

Move over, I think I'll join you .... along with about 100,000 others:)

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it was sarcasm rather than a troll..

Re:IRC is next

[RighteousFunby]

Mod parent up.

British parents seem to be so worried about their little girls being deflowered by the big scary paedophiles, and the tabloids (most notably the Daily Mail) are feeding on this.

The Internet is getting the short end of the stick here. We have TV ads saying that parents should continually look over their kids' shoulders to see what they are doing, and that NOONE is trustworthy enough even to talk to online.

Mother: What are you doing?
Kid: I'm talking to a friend I met on the internet using ICQ.
(Wave of panic spreads over parent, thinking that ICQ is some kind of dating program)
Mother: Get off that computer! NOW!

The instinctive reaction is to believe the tabloid bollocks about there being 1 paedophile online for every 5 other users or some shit like that and then tarring all net users with the same brush.

Parents...GET THE FUCK OVER IT!

Re:IRC is next

[Adm1n]

I thought the highest concentration of kiddey-fiddlers were in the Roman Catholic church and the Scouting movement.

Re:IRC is next

[Anonymous Coward]

except irc is run as independent servers, and you could always run your own... IRC isn't going anywere...
checkout plutonic.nexuschat.net if you wanna talk, i go by disasm, and hang in #chat and other rooms...

Re: IRC is next

[Biscit]

You're right in the panic sense. I won't personally mourn the death of MSN chat, just the humbug surrounding it on child protection grounds.

If nothing else this story fuels ignorance and fear, much as the distorted coverage of peadophiles and MMR. It just so happens that children will not suffer in personal development terms from their parents having unfounded fears of internet chatrooms, where as fears that prevent parents letting their kids walk to school, play out, or go on adventurous activities will.

The problem is not chatrooms, but that parents don't teach kids how to deal with strangers. They prefer instead to prevent their kids from meeting "strangers" in the first place.

Article in Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, there was an article in the Metro (free UK newspaper distributed on trains and buses) -- the slant was that it would curb paedophiles preying on young children. They cited a recent example of this trainee teacher guy trying to 'buy' a nine year old girl for sex using chatrooms.

Fair enough for MSN to ditch it though, there's plenty of other services out there. I wasn't even aware they hosted chatrooms until today.

Re:Article in Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

Excuse me - we're talking about MSN Chatrooms here, not MSN Messenger you can stop spluttering your badly-typed moronic rants about the evil Microsoft and shut the fuck up, as you obviously have not a clue what you're talking about.

Re:Article in Metro

[troc]

That was the guy's problem, he should have tried to buy her with cash :)

Sorry.

troc.

Re:Article in Metro

[troc]

ooh a score of 1 was overrated? some people have no sense of humour. I should have used my karma bonus then they'd have assumed it was a good post!

*smirk*

troc

Re:Article in Metro

[Biscit]

And this is relevant to the post you are replying to in what way?

What's the problem here?

[DavidpFitz]

I don't see a problem with this. MSN (Messenger) costs lots to run. They want to increase their market share so to get more value for money - and if they were in a monopoly position in the IM market this would bea very bad thing. However, they're not the number one player - they are just trying to be. If they think that this will help them achieve that, then that's their perogative.

Personally, I think this is a good thing. It will help drive torward a interoperable standard for IM - not playing catchup with AOL and MSN "standards." Otherwise, we risk being in a situation in a few years similar to where we are with Word doucments now.

Re:What's the problem here?

[Anonymous Coward]

You really ought to read the article in more detail. They're not talking about shutting down Messenger -- just the chatrooms on MSN.

Indeed, they suggested Messenger was a viable alternative to communication once the chatrooms are gone as you can block strangers from contacting you on Messenger. Whereas the chatroom medium inherently allows strangers to communicate.

Re:What's the problem here?

[Anonymous Coward]

Swift death to pedophile's is the only answer.

Re:What's the problem here?

[Anonymous Coward]

Lose the greengrocers' apostrophes, dude!

Re:What's the problem here?

[Saint Stephen]

Nah, you're missing the strategy: (1) Give away IM; (2) Get everyone in the world to live/breath/eat/sleep your IM service, like Crack; (3) monetize it.

By and large the sheep will fork out their credit cards to keep the crack coming. Monetizing MSN is MS's wet dream.

They'll eventually pull it off.

Re:What's the problem here?

[Anonymous Coward]

and gain an a, after the first p.

Re:What's the problem here?

[Alan_Peery]

Quoting from the London Times article:

It is estimated that the 250,000 Microsoft chat rooms worldwide will get two weeks' notice to close down. The company says chat room users will be able to communicate using Microsoft Messenger instead.

Of course, there's a major difference between these two mediums:

• In a chatroom, I'm only in that chatroom.
• On Microsoft Messenger, I'm in all groups that ever talk to me.

The ability to choose and focus on a single conversation will be lost. At least until people move to other chatrooms.

Re:What's the problem here?

[the_Bionic_lemming]

Nah, you're missing the strategy: (1) Give away IM; (2) Get everyone in the world to live/breath/eat/sleep your IM service, like Crack; (3) monetize it.

By and large the sheep will fork out their credit cards to keep the crack coming. Monetizing MSN is MS's wet dream.

They'll eventually pull it off.

YEAH! Just like they did with IE -

oh wait..

Liker IRC...

[Compunerd]

...only evil comes out of it. Why should people talk about other things than bondage, rape and casual sex? Beats me.

Re:Liker IRC...

[azzy]

Slashdot
Bondage, rape and casual sex. Stuff that matters.

Re:Liker IRC...

[lanswitch]

well, there's computers, ofcourse. I haven't seen a computersexsite, yet.

Re:Liker IRC...

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot
Bondage, rape and casual sex. Stuff that matters.

You forgot frottage and onanism, you insensitive clod!

Re:Liker IRC...

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on now, that's hardly in the same league as bondage and rape.

Re:Liker IRC...

[ihatesco]

Digital Data Porn (workplace safe if you aren't a nerd).

Re:Liker IRC...

[lanswitch]

Thank you. I have been looking for a site like that. Now i'm off to the bathroom...

Make more money

[TuataraShoes]

Its obvious that Microsoft make decisions for no other reason than to make more money. The subscription chat services make more money than unsubscribed.

The real reason for this is that the lawyers are screaming to cut the unmonitored service before they get sued.

Nevertheless, that kind of chat is among the most banal and crappy of all internet applications. If every provider stopped supporting it, it would be no great loss.

Re:Make more money

[bdowne01]

Its obvious that Microsoft make decisions for no other reason than to make more money. The subscription chat services make more money than unsubscribed.

Companies exist to make money. They don't do it for the fun of it all.

As much as I despise Microsoft because of their business practices, I can't really blame them for attempting to make money off one of their products. That's the problem with companies, they're always out for a buck.

As long as there's free alternatives, let them go ahead and charge what they want. The informed will begin to use free software more frequently because of it; and the uninformed might just discover it for the first time.

Re:Make more money

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as just the basic one-on-one chat still works with MSN, there will be great difficulty in convincing my stubborn or clueless friends to switch to Jabber. Why? There's no "real" reason to switch.

I could always keep a Jabber client (with a whole two people on my contact list) open alongside my MSN client, at least until Jabber gains serious momentum. Or get new friends. ;-)

Re:Make more money

[nyseal]

I'm not especially a MS fan but if companies were not out to make a buck none of us would have jobs. I'm not talking CEO status here (although that has a great impact in the bigger picture), however how long do you think a company losing money can support its staff? As a quality manager, I get into this debate on a regular basis with our sales staff and business unit manager because of profit margins. Apparently they'd rather tape a nickel to each part we sell rather than lose an account. That's completely ludicrous. That means each time we fulfill an order we lose money; and also pisses off the employees because they have not had a raise in 2 years. Jeez, I wonder why. Sure, it's up to us as a business to MAKE ourselves profitable but there inevitably comes a time where we have to tell the customer: "We can't sell you this product anymore because we're losing money'. It's a hard pill to swallow, but I'd rather be part of a 1 million dollar profitable company than a 1 billion dollar company that's losing money left and right; regardless of the corporation name. All this talk on Slashdot about 'free' (music, software, videos, etc) does not create jobs. One could argue IT positions (which is a very small percentage of most viable business models) but what if there's no company to work for? Then what? We'll all be able to enjoy reading Slashdot from a sidewalk by stealing someone else's bandwidth via a Wi-Fi on Main Street. I don't claim to have all the answers but I certainly know how to ask the right questions.

Re:Make more money

[bdowne01]

A point well taken, but some notes to follow up on...

Company A has every right to sell products that they create. However, I as an individual also have a right to give away things that I create; in other words, free software.

If my project becomes greater in quailty and value than Company A's Widgetmanager(TM); so much so that it doesn't seem worth they money, compared to my free Widgetmanager, who's at fault? Me? Absolutely not.

Jobs at companies will be secured, as long as companies realize that they're revenue model is not guaranteed. Too often companies treat the customer as a given (read: RIAA) than a customer.

If Company A's product offered enough features and additional customer service in the form of support, I would have no reservations about spending money to buy it over a free alternative.

The problem is when Company A uses it's market power and monetary strength as a club, instead of arm for improving its products.

They hate...

[Anonymous Coward]

that people bash about Microsoft in their own chat rooms. Now those people are undere control. What a Brave New World.

We've got a witch!

[Anonymous Coward]

"It's starting to become clear that Microsoft is starting up the IM wars again and that the 3rd-party lockout indeed isn't so much about security as it is about marketshare."

Your questioning of microsofts motives clearly indicates that you have something to hide. Are you a paedophile?

We have found a nonce! may we burn him?

Re:We've got a witch!

[Anonymous Coward]

may we burn him?

Burning's too good for this sicko! He should suffer the same fate as King Edward II!

Re:We've got a witch!

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you know that pedos use the snail mail too? Perhaps all our letters and parcels should be opened by the Post Office or whatever mail service to make sure that no pedo material is being sent over the snail mail. I for one have nothing to hide, so I have absolutely no objections whatsoever.
You know, I bet they travel about in cars and busses to. Maybe there should be checkpoints every 10 miles along the roads where cars, lorries (trucks), busses etc. can be stopped and searched by the police in case there is a pedophile or pedophile material?
I have absolutely nothing to hide! I will enthiusiastically agree to these measures!
Pedophiles also live in houses. I think our houses should be subject to random, unannounced searches to catch them when they least expect it! I have nothing to hide at all! Let them do it, and start no! Every day wasted is another pedophile opportunity!
WE MUST ACT NOW, WITHOUT DELAY!

Re:We've got a witch!

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you know she is a nonce?

IM Lockout

[rf0]

Well there is a 3rd party which is open and works. Its called "Jabber". Now of course most people here know this but along with the Yahoo also shutting people out prehaps its time to move

Rus

Re:IM Lockout

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats a messaging client. Not a chatroom, additionally the article mentions that they're going to concentrate on msn messenger, rather than abandon that also.

Jabber has been around for a while, so will MSN Messenger.

There really hasn't been anything from Microsoft (as far as I'm aware) of locking anyone out from Messenger. AOL have been active in that particular area with their AIM client. I imagine with Microsofts attitude and competitive nature its only a matter of time.

What is interesting however, is the shift from free services to paid services. Note the service is shutting down in most countries, but not all. Maybe the service will be improved under these countries then re-introduced as a paid service again.

It's all about pedophiles

[surstrmming]

Microsoft has prepped the mainstream media that this is all about saving children from pedophile predators.

Child abuse experts were interviewed saying this actually increases the risk to children, because kids have emotional ties to their online chat friends. Now they might give mobile phone numbers and other personal data to their online friends so that they can stay in touch... and if that friend is a pedophile, he is that much closer to meeting the child.

The child abuse expert urged parents to talk to their kids about this, so the child can deal with this close down of chat rooms in a better way.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[moderators_are_w*nke]

This is, of course, complete rubbish. Its all about finding a way to ditch a free service that is costing them money and replace it with one they can charge for. This is sensible business practice from a money point of view, but the business model is more akin to drug pushing than online services.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[16K Ram Pack]

Is there an equivalent of Godwin's Law for people using the issue of child safety as a means to do other things?

Whenever I see stories of people doing things "to protect children", I often look for alternative motives. I think press departments of governments/corporations use this as a way of ceasing debate, but they know that people are too afraid to oppose the thing done because they don't want to be seen as against protecting children.

HM Government wants new snooping powers on email - undoubtedly as the legislation gets closer, the "protecting children" trump card will be played.

Like the experts say, What MS are doing will not protect children. They will find alternative chat rooms, possibly in juristictions outside the UK, with absolutely NO regulation or searches by police being available.

In this case, it looks like one of the following is the real story:-

MS are scared of getting sued

MS are looking to get people using messenger to increase their stranglehold.

MS are looking to publicise MSN as a service, encouraging non-savvy parents to believe that signing up to MSN means their kids won't use chatrooms.

MS want some publicity to help spin the image of them being a good company with strong, secure software who care about their users after the virus disaster.

If MS really cared about children, they'd host chatrooms and put some of their massive resources into moderating them.

Of course, the mainstream media are too thick to deal with the real issues in this - protecting children through education of parents and children in using the internet.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[Andrewkov]

I was waiting for someone to say this .. I agree, it sounds to me like they're ditching an expensive operation which doesn't have much (if any) potential to generate revenue. And just so they don't look like money-grubbing bastards, they tag on "it's for the children". ... Yeah, right.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[will_die]

Since this is all about the pedophiles which I guess means MS is saying they are using MS products, why is MS waiting 30+ days? Don't they care enough about the children to be a stop to this right now? How many more children are going to be hurt because MS does not stop this right as they have identified that it was a problem?

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[GregWebb]

Exactly.

I was very disappointed with Radio 4 this morning covering this but not thinking to discuss that this means MS are stopping a free service, getting good publicity for themselves for free and instantly bashing all their competitors by implication. Oh, and getting referred to as a 'leading internet provider' in the UK where MSN don't operate.

This is very nasty marketing from MS, definitely increases the risk to children and should have got them shouted at loudly.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[DavidBrown]

This is, of course, complete rubbish. Its all about finding a way to ditch a free service that is costing them money and replace it with one they can charge for. This is sensible business practice from a money point of view, but the business model is more akin to drug pushing than online services.

And there's a problem with this, why?

Microsoft doesn't need to use online child predators as a justification for this move. There's no point to it, because it's not likely to convince anyone of its motives. The problems Microsoft stated with online chat are likely one of the reasons why they have changed their position.

The other reason is clearly profit, but, guess what, Microsoft is actually in it for the money. Their business model in IM and online chat rooms isn't all that different from many other software companies - give it away for free and build up a demand for it, then start charging. If consumers don't like it, they can go elsewhere.

MS does not have a monopoly in this, and they aren't doing anything illegal or morally suspect. Is it like drug pushing? Perhaps, but so was the freeware release of Doom's first mission, and many "public beta" tests, which are as much about marketing as they are about fine-tuning software.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[Hatta]

Yeah, people get retarded when they have kids. It's sad.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[Adm1n]

Parenting 101: Do not let your kids watch T.V. without concent!
Do not let your kids roam the internet without your concent!
Do not let your children online.
Most North-american families are content with the Television raising the kids, so the time your daughter is 14 she want's the high fashon, neo-capitolist consumerist propoganda that all of those in her social niche have been brainwashed by. Your son want's to be uber-cool (skater, snoboarder, singer, DJ, athlete) with a massive computer for better quake games. MS is using this "EXCUSE" as a way to propitize a non propitary part of their suite, it's that simple and it's ALWAYS about MARKET SHARE, anything else is hogwash used to blind the public.
Let's be realistic, there is a greater chance of your child getting abused via social channels (dance class, brownies/scouts, school, babysitters), CHURCH... than online that's were most pedo's are, the ones online are just as dangerous, and may even exist in moderated environs, it's not difficult to become a moderator and I'm sure MS is not going to conduct backround checks on all of the moderators they'll need. Besides the real pedo's have places like Ifriends.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[Anonymous Coward]

The Tabloid Law: The probability of an appeal to emotion involving one of The Unholy Trinity (paedophiles, criminals, terrorists) approaches one in proportion to the sensationalism of the reporter.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[pmz]

"protecting children"

Even if we do the right thing for protecting our chilren (permanently locking them into a padded basement, obviously), we have this critical dilemma:

1) No sunlight can lead to soft bones, nutrient deficiency, and obvious harm.
2) Sunlight can lead to skin cancer, "leather face" (for the teen beach bunnies out there), and obvious harm.

Damn.

Okay, the right way to protect the children, then, is to have no children. Problem solved.

What, even this isn't satisfactory? What do you mean you want kids?

Ah, crap.

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[TomV]

it's not difficult to become a moderator and I'm sure MS is not going to conduct backround checks on all of the moderators they'll need

Ah, now, they may not have a choice in that mattter in the UK, as the Protection Of Children Act 1999 states that

it is an offence for any organisation to offer employment that involves regular contact with young people under the age of 18 to anyone who has been convicted of certain specified offences, or included on lists of people considered unsuitable for such work held by the DfEE (List 99) and the Department of Health. (PoCA - Protection of Children Act list)

and to be honest, what would be the use of a moderator who hadn't had a background check? Chatroom moderator would just become another prime 'opportunity' just like scout leading, teaching, or whatever the demon of the week is this time round.

tomV

Re:It's all about pedophiles

[40000]

The main thing to remember when using things like chatrooms is that if someone won't give you their phone number (by email or something else less public than chat) then answer the phone, they aren't worth going to meet in real life.
That's the same for everybody, young or old, it's not the internet's fault that bad things happen.

Wool over the unwasheds eyes again

[beady]

Surely Microsoft realise that by doign this, they are just going to shift the children and unsavoury types to using less servers, therefore making it easier for the nastys to go after the children as there are less places to focus on...
Well done to Microsoft making the world think its doing children a favour, rather than making the peadophiles lot easier

Re:Wool over the unwasheds eyes again

[Anonymous Coward]

That's ridiculous. You talk as if MSN is, like, *the* service for children. It isn't -- they use hundreds of different services already. So disbanding MSN chatrooms will just mean they distribute over other services. It makes no difference whatsoever to the ease that 'nastys' can get 'em.

Re:Wool over the unwasheds eyes again

[Biscit]

The claim MSN are making is that shutting their chatroom service is in the name of child protection. When as you say it makes no difference.

eh...

[mcrbids]

It's starting to become clear that Microsoft is starting up the IM wars again and that the 3rd-party lockout indeed isn't so much about security as it is about marketshare.

Starting? Even without the anti-MS bias, you have to admit that altruism doesn't exist among companies. No air==dead people. Money is air to a company.

If MSN figures they can get more air this way, they will.

Duh.

MS only was nice so long as they got marketshare away from AIM. From this POV, it seems Jabber really needs to be rallied...

No service? Go underground...

[Talthane]

My immediate reaction is that this will simply drive chatroom-using children to less-monitored, less well-policed chatrooms where they can carry on gossiping - especially if they don't have access to IM clients. Only nobody will be watching those chatrooms.

As much as I loathe some of Microsoft's practices, I would have preferred an organisation like them to be monitoring (young) children's chatrooms than SmallISP.com(tm). Purely from a resources standpoint, Microsoft was one of the best-equipped organisations to watch for paedophiles and other slime.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

"paedophiles and other slime"?

It's these kinds of broad, unquestioned overgeneralizations that create the very monsters you describe. Being a pedophile myself, I am absolutely NOT slime, I am very proud of my stands and morals standards regarding my orientation (which I've not chosen). Knowing others like me, I can tell you only a small part of "the pedophiles" ever lay a hand on a child, far less than prey on them. With your (as in everyones) overgeneralizing "guilty by assosiation" slander, which every one of us have to endure every day in our secrecy, you create expectations of criminal behavior, as it were. I wish people would just say "child rapist" or "child molester" or whatever, if that's what they mean (because, you might not realize or believe it, but far from all child molesters are pedophiles).

(anonymous for obvious reasons)

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree with this. I'm not a paedophile but one of my friends is, and she wouldn't dream of abducting and raping a child. Indeed, her paephilia is not exclusive and she has some sexual attraction to adult men too.

It's not always an all encompassing obsession. In this case it amounts to just slightly more than a rather perculiar fetish.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

As much as I loathe some of Microsoft's practices, I would have preferred an organisation like them to be monitoring (young) children's chatrooms than SmallISP.com(tm). Purely from a resources standpoint, Microsoft was one of the best-equipped organisations to watch for paedophiles and other slime.

I used to work for MSN Chat, and because of the Non-Disclosure-Agreement that I signed, I have to post AC.

MSN did crap all to watch for peadophiles.
A paedophile was after a pre-teen girl on MSN Chat, I was alerted to it by the girl, and I followed it up on the MSN side of things. My immeadiate manager didn't do anything about it, he ignored it, so I went over their head and informed that managers manager. That manager also didn't do ANYTHING. I had to go up to three levels of management before they would do ANYTHING about it.

That paedophile was then monitored and had his account killed.

Another time I located an entire paedo ring operating a chat room on MSN Chat. There was about 30 paedophiles in it. I monitored the situation and reported back to MSN, who once again IGNORED the situation. So I was once again kicking and screaming with my managers at MSN Chat. In the end, they did NOTHING about it.

MSN Chat are NOT the people that you want protecting your children. Through my experience previously working at MSN Chat, they wouldn't give a damn if any kids got raped or killed.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[stridebird]

That's an amazing comment. I have never really considered the paedophilia from the context of the paedophile but of course they have rights(*) too and it isn't the thoughts (hey right: my thoughts are still mine, right? I can think what i like, right?) but the actions that make up the crime. OK, intent to commit a crime, but if I walk along the street and think a thought, anything controversial and no-one hears it, it's just in my mind, then it's not a crime. ah shit, IANAL. I don't know. I just don't like to hurt people and that's the field that swings my compass needle. Other then that, I am a weirdo and you wouldn't always want to be in my head...(I don't always like being there myself, so god help ya). (*) not to realise their desires on other people, but to HAVE that condition and to control it and to be respected for doing so.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[swb]

Sorry, there are no "good" pedophiles. Simply refraining from raping children doesn't make you a "good" pedophile, you're still deeply disturbed. You can't ever justify a sexual relationship with a child, and its certainly not healthy to engage pedophillic fantasy behavior and call it "OK" as long as no children were hurt.

I hope you recognize your mental illness and are seeking therapy to disengage from pedophilia.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

My immediate reaction is that this will simply drive chatroom-using children to less-monitored, less well-policed chatrooms where they can carry on gossiping - especially if they don't have access to IM clients. Only nobody will be watching those chatrooms.

As much as I loathe some of Microsoft's practices, I would have preferred an organisation like them to be monitoring (young) children's chatrooms than SmallISP.com(tm). Purely from a resources standpoint, Microsoft was one of the best-equipped organisations to watch for paedophiles and other slime.

NSA knows this, that's why they're working with Microsoft, not only to watch for slimes, but also for what you think and do.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[poptones]

I used to "volunteer" in two MS chat rooms back when the comic client was shipping with IE4. it was a popular and fun service, and the only time I can recall actually enjoying chat (yes, I'm saying I liked the comic interface and it's a damn shame no one has picked up that torch). Among the people hanging about in the help room were a tech from the southeast, a service worker from canada who administered a local program for physically disabled children, and several teens who would pop in every afternoon from school.

We never saw pedos there. Not much, anyway. Because the kids didn't hesitate to tell us about inappropriate whispers from strangers, and sevral of us were given enough administrative power to handle things ourselves when they did.

IOW both our "unmonitored" rooms were fully "monitored" and there were people at the ready who could act if needed - that is, so far as acting was needed. This is chat, after all - no one can reach through the line and abduct a child telephonically.

And if there WERE twenty pedophiles hanging about in a room, so what? If they're all pedophiles they're not children - i.e. so long as they are hanging about stroking one another and swapping stories and old trophy shots they are not fucking children. You cannot make it illegal for people of similar interests to congregate and talk - even if you don't like their topic selection. Unless someone is conspiring to abduct the neighbor kid or discussing the plot of their next self directed child rape flick, no crime is being comitted, no one is endangered, and you SHOULDN'T have the "right" to shut them down. And if they ARE stupid enough to do this in public the last goddamn thing you should be doing is shutting them up. Let them talk and incriminate themselves and collect the evidence to haul'em off to the pokey. By silencing these people all you do is make them harder to police.

It's been said a thousand times already: the "child protection" issue is a complete red herring. But what's NOT being said is many of those rooms ARE monitored by people who care and can - and do - act, even if they are not on the corporate payroll.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, there are no "good" pedophiles. Simply refraining from raping children doesn't make you a "good" pedophile, you're still deeply disturbed.

So even if a pedophile goes to great lengths to stay celibate for all his life, you won't even encourage that, but still continue to persuade him he's "deeply disturbed"? Do you think it's entirely unlikely that if enough people do this to him, he'll eventually believe it, and start acting "pedophilic" as society expects of him?

You can't ever justify a sexual relationship with a child

I agree completely, and I don't have to justify it, since I have never or will never engage in one.

and its certainly not healthy to engage pedophillic fantasy behavior and call it "OK" as long as no children were hurt.

"Fantasy behavior"? That's an oxymoron if I ever heard one.

I hope you recognize your mental illness and are seeking therapy to disengage from pedophilia.

I'm afraid I am what I am. I believe you can't decide what you are, but you can decide what you do. So I decide never ever to expose a child to anything other than friendship, and that'll be enough for me.

I don't ask for support, I ask you to consider what you're doing to other humans when you year after year try to persuade them to become monsters when they're not.

Re:No service? Go underground...

[Anonymous Coward]

"and its certainly not healthy to engage pedophillic fantasy behavior and call it "OK" as long as no children were hurt."

Why not?
Seriously, is there any proof of escalation?

replace pedophile with video games and you see where the problem is.

I can fantasize about yanking some ass out of his car and kicking him to death all I want. As long as I dont do that I have not committed a crime.

BBC discussion

[Phroggy]

I just heard a discussion about this on the BBC's Radio Five Live. One concern they raised: children will not stop chatting online, but will simply switch to other chat services which are even less safe than MSN's. Not only that, but with the announcement of the impending closure, there will be a scramble to exchange contact information before the deadline, which may include phone numbers or other personal information (precisely the thing we don't want children to do).

Another point they made: when talking to your children about the dangers of talking to strangers online (or anything else, really) it's very important to explain WHY it's dangerous, and make sure they understand exactly what the dangers are and how to avoid them. Children tend to rebel against authority, especially when they can't see good reasons for the rules parents set for them.

Re:BBC discussion

[yelmalio]

I just heard a discussion about this on the BBC's Radio Five Live. One concern they raised: children will not stop chatting online, but will simply switch to other chat services which are even less safe than MSN's.

Speaking as a parent of 3 girls I think MS are between a rock and a hard place with this. There have been several high profile cases of underage people being lured into sex through chatrooms. If MS continue the service they undoubtedly will get flack for helping aid Paedophiles. No sooner was this announced they where closing the service they get accused of censorship. There have been calls in the UK to legislate that chat serverice providers 'properly monitor' users. Can't have it both ways and it's not up to MS to monitor each and every conversation. That would be a greater breach of privacy.

I've seen several comments here and here that this will allow people to ween off MS. It's not about MS crapware, censorship or privacy, it's about kids being abused by adults.

What is needed here is an education programme to teach parents, not children, as to the dangers. Most parents are clueless about the Net as a whole.

Re:BBC discussion

[the_womble]

It's not about MS crapware, censorship or privacy, it's about kids being abused by adults.

It is about MS Crapware. According to the article MS said:

"This is a decision based upon consumer experiences, child protection and our strategic investment to build up MSN Messenger,"

and:

Users in the affected regions will still be able to chat online but must do so through Microsoft Messenger, the company's instant messaging product.

and:

In the United States, Canada and Japan, Microsoft will introduce an unsupervised chat service solely for subscribers

It is not about protecting children, it is about getting people to use MS Messenger and subscribe to MSN. Most users will not know about competing services. They will recieve a message from MS telling them that the service they have been using is being closed down, and here is how to subscribe to the new secure replacement from MSN. What will the average user do?

Re:BBC discussion

[Hognoxious]

There have been several high profile cases of underage people being lured into sex through chatrooms.

Then we'd better ban sweets, puppies and pop music too.

Re:BBC discussion

[tnmc]

The keyword here is "parenting". Too many parents use the Internet as a babysitting tool rather than actively get involved in parenting their children.

Remember that last famous incident, where the 12-yo ran off with the Marine to Germany? She was spending 8+ hours a day on the net, wasn't it? And her parents thought that was too much so they "limited" her to 5 hours a day? I thought, "what?!". A 12 year old should be out running around playing tag with the neighbourhood kids, not spending even five hours a day sat in front of a computer monitor!

Finally, I leave you with wise words of caution I found on the BBCs public forum on this topic;

"Safeguarding children" is the emotional bullet which will kill freedom of expression and ultimately take away our rights for good.
Henry, United States

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

There have also been *more than* a few very high profile cases involving the catholic church and their priests. Why doesn't anyone request closing it? Because they pay the victims off?

In my ~6 years of internet usage I have not yet encountered any kiddie porn or paedophiles (admittedly, I haven't *looked* for them, but one would expect given the media converage that there isn't anything else on homepages/chatrooms/IM/etc.).

Re:BBC discussion

[Jim the Bad]

And churches, of course.

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

"even less safe than MSN"? These words make no sense, how can something be less safe that MSN? That's like "below zero kelvin".

Re:BBC discussion

[mdwh2]

I've seen several comments here and here

Whilst the main talking point covers Microsoft in particular, there is the more general vote they have asking "Should chatrooms be closed down?" I know that votes like this should be treated as unreliable, but I find it worrying that almost half the four thousand or so people who have currently voted answer Yes.

I'm rather displeased with the (allegedly non-biased, and funded by my taxes) BBC's reporting on this as a whole - for example, they quote some statistics about how teenagers engage in sex talk or meet up - but um, with dodgy old men, or simply other teenagers? It hardly surprises me that plenty of teenagers engage in sex chat or meet up with other teenagers, but the context of that survey implies it is the former.

It also seems that they believe the laughable idea that M$ are switching to subscription based services so that it isn't anonymous, and that it is the "free, unmoderated chatrooms" that are a bad thing. Um, so making money from it has nothing to do with it of course.

I'm not sure if it's a case of M$ reacting from the existing witch-hunt paranoia or not, but the whole thing just adds further fuel to it.

Most parents are clueless about the Net as a whole.

Agreed. I wonder how many people thinking that chatrooms should be outlawed have actually used one. Also it's amusing how many of those on the talking point seem to think that chats are only provided by companies, who can then close them down..

Re:BBC discussion

[Oddly_Drac]

"It's not about MS crapware, censorship or privacy, it's about kids being abused by adults."

And just to hammer home the validity of this complaint, should we compare the numbers of sexual abuse at the hands of family to the numbers of sexual abuse at the hand of chatroom perverts?

Not having a go at you personally...I know this must worry you, but do you start educating your kids yourself, or wait for the government to do it?

Re:BBC discussion

[technomom]

Agreed. A 12 year old on the computer for 8 hours is not being parented.

But I think a 12 year old playing tag is probably pretty unlikely. Tag is more for the 4-8 year old set.

JoAnn

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you remember what it was like being 12 years old?

Re:BBC discussion

[dvcx1]

I am sorry I only listen to government / corporate approved news, this is a BBC free zone (USA)

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you allow your children unsupervised internet access? Because you SHOULD NOT. Your home computer should be in a family room where it's easy for everyone (including you) to see what your children are doing on the computer.

You wouldn't allow your child to roam the streets of your town alone, so why would you let them roam the world's information networks unsupervised? There's a lot more graphic internet content unsuitable for children than there are dangerous strangers.

Re:BBC discussion

[Phroggy]

I am sorry I only listen to government / corporate approved news, this is a BBC free zone (USA)

I'm in the USA too. Listen here.

Re:BBC discussion

[Phroggy]

Do you remember what it was like being 12 years old?

Yeah, I spent as much time in front of a computer as possible - either at home, or staying after school to use the ones there. The difference was, nobody I knew had any idea what the Internet was - the World Wide Web didn't exist yet. A couple years later I started chatting online in the Teleconference on a local multi-line BBS, although I soon realized that you can't really get a word in edgewise at 300 baud (at that speed the text comes in as fast as you can read it), so it wasn't until we got a new computer and a 14.4kbps modem (when I was 16) that I really started talking to people online (still on BBSes - people were starting to use the Web, but ICQ didn't exist yet and I didn't know about IRC).

I met a girl from a BBS. She was huge. We played laser tag.

So anyway, yeah, I remember when I was 12 years old. It was nothing like being 12 years old would be today.

Re:BBC discussion

[Phroggy]

for example, they quote some statistics about how teenagers engage in sex talk or meet up - but um, with dodgy old men, or simply other teenagers? It hardly surprises me that plenty of teenagers engage in sex chat or meet up with other teenagers, but the context of that survey implies it is the former.

I think the point they were trying to make was, if you talk to someone in a chatroom, you have no real guarantee that they are who they say they are - if they say they're another teenager, they might be another teenager or they might be a dodgy old man pretending to be a teenager. Obviously the vast majority of them really are other teenagers, and most of the time everything works out just fine.

When you arrange to meet someone, you can do so carefully (meet in a public place with lots of people around, go with parents or friends so you're not alone, and make sure you have a way to leave if things turn out not to be as you expected) or you can do so recklessly ("Hey, my parents will be out of town this weekend and they think I'm staying with a friend, here's my address"). If children aren't aware of the dangers, they won't make wise decisions. Parents can't always be there, which is why it's important to teach children how to make wise decisions on their own.

Re:BBC discussion

[Phroggy]

You wouldn't allow your child to roam the streets of your town alone, so why would you let them roam the world's information networks unsupervised?

Depends on the age and maturity level of the child. I would allow a 16-yr-old to do things I would not allow a 12-yr-old to do. If I don't allow them to roam the streets of my town at 16, what happens when they turn 18 and move out and are suddenly roaming the streets of some other town without my knowledge?

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

" If MS continue the service they undoubtedly will get flack for helping aid Paedophiles."

MS selling software helps paedophiles. Should they stop that as well?

Re:BBC discussion

[Anonymous Coward]

My local NPR station get a BBCnews feed to play each day, not bad most of the time.

What about Hotmail?!

[glassesmonkey]

I read it was because of spammers and kiddie pr0n..

I can only hope they shut down Hotmail next, though I feel it is more the S&M version of mail for people that enjoy getting spam in their mailbox.

Simply a question of being sued

[Chris_Jefferson]

I'm not suprised this hasn't come quicker. Clearly microsoft can't afford (well, they don't want) to pay for moderation of all their MSN chatrooms. However you can imagine the uproar if the headline "Pedophile kills child after grooming in MSN chatroom" appear in papers. This isn't going to help, as everyone will simply move to another chatroom site but I can see my microsoft is doing it.

I don't blame them

[mo^]

I think this is a very understandable position to take. Microsoft get lumbered with enough bad press as it is. All it takes is for one 14 year old to travel half the globe to meet a guy she was chatting to in MSN "channels" for MS to get slated for allowing this to happen.

Childrens channel moderation should not be taken lightly. Here in the UK there is a lengthy screening process for anyone who work with children, and unless MS could guarantee correctly screened moderators (screend of course in EVERY country that the channels operate) there is no way they could protect themselves from outraged public opinion.. Parents like to blame other people for not watching their children closely enough, and if a child is using a major companies message system, they have an easy target for their ire.

I personally believe any such undertaking to be ridden with obstacles, and microsoft as a "software" company are right to back away from this kind of thing

Re:I don't blame them

[Anonymous Coward]

FACT: The Internet is a public place, parents that let their children roam public places unsupervised are still responsable for letting them do so.

Re:I don't blame them

[mo^]

I couldn't agree more, but "concerned parents" groups like to place the blame firmly at anyone elses door.

I'm just saying M$ are right to cover their own arses on this one.

Re:I don't blame them

[Anonymous Coward]

Childrens channel moderation should not be taken lightly. Here in the UK there is a lengthy screening process for anyone who work with children, and unless MS could guarantee correctly screened moderators (screend of course in EVERY country that the channels operate) there is no way they could protect themselves from outraged public opinion..

How is this moderator ment to know the applicable ages of consent for all of the chatters and the interactions between them? In order to even start they'd need to know citizenship, current location and location of permenant residence. Note that the law in Scotland differs from that in England & Wales.

Re:I don't blame them

[Spackler]

Microsoft get lumbered with enough bad press as it is. All it takes is for one 14 year old to travel half the globe to meet a guy she was chatting to in MSN "channels" for MS to get slated for allowing this to happen

Ok, think about that for a second. Have you EVER heard a report on the mainstream news that specified the company who owned the "chat" service? My guess is no. When you listen to them, they say "Internet Chat Room". AOL or Microsoft are NEVER referred to. MS and TW are also media companies. Can't rock the bed.

Re:I don't blame them

[TiggsPanther]

"Here in the UK there is a lengthy screening process for anyone who work with children"
(emphasis mine)

No shit, sherlock. I applied for Disclosure last May. It took about 6 months or more for them to finally get my paperwork dealt with.
Even worse, it took about 4 months for them to return my form saying "You filled this bit in wrong".

And it wasn't until the Soham murders that the CRB even admitted that they had a backlog - when by then I'd already been waiting for more than the "3 weeks" it was supposed to take.

And the upshot of this?
The backlog was still in full swing by September, and many schools were unable to run full classes because new staff didn't have clearance, and eventually the Government had to say that new teachers could start without the full Disclosure.

And all it's really done is tick off people who loathe forms, or who hate being "guilty until proven innocent".

Re:I don't blame them

[andy1307]

Here in the UK there is a lengthy screening process for anyone who work with children

A 14 year old leaves her parents and takes enough money to go halfway around the globe without her parents knowing about it? Maybe the UK needs a lengthy screening process for would-be parents..If the government thinks you can't raise a child, maybe they shouldn't let you procreate..This way, the rest of us won't suffer.

Re:I don't blame them

[mo^]

Sacry thing is in the instance that first springs to mind it was a 30 something ex-us marine who encouraged her to leave.

Brief article with links here

but yes, there should be a screening program for parents. as the old saying goes.. you need a license to own a tv, but anyone can have kids

Re:I don't blame them

[Anonymous Coward]

FACT: The Internet is a public place

NOT FACT: Microsoft is to provide all services we want for free

If you would like to provide free chat rooms for anyone then that is your choice.

If Microsoft wants to charge and control their chat rooms then that is their choice.

Re:I don't blame them

[5KVGhost]

FACT: Microsoft is a private company that is expected to obey the child protection laws of the countries in which they operate.

Morally speaking, parents are, of course, ultimately responsible for the welfare of their children. But that doesn't mean that a child in a public place is not protected by the law.

If a child is dragged from their mother's arms while walking down a city sidewalk we don't dismiss the issue by telling the mother that, oh well, I guess she should have held on just a bit tighter.

Well,

[Sevn]

Seeing as how Microsoft doesn't seem to be rapidly gaining any ground in the browser wars, or the mid-range server OS wars, or the gaming console wars anymore, it might be good for them to concentrate on an instant messenger war for a little while so they can remember what it was like to win a war.

is there a connection?

[deltagreen]

I know this is Microsoft we are talking about, but I don't see the clear connection.

OK, shutting down forums will stop many from moaning about Microsoft's MSN Messenger in their own chat areas, but if it hadn't been for the dates, I would have said these two issues are unrelated except for the date. Can someone clarify if I'm missing something obvious here?

What a shame..

[Ckwop]

I think this consitutes the first step in a slow march towards the ban of unmonitored chat rooms. Something which is absolutely bizarre considering the fact that the chance of your child being groomed by a paedophile are probably about the same as your child being struck by lightening.. In the UK we see about three to four cases of this a year.

More children get killed in car accidents.. in fact it's the biggest killer of under 12's if i recall correctly..

Unmoderated chat is about freedom of speech. The price we pay for freedom is that evil, to some extent, is free too. A world without fear and terror is a world without freedom.

Freedoms are being removed left, right and center in the post 9/11 world. The irony is that the terrorists succeeded.. The land(s) of the free are no longer as free as they used to be.. My forefathers fought for our freedom in blood.. We shouldn't give in.. Every man killed by a terrorist is a solider for freedom.. Let's not let democracy drown at the hands of a few.

Simon

Re:What a shame..

[Anonymous Coward]

Something which is absolutely bizarre considering the fact that the chance of your child being groomed by a paedophile are probably about the same as your child being struck by lightening.. In the UK we see about three to four cases of this a year.

With most cases of child abuse involving people already known to the child. IIRC parents and step parents actually top the list here.

More children get killed in car accidents.. in fact it's the biggest killer of under 12's if i recall correctly..

A risk which has increased, as more and more children are "taxied" to schools. Sometimes justified to "protect them", even though the rate of child abductions hasn't changed in decades.

Unmoderated chat is about freedom of speech. The price we pay for freedom is that evil, to some extent, is free too. A world without fear and terror is a world without freedom.

In practice you are more likely to get a situation where most people live in fear and terror of a small group who have complete freedom. Since no-one dare speak out against a corrupt official who breaks the laws her or she claims to be upholding.

Re:What a shame..

[Komarosu]

Unfortunaty Si, looks like our channel could be under threat if Carol Vorderman and the UK Gov have there way. Remember the minority always ruins it for the majority (votes, bush/gore...u know :))

Re:What a shame..

[16K Ram Pack]

More children get killed in car accidents.. in fact it's the biggest killer of under 12's if i recall correctly..

And how do papers like The Sun deal with speeding? By declaring a success when they get the government to paint speed cameras orange to make sure people can see them.

Re:What a shame..

[Anonymous Coward]

Speeding isn't the problem, per se. It's WHERE they speed.

It'd be better if the speeding penalties were graded more severely according to the local limits e.g. 10 over in a 30 gets you a hell of a lot more punishment than 10 over in a 60. Unfortunately, that aint the case...

Re:What a shame..

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

Interesting that you think that a problem. I'd think that having drivers slow down because they see that the road is monitored would be a positive thing. The goal IS to slow down speeders, not merely to penalize them, right?

Re:What a shame..

[steve.m]

Who cares if unmoderated chat rooms get taken off line - it's hardly a loss of personal freedom - it's not a right, its a service that has been provided free of charge by a profit making company.

MSN chat has existed for less than 10 years. Talking with others in public or
private has been around since lauguage developed.

The internet is not a replacement for a social life, however it can be an extenstion.

If you can tear yourself away from the internet, Why don't you enjoy your freedom to go down the pub tonight and have some unmoderated chat with a real person.

Re:What a shame..

[blibbleblobble]

"More children get killed in car accidents.. in fact it's the biggest killer of under 12's if i recall correctly.."

And who is speeding around in a big van they don't really know how to drive, without much visibility, at about the time that kids are walking home from school?

Ah yes, the mothers.

So who is parking on double-yellow lines, on pedestrian crossings, and on the no-parking zones outside school, meaning that nobody can see the kids about to cross the road?

Ah yes, the mothers.

Let's ban communication, it seems much simpler than this traffic-safety business.

Re:What a shame..

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely, people will slow down when they *know* there is a camera there but they sure won't if they *know* there isn't one.

If they think there might be camera there, then hopefully they'll slow down as well.

Re:What a shame..

[16K Ram Pack]

Actually, I think it is - if you do 80mph on a UK motorway, you are unlikely to get caught. Do 40 in a 30mph and you will.

Re:What a shame..

[16K Ram Pack]

So, therefore the police should never used unmarked cars on traffic patrols?

There's a journey I used to do regularly and people would basically slow down for the cameras and accelerate straight after them. So for about 200 yards per camera, they achieve their objective.

Imagine if speed cameras were small emough that they could fit in a cats-eye and look like any other cats eye. People would have to reduce their speed.

Re:What a shame..

[mdwh2]

Who cares if unmoderated chat rooms get taken off line - it's hardly a loss of personal freedom - it's not a right, its a service that has been provided free of charge by a profit making company.

I don't care if someone providing a chatroom decides to take it down - of course I don't have a right to that. But the government banning all private unmoderated chats is something I would care about, and would be a loss of my freedom.

If you can tear yourself away from the internet, Why don't you enjoy your freedom to go down the pub tonight and have some unmoderated chat with a real person.

Would you mind if your local pub was shut down for fear that an underage person might visit there? Would you keep quiet when others were suggesting that all pubs should be shut down because of this?

Re:What a shame..

[steve.m]

Pubs usually get shutdown *after* illegal activities have been taking place on the premises (drug dealing, late drinking, serving minors, etc.)

The MSN chatrooms are being taken offline for similar reasons...

Re:What a shame..

[Ckwop]

I didn't say it's a shame that MSN got pulled.. i'm saying it could be the first step towards a march to *banning* unmoderated chat. That is a disaster :P

Re:What a shame..

[mpe]

Interesting that you think that a problem. I'd think that having drivers slow down because they see that the road is monitored would be a positive thing.

If the result is that they jam on the brakes as soon as they see a camera then accelerate once they have passed one the result is probably more dangerous than if they were just speeding.

Re:What a shame..

[TimB]

It's not a van, you numpty... it's a Range Rover. And it's a necessity. Otherwise the kids would run the risk of getting some exercise on their way home.

Re:What a shame..

[mdwh2]

Pubs usually get shutdown *after* illegal activities have been taking place on the premises (drug dealing, late drinking, serving minors, etc.) The MSN chatrooms are being taken offline for similar reasons...

But do all pubs owned by the same person or company get shut down? I thought it was just that specific pub? Not to mention that few people suggest shutting down all pubs everywhere.

Re:What a shame..

[TomV]

But do all pubs owned by the same person or company get shut down?

Nearly. It's not a question of who *owns* the pub, but of who's *responsible* for it. And the licensee would certainly lose his/her license and be prohibited from operating a drinking establishment, for a while at least.

Re:What a shame..

[turgid]

If the result is that they jam on the brakes as soon as they see a camera then accelerate once they have passed one the result is probably more dangerous than if they were just speeding.

Yes. You should see the way some people abuse the variable speed limit on the M25.

Why not

[hallie_ball]

I haven't used it, will not use it.

They should shut it down, more bandwith on Internet.

KIddies, you must use IRC, with a 1200 baud modem you can chat over the world.

Hail to Microsoft

It's also interesting to note

[evil_one]

that only MSN customers can use the chat service now. This is the reason that the countries that they keep a chat service in are countries that they have MSN in. (As an ISP)
Now they know the names & credit card #'s of all the players in the chat rooms. (They actually say this in the article.) Apparently they will still have 'unmonitored' rooms, but I'd bet money that they still track specific usage.

Re:It's also interesting to note

[TehHustler]

I think the feeling is that if something WAS to happen that was in any day dodgy or criminal, MSN are able to help the cops by giving out the account details, whereas with unmonitored public access rooms, they can't really find out who is who.

Re:It's also interesting to note

[JoeCommodore]

I read that news too and my spidy senses went off. I am thinking the reason for the credit card requirement is for other deeper reasons:

1. A person's identity can be attached to a EULA to make it more enforceable.
2. Makes the mark^h^h^h^h er.. person a "customer" and therefore makes microsoft immune from such anti-spam laws or other regulations involving spyware and remote updating.
3. Of course the obvouls of selling a non-free services as a requirement of accessing a "free one" (I can't remember my consumer ed. class from high school, I'm sure there is an illegal term for this...)

We still have IRC... Shutting down is useless.

[sabri]

For some reason, this seems world news. I don't agree. MSN chat has always been a GUI for IRC and IRC is not dead. At least, not yet. Undernet, Efnet, IRCnet, DALnet and a lot of smaller networks still exist and will do so for a long time.

If lusers are smart enough to browse, they are likely to be smart enough to surf to the mIRC website and download mIRC. Connect to your favorite network and the Chat Goes On!. However, MS has a point. (never thought I'd ever say that). IRC and chatting in general has become more and more dangerous for our children. Pedophiles know exactly how to present themselves to innocent children and it is partly the responsability of their parents to educate them. Partly, because in my opinion the ISP's could be more response on abuse complaints and so can law enforcement agencies.

In The Netherlands, a pedophile was captured by a tv-journalist on national TV while he tried to force a young boy to come to his house and do "some things". The pedophile works on a school. The school did not fire him, and the court gave him 240 hours of force community-work as a punishment. Unacceptable.

In these ages of continious improvement in communication possibilities, the judicial system (yes, for once that includes ISP's) should be aware of their important tasks in order to protect our children from pedophiles. Shutting down chat-rooms will simply not help as there are numerous of other possibilities to contact youn children.

Re:We still have IRC... Shutting down is useless.

[grahamm]

I agree. It is rather like shutting down all pubs because criminals meet in pubs to plan their crimes and sell stolen goods and drugs in them.

Re:We still have IRC... Shutting down is useless.

[mo^]

You will find that it is well within police powers (in the UK at any rate) to close down pubs or clubs that they believe are used for drug dealing or prostitution, even if not condoned by the landlord. [at least the police can make recommendations to the local licensing authority] It is also quite common for a publican to take the initiative and close themselves before the authorities do.

This then makes criminals use their own homes or business establishments to do business in. This i guess is the equivalent of forming your own chat room on an IRC server. In fact i do know of people who have produced their own chat networks contactable via standard IRC clients purely so they can discuss "growing" issues.

I for one know if my pub was being used to peddle hard drugs, I would close it down rather thaan face the responsibility for any deaths caused by the activityon my premises. and a pulican in the UK IS responsioble for such

Hmmm... maybe...

[jantheman]

..they want the bandwidth that had for this?

Money

[BenjyD]

"In the United States, Canada and Japan, Microsoft will introduce an unsupervised chat service solely for subscribers,"

"Users in the affected regions will still be able to chat online but must do so through Microsoft Messenger,"

Of course it's about protecting children. Honest. The British press I've seen is latching onto the protecting the children angle to the exclusion of everything else. Bring back Chris Morris.

Excuse me...

[Thomas Miconi]

Am I the only one here to think that maybe they're actually doing this for the very reasons they quote - i.e. they're scared to death at the idea of being associated with all these net-paedophiles stuff ?

Clueless journalists are just as dangerous for MS as they are for others (note: I'm talking from the UK, homeland of such some monuments of fair, objective et reliable reporting as The Sun). They've seen those stories about paedophiles "hunting" over the internet, and they know how 'sensitive' the public is about anything related to paedophilia (Britain is also the place were angry mobs assaulted a doctor's house because they confused the word 'Paediatrician' with 'Paedophile').

This may be a much more compelling reason than locking out a few thousands 3rd party clients.

Thomas Miconi-

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed - and as this isn't even related to the MSN Messenger software it has nothing to do with locking out 3rd party clients at all.

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Am I the only one here to think that maybe they're actually doing this for the very reasons they quote - i.e. they're scared to death at the idea of being associated with all these net-paedophiles stuff ?

Yes.

Re:Excuse me...

[gad_zuki!]

> i.e. they're scared to death at the idea of being associated with all these net-paedophiles stuff ?

Well, more accurately the lawsuits and constant warrants for information everytime someone says ASL in a chatroom. Knowing MS, it probably isn't profitable, will never be, thus drop it.

Re:Excuse me...

[ideatrack]

I think I've had to read enough stories in the news recently about teenage girls being raped by people they've met on the Internet to want something changed. There isn't a way of making the Internet as open as we would like it without making it easily abusable. It's a sad fact about human nature. Sure there's a good reason for MS to do this, as it promotes their IM, which opens up further scope for abuse. But when there is a problem with no easily definable answer, sometimes a kneejerk reaction is needed to show what the solution should be. If one person is saved by this, then surely it's a good thing?

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Teenage girls have been raped for centuries. It doesn't suddenly become worse because they meet their rapist over the Internet. The real focus here is on pre-teens -- remember that pedophilia is sexual attraction to pre-pubescents.

Or to put it another way, if there's grass on the field, go ahead and play :-)

Re:Excuse me...

[malf-uk]

Naturally it seems the tabloids see this as a "good thing".

However, according to the newsletter (http://www.wtps.co.uk/) that I receive daily it seems at least one newspaper (the non-tabloid Daily Telegraph) doesn't, saying

"the ban effectively penalises legitimate chatroom hobbyists while failing to tackle the root of the problem.
Chatrooms are no more culpable for paedophilia than "the telephone system, the Royal Mail, the Church of England, the Boy Scouts, the Girl Guides, the Youth Hostels Association, the Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme, all schools, the NHS, the railway network, the seaside holiday... indeed, any institution that allows adults contact with children,"

"It is plain bonkers".

Re:Excuse me...

[Oddly_Drac]

"I think I've had to read enough stories in the news recently about teenage girls being raped by people they've met on the Internet to want something changed."

Stop putting 'internet chat rapes' into Google and the problem goes away.

Seriously, a lot of this is bluster because of the relatively simplistic way the whole thing is presented by media and interest groups. 'peadophiles' are the social terrorists for a time when people are trying to shift that uncomfortable problem of telling their kids about 'jiggy' and the relative dangers _of talking to strangers_.

In terms of the last couple of cases of 'chatroom' abuse, all parties have been consenting. In fact the most recent has been a case of a couple of youngsters running away with each other.

The peadophile argument is Godwinesque to the extreme because you can't argue against these things rationally when people start emoting about it. 'Think of the children' is usually trumpeted by people who're on extremely shaky ground.

"If one person is saved by this, then surely it's a good thing?"

Going to extremes to save a single person is never good, especially if you unknowingly place more in danger.

This isn't altruism, this is about cutting a lossmaker. Where chatrooms are controlled, moderated and *logged*, you have some fairly specific information to find people with...driving the whole thing underground doesn't cure the problem, it just makes it harder to control. The vast majority won't give up because a chatroom isn't there, they'll just find someplace else. MS' thing is about dodging possible liability.

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

i was going to believe this until the belgian representative kept plugging messenger in the interview. he must have accidentally mentioned it 5 times.

Re:Excuse me...

[/.Rooster]

Oh Hardly... I submitted this story earlier and my first take on it was MS has not suddenly developed a moral conscience, but rather they realise how much money and effort it was to keep the who shabang going. What do they care now anyways now that the previous users have signed up for MSN service with all their goodie goodie marketing profile info.

Call me a cynic but it is not like MS went into this IM stuff without a plan to handle this sort of stuff, what they did not count on was the added bad karma they generate will come back to haunt them in Hotmail spam and IM chatrooms. You wait for them to bring out new moderated chat rooms which are subscription only and trumpet that as the way forward for IM style services.

I'd love ot be proved wrong but just like other double standards MS loves employing it a wonder they don't yank chat access for their world market instead. Anyone else care to specualte on why that is?

Snuff said.

Re:Excuse me...

[TiggsPanther]

Ah yes. The wonders of the "Paulsgrove Estate" incidents.

And it's reactions like that that make people too scared to ever offer help to a kid, on the worry that anyone watching yould think you're up to no good.

Re:Excuse me...

[cut and paste]

I agree but found the "illiterate mob" episode extraordinary for another reason: and that was, let alone misunderstanding the word, these people thought a 'paedophile' would advertise his services on a brass plaque by the front door, in the yellow pages, etc, etc.! Maybe they spotted his framed diploma in 'Paediatrics' ... bet that *really* riled 'em. You couldn't make it up! (TM) (Richard Littlejohn, The Sun)

Re:Excuse me...

[TomV]

This seems right on the money. That would be the money that Moft will lose from ad views, the money that will flow to other chatroom providers from AOL outwards. Or the money that they might have lost if they'd ever been tarred with the brush marked "microsoft, the child-raper's best-kept secret".

At the moment in the UK at least, there seems to be a growing line from the press that 'the internet' is primarily an evil tool used by very evil people to do very evil things and that 'it must be brought under control'.

So there are several very good reasons why Moft might do this, including:

• to avoid perceived guilt-by-association amongst the paediatrician-haters,
• to, perhaps somewhere down the line, avoid liability as an 'accessory' to some deeply revolting crimes, particularly with David (Knee)jerk Blunkett runnig the home office to the Sun's latest whims,
• to make it easier for the people managing the MSN service to sleep at night given the undeniable fact that a vanishingly small fraction of their unmonitored users are the sort of people who, as a card-carrying woolly liberal, I could merrily see burned at the stake on live TV.

The big Risk that's been pointed out, OTOH, is that a lot of kids who see that they're about to be cut off from their online friends, may use the last two weeks of the service for a flurry of real-name, phone-number and snail-mail exchanging, exposing them to more danger than was ever posed previously by the service.

I was, frankly, revolted by the post by 'Frank Kalf, Holland' on the BBC talking point discussion, where he said Best move ever, that will get the kids off their Windows addiction, and make them familiar with other operating systems like OS/2 , Linux and BEOS which operate ICQ . Jesus wept, Frank, whatever your views on the relative merits of various OS platforms, get a sense of proportion, please.

TomV

Re:Excuse me...

[TomV]

Stop putting 'internet chat rapes' into Google and the problem goes away.

Not in the UK, my friend. Here it would be more a case of 'stop reading newspapers, do not watch television, do not listen to radio and avoid having watercooler conversations with colleagues'.

Rightly or wrongly, at present in this country this is seen as a huge and pressing issue, or at least as an issue which is pretty much guaranteed to support newsmedia sales and probably a nice cheap votewinner for demagogues into the bargain.

This is, certainly, simplistic, but it's also real.

tomV

Re:Excuse me...

[ozbon]

The same point has been raised by one of the sites I regularly read, d4d, saying some more about MSNs policy etc.. They're reckoning according to some stories that 20% of the people using MSN are spammers, and "a smaller number" are paedophiles.

Re:Excuse me...

[MadAhab]

true enough and well said. of course, the press is still sheepish and herdlike enough not to ask what ulterior motives microsoft might have, which is the real problem. journalists seem to be extremely gullible when it comes to technical issues. and i'd add one other possible motive... once they've declared themselves "pervert free", it's an advertising angle against other chat. it won't be true, of course, and all a real pervert has to do is find the kids through message boards first... but once again, most won't think beyond the tip of their nose and won't get this until too late.

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not according to the law- if she's 17 and 364/365, she'll illegal.

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop putting 'internet chat rapes' into Google and the problem goes away.

Just like Windows XP becomes completely secure when you unsubscribe from Bugtraq.

Re:Excuse me...

[dup_account]

Gee, the people in he UK sure do seem to be obsessed with pedophiles and adults have sex with children.... hmmm...

I always like to remember that the news has become a source of entertainment... So they run the stories that people want to see.

Re:Excuse me...

[rifter]

Teenage girls have been raped for centuries. It doesn't suddenly become worse because they meet their rapist over the Internet. The real focus here is on pre-teens -- remember that pedophilia is sexual attraction to pre-pubescents.

Or to put it another way, if there's grass on the field, go ahead and play :-)

Interestingly enough, I recently saw the 1969 Dragnet movie on AMC. The featured criminal was a photographer who picked up models and then tied them up, took pictures of them, raped them, and killed them. One of the more interesting aspects of this tale (which was, as all Dragnet tales were, a dramatization of s true story) was the fact the killer used pen pal letters and personal ads to attract victims.

People have been using remote means to meet mates for millenia. As for the teenage girls thing, well, you have to understand that the currently accepted ages of consent are very recent as are the idea of consent itself. Remotely arranged marriages involving very young girls have been the rule of the day in many societies.

Of course that all clouds the issue. The fact is that even in societies/situations where marriage was consensual for both parties, it has been a common practice to get to know people remotely in order to ultimately form these unions, and it has been the case that evildoers have taken undue advatage of the situation. The internet is just a new and faster way to do it, and actually is much safer than letters in that you can do a lot more checking with the internet. For instance, you can get streaming video of a person, which makes it less likely they are sending fake pictures. You can check their statements to see if they are lying. You can check people's criminal record. All of this is possible through the internet and less so using older means

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, one of my first thoughts upon seeing said Paediatrician was "boy would I like to molest her ;)

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

" Am I the only one here to think that maybe they're actually doing this for the very reasons they quote - i.e. they're scared to death at the idea of being associated with all these net-paedophiles stuff ?"

Chances are MS makes money from pedophiles who buy computers/Windows.
Why isnt MS deathly afraid of that?
Orwill the next big PR push from them be to claim WinXP is not used by child molestors, but Linux is a free haven for them?

Re:Excuse me...

[Anonymous Coward]

"So there are several very good reasons why Moft might do this, including:

* to avoid perceived guilt-by-association amongst the paediatrician-haters,
* to, perhaps somewhere down the line, avoid liability as an 'accessory' to some deeply revolting crimes, particularly with David (Knee)jerk Blunkett runnig the home office to the Sun's latest whims,
* to make it easier for the people managing the MSN service to sleep at night given the undeniable fact that a vanishingly small fraction of their unmonitored users are the sort of people who, as a card-carrying woolly liberal, I could merrily see burned at the stake on live TV."

But MS still sells software to people who, it turns out, are child molesters. Also hardware makers sell stuff to these same people. Shouldnt the stupid Brits be trying to ban all software hardware and even cars (child molestors use cars as well).

Interview on BBC TV news

[PinglePongle]

The European head of MSN was on the news this morning; she was singing the praises of messenger, including the highly dubious claim that "MSN Messenger is safe, because you know who you are talking to, unlike a chatroom where you can just bump into anyone". Huh ? You know who you're talking to on Messenger ? All you know is some hotmail account name; there's absolutely no guarantee that "bobby13" is indeed a 13 year old and not some drooling psychopath.

I guess AOL is happy though.

Oooh... contraversial!

[Anonymous Coward]

Quite right. Children need to be let loose more often - otherwise they end up voting Conservative.

... so don't use MSN then

[Stween]

The chat services probably had a bigger spam problem than Hotmail does. What with that and various dodgy news that surfaces all too often about Internet paedophelia, I'm not surprised that this didn't happen earlier.

As for Messenger, Gaim is updating to the newer MSN protocol (version 9?), and nobody is really sure how Microsoft will be going about blocking third party clients.

If they're really just blocking old protocols (which is what some of the messages MSN Messenger sends out suggest), up-to-date third party clients might do just fine.

Yeah, great...

[The Tyro]

So it can go back to the old-school days of EFNET?

D00000D! Wassssup!! :-P~

RU single???

B0st0n R0X0r5!!

ROFLLMAOPIMP!

Ah well. I was planning on moving to DALNET anyway...

Re:Yeah, great...

[SimuAndy]

So it can go back to the old-school days of EFNET?

You young whippersnapper. :)

TELL JENN AT PSUVM1 HI THERE SWEETIE

Good ol' .bitnet relay.

long live iChat

[selderrr]

although it is using AOL or .Mac (both proprietary) it has 2 advantages :

- Not bound to MS, who has a history if being big brother and control freak
- kids can use the iSight, which works flawlessly and assures the person on the other line is indeed a kid and not an imposter.

All that aside, I think this whole pedophile paranoia will one day grow a more mature and intelligent way of educating your kids. I have 2 toddlers myself, and get scared by the though that one day they will ride their bicycle from school to home alone. Does that mean I'll install a camera or GPS tracking in their forehead ? Offcourse not. Most parents agree with the fact that kids need to learn that the world can be a dangerous place, that strangers can be freaks, etc etc, but that all in all, it's a nice world, and we should be happy to live in it. The same holds for web communities. They have their inherent dangers, but all in all it's a nice world.

Just watch for the freaks and don't do anything head-over-heels.

The Worlds gone mad

[Cookeisparanoid]

It seems these days people are afraid of everything, and Microsoft have used that fear to seems like they are doing us a favour by taking away a service!

Being promoted slightly differently in Australia

[Nocterro]

Here it has been promoted as being due to problems controlling peadophillia, with a few recent incidents referred to. I hadn't realised it was global until I read it here.

Chatrooms are quite sinister

[Zog The Undeniable]

I once went to the Sugababes' website (don't ask why) and the chatroom - clearly aimed at their pre-pubescent fanbase - appeared to be full of pervs trying to pick up kids - or kids pretending to be pervs trying to pick up kids, I'm not sure which. More dangerous than pr*n sites - pr*n sites may corrupt your kids, but they don't lure them into secret meetings or ask for photos.

I do use one IRC channel, but it's a special one on QuakeNet for a few mates who used to play Quake 2 together - never any trouble in there.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[pubjames]

I once went to the Sugababes' website (don't ask why)

Why?

I am strongly against actions such as banning technologies like Chat because the could be used by paedophiles. I also believe that in reality paedophiles are extremely rare. However, in the case of public chat groups like the one you mention, I do think that there is a moral obligation on behalf of the service provider to monitor it.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[hanssprudel]

peared to be full of pervs trying to pick up kids - or kids pretending to be pervs trying to pick up kids

Or maybe journalists acting like pervs who want to pick up kids to get an "exclusive", or LEOs acting as kids looking to be picked up by pervs, or just baiters looking to out pervs by publishing chat transcripts.

I have always had the feeling that if there really is a population of pervs out there who believe their are many kids who want to be "groomed" it is because their are so many LEOs and journalists and baiters out there acting like it.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[Zog The Undeniable]

I liked the music! However, the only feature on the site (at the time - haven't been back) was a very sophisticated chatroom where you could wander round the "Sugababes' house" and have conversations in different rooms. When the first messages on the screen were "Wanna smoke a bowl?" and "I'm looking to meet a nice young girl" I got the feeling it wasn't being used by the intended audience.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[DoorFrame]

How could any service provider actually monitor EVERY anonymous chat room? It's not possible.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[pubjames]

How could any service provider actually monitor EVERY anonymous chat room? It's not possible.

By service provider I am referring to whoever is responsible for the Sugababes web site.

Re:Chatrooms are quite sinister

[blair1q]

You would think that law enforcement would LOVE chatrooms, since they're logged and traceable, and the cops can bait the scum without having to dress up.

This is dangerous....

[pirhana]

Shutting down services is not the answer for abuse of the system by some bad elements. The dangerous aspect of this is that, So called "abuses" of chat is applicable to irc and many other applications as well. There is also abuse of the systems in these applications too. So they could use the same argument to shut down any of these . On the contray if somebody is genuinely interested in stoping the abuse , they should look for serious level of parental level cotroll. Because perception of "morality" widely varies and whats acceptable to one person may not be acceptable to others.

Good News

[lateralus]

Let Jabber step up and recieve its rightfull place.

Compelling reasons ...

[cj_goth]

> Am I the only one here to think that maybe they're actually doing this for the very reasons they quote

No, not at all. Here are some of the reasons Microsoft gives in the article (thru Geoff Sutton, European GM of Microsoft MSN):

""This is a decision based upon consumer experiences, child protection and OUR STRATEGIC INVESTMENT TO BUILD UP MSN MESSENGER"

"The straightforward truth of the matter is FREE unmoderated chat isn't safe"

Emphasis is mine in both quotes. But there you have it, even within the Microspeak they are admitting that its really profit/market-share driven.

That second quote looks very like their "free, open-source software isn't safe" marketing, doesn't it?

Re:Compelling reasons ...

[TiggsPanther]

At least one thing you have to acknowledge. They're admitting that part of the decision is business-oriented.

At least, for once, they're being open about it.

Re:Compelling reasons ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Emphasis is mine in both quotes. But there you have it, even within the Microspeak they are admitting that its really profit/market-share driven.

Thank you Captain Obvious. Any business worth it's salt makes decisions that are

1. profit/market-share driven
2. due to result of legal action

A business that makes decisions based on any other criteria will not be in business very long.

Re:Compelling reasons ...

[Carrot007]

> That second quote looks very like their "free, open-source software isn't safe" marketing, doesn't it?

Not really it looks more like the free = we don't make money of it argument. ie They've got bored of it and don't see how to make money off of it and no longer need it as a promotional tool so are abandoning it, they do this a lot of times.

You however are seeming a little paranoid today. Relax, chill and worry less.

Blame it on the wierdos.

[Agent R]

Well, it looks like the problem with security is becoming out of hand here. Me thinks it is way too many pedophiles who brazenly abuse the system is what caused MS to cut it off.

Just as well.. maybe we'll have a few less trojaned machines out there.

Precedent

[zelurxunil]

Im using an iMac, and apples iChat program. It is only a matter of time before AOL will lock out these types of clients. Its obviously their choice to make, and my choice to disagree with. I will not download the AOL client for AIM for mac os X, because I do not want any AOL software on my computer. Personally I think open source developers should create an instant messenging protocol of their own, I would be glad to help.

Re:Precedent

[Angostura]

Umm no. Apple and AOL entered into a formal agreement to let iChat become an official AOL client. You have AOL's blessing to use iChat.

Doesn't that make you feel good?

Re:Precedent

[aderuwe]

One word... Jabber.

Re:Precedent

[Tar-Palantir]

AOL won't lock out iChat, because it is not an unauthorized third-party client. Apple has a deal with AOL, which presumably involves large sums of money. iChat, thankfully, ain't goin nowhere.

Fear of new technologies

[pubjames]

This is nothing new. New technologies always inspire fear. When doing some research once I read an article in a magazine from around 1890 talking about how young ladies should not be allowed to use the telephone for more than a few minutes at a time due to fear that they weren't mentally strong enough to cope with the sensation of talking to a disembodied voice for very long.

In my lifetime I seen fear of video cassette recorders (remember how "video nasties" were going to corrupt a whole generation of children?) and similar fear of video games, and now all this stuff related to the internet.

The really stupid thing about all this from my point of view is how the press in the UK has caused the general public to believe that paedophilia (that is, adults that find pre-pubescent children sexually attractive) is common, when in reality it is very rare and probably no more so today than it was fifty or 100 years ago. This has caused, for instance, parents to be afraid to let their children go out to play outside. This is a real shame.

Re:Fear of new technologies

[Hognoxious]

In my lifetime I seen fear of video cassette recorders (remember how "video nasties" were going to corrupt a whole generation of children?) and similar fear of video games, and now all this stuff related to the internet.

Thou art but a youngester, knowest thou naught?
Verily, William Caxton was a right rogue, with his printynge-presse, a worke from ye verey hande of 7atan to spread vyle and seditious corruption against ye Church, ye Kinge and all moralitie.

Re:Fear of new technologies

[minus9]

Maybe now parents will encourage their children to play outside away from the dangers of the evil, deviant Internt.

Re:Fear of new technologies

[Anonymous Coward]

The really stupid thing about all this from my point of view is how the press in the UK has caused the general public to believe that paedophilia (that is, adults that find pre-pubescent children sexually attractive) is common, when in reality it is very rare and probably no more so today than it was fifty or 100 years ago. This has caused, for instance, parents to be afraid to let their children go out to play outside. This is a real shame.

It has also seriously warped people's view of what is sexually normal. Back when paedophilia was an unknown country, there was no such thing to interfer with people's perceptions of age & sexuality. In one Star Trek TOS episode, Kirk & a 12y old girl are attracted to each other, Kirk even jokingly says "I don't date younger women" - and this was in the 60s when they wouldn't even let them write in the vice captain as being female. Even television and books from as recently as the 1980s & early 90s contain interaction between adults & children, & children & males which would be considered unacceptable in today's paedo-feared environment.

It is a fact that adult males find teenage girls attractive... psychological studies have shown that males find girls to be in their peak of physical attractiveness from ages 14 to 24. It is more normal for males to find younger girls attractive than to find women in their 30s attractive. What is abnormal is a paedophile's focus on pre-pubescent children, which should not be confused with attraction towards pubescent 'children' - today's concept of 'children' in itself being a seriously warped one. A normal adult will only be able to find a pre-pubescent child attractive to a relatively limited degree, which is a bit different than the absolute-absense of attractiveness which society pretends is the norm.

We shouldn't have this environment where merely being alone in the same backyard as a 10y old girl is considered suspicious. I'm not able to show my cousins any affection, I'm too scared too, why should I not be able to show I care? Fathers where I live are afraid to hug their children in the streets. Fathers get yelled at for turning up at the swimming pool to pick up their children. And I can't choose the career I wanted for no other reason than a part of it involves working with children, and as a male I can not do that.
This hysteria is doing alot to hurt children, and is probably doing nothing to protect them.
Most sexual abuse of children is comitted by hetrosexuals... think about that.

Re:Fear of new technologies

[pubjames]

I have just spotted my comment above posted on the BBC web site "Have your say: MSN Chat closure - your views" attributed to a Mark Bowen from Wales. Mark - if you are reading this - you could have at least corrected my typos before posting it on the BBC site!

Re:Fear of new technologies

[plugger]

Nah, young ladies should not be allowed to use the telephone for more than a few minutes because otherwise they stay on the thing for bloody ages.

(Actually, I probably spend more time than my wife on the phone, but let's not spoil a good stereotype).

Is it just me ??

[AftanGustur]

If MS continue the service they undoubtedly will get flack for helping aid Paedophiles.

What I find totally scandaluse about the "to protect the children" claim. is that nobody seems to want to know what new features are in the new service, and how Microsoft plans to use them to protect the children in ways that can not be done today..

To me it just sounds like marketing blah blah to cover up the real Classical MS motive "To crush the competition" ..

Re:Is it just me ??

[Anonymous Coward]

NEWS FLASH - GM has a mandatory recall on all two door cars since peadophiles are known to use them for child abductions. You have to turn your car in and have back doors welded on! GM didn't want to be corporately responsible for child abductions. A back door installation will cost just $5,000. In other news GM shares jumped $5 dollars after the announcement they are peadophile free. Insert vomit here ----->

Microsoft Blocks access to the Internet

[acegik]

Lets hope this wont be the next title on slashdot. After all the internet is hosting Pedo sites and illegal music and movies, to protect us they should block or at least filter out sites that might offend us - NOT

Let's sum up the obvious then...

[madmarcel]

I know this is going to be modded 'redundant', but what the heck...let's sum this up:

* Obviously Microsoft is not the only chat-room 'provider' in the world. Plenty of alternatives. Some of those alternatives are potentially less safe than whatever Microsoft provides.
Most people will simply migrate to another form of chat-rooms. This will have no impact WHATSOVER on people trading porn and doing who knows what else in chatrooms.

* Microsoft is going to provide 'subscription' based chat-rooms. Some monitored(?), some unsupervised? Either way, more control and money for Micro$oft. (And probably proprietary lock-in - or an attempt at that ;)

* A subscription based chat-room means you need a credit-card to be able to use it. Who would be stupid enough to pay for something that you can get for free? It also means -> 'goodbye anonymous internet/chat-room user' -> 'hello Mr <insert name>, please pay here'. Also fits in well with the .NET eh..thingy strategy. (Preparing customers for a future where you have to pay for things that are free at the moment using some sort of subscription model)

* A chat-room where people are registered (using their credit-card) is nice, and implies more responsible people, and possibly guarantees accountability and who knows what else, but (IMHO) the whole point and appeal of a chat-room was the anonymous access!

* The media is focusing (almost exclusively) on the 'safer for our kids' angle...yeah right.
The articles I've read seem to imply that Microsoft is the ONLY chat-room provider and that this is 'a great step forward'. Right. Whatever.

I don't use IRC by the way. I can think of many better ways to waste my time.

Re:Let's sum up the obvious then...

[Anonymous Coward]

I was also hacked off with the Microsoft is the ONLY chat-room provider cr@p! It's like Microsoft invented IRC. What next ? Microsoft invented Instant messaging ? How easy is it to find people of a certain age-group of a particular gender on MS Instant messenger that want to chat ?
Ban MSN messenger next I say!

Re:Let's sum up the obvious then...

[hetairoi]

Who would be stupid enough to pay for something that you can get for free?

concerned parents who don't want to prevent their kids from talking to their friends, but want to be reasonably sure they aren't talking to 40-year old men trying to lure them lure them away? There are plenty of non-technical people out there who are willing to pay for things like this.

the whole point and appeal of a chat-room was the anonymous access!

not for everyone. I don't think most kids under 16 are worried about being anonymous, they just want to talk about the latest B. Spears album.

Of course, this isn't going to solve the problem, and the fear-mongering being used by the media is rediculous, but I don't really see this as a problem as long as there are alternatives. Informed parents can feel better about allowing kids to chat online and I'd bet we'll soon see software that blocks online chat software for just those parents.

I do wonder if this monitoring will open M$ up to lawsuits if some kid runs off with a person they met in a moderated chat room though.

About the lock-out

[MrHanky]

From /usr/share/doc/gaim/changelog.Debian.gz:

gaim (1:0.68-1) unstable; urgency=low

* New upstream version. (closes: #209021)
- new event system and perl API
- ignores MSN's upgrade spam (new MSN plugin will be in 0.69)

Seems like users of free software are going to survive this time as well (if the new plugin works, that is). Now if only the Jabber servers can fix their transports as well.

Re:About the lock-out

[gl4ss]

Afaik msn chat!=the im service, that is, nobody uses the chat(ex-comic chat) anyways.

Re:About the lock-out

[MrHanky]

Afaik msn chat!=the im service, that is, nobody uses the chat(ex-comic chat) anyways.

Yes, I know that. But the article mentioned the IM service as well, so I thought it was appropriate to mention it. And also, Kopete, the KDE messenger, seems to already have support for the msnp9 protocol (I'm using it at the moment, and I'm not getting any upgrade spam from MS).

"Think of the Children(r)" argument

[SgtChaireBourne]

This is a decision based upon consumer experiences, child protection and our strategic investment to build up MSN Messenger.[my emphasis]

Hmm. Interesting that MS has lost enough credibility in the mainstream that they can't use the "improves security" || "good for what ails ya" argument any more.

This would be a good opportunity to turn people on to cross-platform IM clients like GAIM. I doubt anyone in the tech communities is naive enough to take the children argument as more than a red herring to keep IM from joinging the OS/Broswer/Mediaformat/Office format anti-trust action. It does, however, provide a very good cover for pushing people into MS-Passport, despite its reputation, and for locking out non-Microsoft IM clients.

Alternately, this can be seen as just another product or service being dropped or postponed as the company sheds weight to try to stay afloat.

Lastly, regarding the link. This is being covered by everyone and his dog, even Reuters, so no need to plug poor sources..

Who uses MSN Messenger?

[Xipe66]

I don't know a _single_ person who uses it. Most people I know disable it and the MS Passport first thing they do after a fresh install.

Is it only in Sweden (or only in my circle of aquaintances) that ICQ and Jabber reigns supreme?

Re:Who uses MSN Messenger?

[Anonymous Coward]

It may be only in Sweden, but not only in your circle of aquaintances - unless I happen to be part of it.

Nobody uses MSN Messenger. Everybody uses ICQ.

Re:Who uses MSN Messenger?

[BenjyD]

Damn Swedes, always right about everything. Almost everyone I know (UK) uses Messenger (and hotmail). It's preinstalled, "it's Microsoft, it must be good".

Re:Who uses MSN Messenger?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm also swedish, and everyone I know (that uses and IM at all) has ICQ.

It may be because they all started using it before MS even had a IM client though... I don't know.

Re:Who uses MSN Messenger?

[Anonymous Coward]

Almost all of Europe [except Sweden apparently] uses MSN. ICQ was somewhat popular a while ago, but that's gone now. AOL has never been popular here [and probably will never be as long as it has that name].

Re:Who uses MSN Messenger?

[BetterThanCaesar]

Naw, it's just that you don't have any non-geek friends. :-) (Okejda, jag kor ocksa ICQ.)

1984

[mm0mm]

Maybe this comment is off-topic at best.

I can't stop thinking that our society is becoming more and more like the world in this classic novel. Though types of crimes committed today have changed since when it was originally written, we are living in the society that is watched by those who are in power. One's identity is a personal property to be exploited by criminals and politicians. Look at how MS has been controlling consumers with propaganda and FUD and what RIAA is doing to people with little voice. The only difference between the novel and reality is that the one who's watching us is not the government, but corporate monopolies that exploits workers and abuses their advantageous positions for nothing but their own profit.

What is "freedom," anyway?

Storm in a Teacup

[turgid]

This is yet another storm in a teacup and media frenzy. It has come about due to the ignorance of the general public regarding the Internet. You must remember that "most people" have only had Internet access at home for less than a decade, and many less than two or three years. Many people are ignorant of technology in general, being unable or unwilling to program simple video recorders. To expect society to have developed a sphisticated and informed opinion of the Internet just now is expecting too much. It is still too soon. Give things another five years and even Joe Public will have a much more rational and balanced view of the Internet, what it can do, and what it's useful for.

What about getting rid of Internet Explorer?

[paulhar]

For example one of my girls typed in "Harry Potter" a while back and got a bunch of sex sites - surely if we have to vet/control what people do on the internet then we should get rid of "browsers". Then move onto e-mail to protect children as spam gets into their mail boxes. Then why not TCP/IP?

Why should chat rooms, forums, browsing, email etc be "owned" by pedos, perverts etc? Why can't our kids use these things without massive over-reaction?

What a sad world we live in.

Re:What about getting rid of Internet Explorer?

[tomstdenis]

"Harry Potter" in google gives me

http://www.harrypotter.com/

as the first link. In fact the entire first page is all fan/official site stuff. Where you got porno out of that I'll never know. Maybe you're kid searched for "Harry can fuck me hard all potter day?"

As for the "preventitive measures" what's wrong with just talking to your kids? When I was young my parents warned me about talking to strangers, taking paths alone [e.g. hidden from plain view from the street], etc....

It isn't upto corporations to raise the current generation of kids just like it wasn't upto television to raise the past five or so decades of kids.

Tom

Re:What about getting rid of Internet Explorer?

[Anonymous Coward]

"For example one of my girls typed in "Harry Potter" a while back and got a bunch of sex sites"

Euhm, how did she do that? Type 'Harry Potter' at any search-engine and the first 300+ sites are about the movies/books.
I don't know how you get to sex sites that quick...

Re:What about getting rid of Internet Explorer?

[Anonymous Coward]

Had your parents let television raise you like they should have, you'd have developed a healthy case of homophobia and wouldn't always be compelled to CAN THE MANHAM.

Re:What about getting rid of Internet Explorer?

[Anonymous Coward]

I, for one, welcome our new MANHAM CANNING overlord.

28 countries

[hey]

Article sez:

Microsoft Corp. announced Wednesday it would shut down its Internet chat rooms in 28 countries, saying the forums had become a haven for peddlers of junk e-mail and sex predators.

Er, what country is a chatroom in. They are in the Internet country.

won't work

[Anonymous Coward]

Around the world, teenagers who use the internet have installed MSN Messenger and use it to chat and network with their friends. Most people on their contact lists are from the chat rooms.
Take the chatrooms away, and they'll slowly migrate to another chatservice that does have chat rooms, like how they migrated to MSN Messenger in the first place away from ICQ & Yahoo etc.

I wish people would be less hysterical about the paedophile fear. The truth is that paedophilia is a fairly rare condition, and almost all sexual abuse of children is committed by people who do not have a paedophilic sexuality.

Besides, paedophiles are attracted to pre-puberlessents, and it is extremely rare for anyone under 13 to appear in the chat rooms. A paedophile would literally have to to sit at their computer non stop for years before they'd find anyone they'd even be able to begin to 'groom'.

Most paedophiles are attracted exclusively to male children, and it is rare for any male under 14 to use chat.

I think the truth about MSN chats is Microsoft is afraid of being sued, and is concerned about their image since almost all chat rooms are both teen-centric and extremely saucy. Yes, teenage chatters mostly talk about s*x.

What will happen is MSN teenage users will collectively go "omg" and slowly migrate to another service, probably AOL AIM.

An Issue.

[Matrix2110]

"3rd-party lockout indeed isn't so much about security as it is about marketshare" and the money lock-in issue.

For gods sake man, don't you read Slashdot?

102 posts and climbing the wall.

Here is where all of the underground chat goes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Invisible IRC is a totally anonymous and encrypted IRC service. You cannot see other peoples IP addresses. There are a lot of people on here, most of which you cannot see because they are private communities hidden in their own little chatrooms. Just run the invisible irc proxy service and tell your IRC client to connect to localhost port 6667 and you are off in your own private Idaho.

I think the tide turned this week

[holy zarquon's singi]

I my own personal media monitoring service I noticed in their weekly week day IT section (Next) (not to be confused with the weekend IT section which sucks big dogs balls), the number of Open Source Software rocks articles trippled with a corresponding decrease in "I would willingly perform any kind of legal or illegal sexual favours for either Bill or Steve kind of articles. And I watch these pages particularly closely, so it must be true.

Re:I think the tide turned this week

[Sevn]

Cool. I think. :) I was actually kinda kidding, but maybe I WAS onto something! YAY ME!

wtf ??

[dreamcatcher72]

"The straightforward truth of the matter is free unmoderated chat isn't safe," said Geoff Sutton, European general manager of Microsoft MSN. % the straightforward truth is that its the parents place to monitor their children .... just another briliant example scare tactics being used to put a damper on free speach.

Money, Money, Money, Must Be Funny ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft has not banned unmoderated chat rooms because it cares deeply about children being courted by paedophiles. Microsoft has banned unmoderated chat rooms because it is scared witless of being sued. It`s all about money and publicity.

Whatever happend to parental control

[Anonymous Coward]

What about parental responsibility? Do you allow you children to watch anything on TV when it can include extreme violence and things like that? Why is the Internet different?

I think that the solution would be to create monitored chatrooms that are safe for children and then LIMIT YOUR CHILDREN'S ACCESS to unmonitored ones.

You and only you are responsible for controlling your children's access to the Internet.

Re:Whatever happend to parental control

[TiggsPanther]

What about parental responsibility? Do you allow you children to watch anything on TV when it can include extreme violence and things like that? Why is the Internet different?

It isn't. The problem is that people do let their kids watch anything, and then bitch like craxy at the TV Execs when "Little Johnny" sees something that they (the parents, not the kids) don't like.

So what?

[NoSuchGuy]

Why should it matter to me?

I don't use chatrooms. (particularly NOT MSN and AOL)
I am not a pedophile!

So why should it matter to me?

Re:So what?

[Anonymous Coward]

you dont have to tell the rest of the world that it doesnt matter to you. what a useless comment and a waste of internet bandwidth, electricity, typing efforts, materials and components used for your computer, the food that you had today, etc.

Re:So what?

[NoSuchGuy]

And this from an Anonymous Coward :-)
Thanks

Cost cutting wrapped in a moral blanket

[DrXym]

A more pertinent question is why isn't MSN supervising it's channels? AOL does it, so why not them? If I were a parent I would take this as an implicit admission from MSN that kids are not safe using their service. I would see it as a recommendation to use another ISP that does try and provide a kid safe environment.

Secondly, if these sickos are infesting the boards as they claim, one might wonder why there aren't an equal number of policemen and admins there to catch them and protect the kids. I'm sure MSN is in the unique position that it can post warnings, censor & monitor conversations initiated from the chat room and provide all kinds of interesting account data and logging if need be. How is closing the service so that kids and paedos disperse over a dozen unmoderated and worldwide servers going to make the internet a safer place?

All in all, I think this talk of shutting the servers down is bunk. MSN could make their chatrooms safer but have chosen not to. This smacks more of knowing it will cost N million dollars to fix their service on the one hand and on the other to cut the service entirely, push people to their instant messaging and ban 3rd party chat clients all wrapped up in a moral blanket. After all, we all know these sickos are preying on MSN minors through their unauthorized Jabber clients right?

Re:Cost cutting wrapped in a moral blanket

[sql*kitten]

A more pertinent question is why isn't MSN supervising it's channels? AOL does it, so why not them? If I were a parent I would take this as an implicit admission from MSN that kids are not safe using their service. I would see it as a recommendation to use another ISP that does try and provide a kid safe environment.

Microsft is supervising the subscriber channels - but not the free channels. They are (or were) after all, free. Employing people to supervise channels costs money, and obviously cannot be done on channels that people aren't paying for. Paid subscribers are also traceable - if someone misbehaves, you've got their real name and address. They can't hide these from you if they paid by credit card.

MSN could make their chatrooms safer but have chosen not to.

Yes, and Slashbots could get all the facts before hysterical anti-MS ranting, but they don't, do they?

Re:Cost cutting wrapped in a moral blanket

[TiggsPanther]

Microsft is supervising the subscriber channels - but not the free channels. They are (or were) after all, free. Employing people to supervise channels costs money, and obviously cannot be done on channels that people aren't paying for. Paid subscribers are also traceable - if someone misbehaves, you've got their real name and address. They can't hide these from you if they paid by credit card.

Much as I'm usually anti-Microsoft, and much as I'm suspicious about the timing of all this, I have to admit that Microsoft are cuaght between a rock and a hard place here.

If they do nothing, they'll be accused of helping protect paedophiles. And as soon as something really bad goes down on one of their free chatrooms, someone will sure their ass.

But anything they can do is going to cost money, and the easiest way to keep tabs on a person's name and address is to have their CC details (or similar "official" billing details) on record.

And, unfortunately for MS, a lot of geeks, techies, /.ers, and even non-technical types are going to be suspiscious of any high-profile company making people pay to "increase safety".

Now that doesn't mean I support or agree with how they're handing the situation. But I do acknowledge that there is a chance that they honestly believe they're doing the right thing for the right reasons.

Tiggs

Re:Cost cutting wrapped in a moral blanket

[DrXym]

Employing people to supervise channels costs money, and obviously cannot be done on channels that people aren't paying for.

But they are paying for them with their presence. MSN sells advertising, the more people on their sites, the more advertising they can sell. Presumably MS only put the chat features there in the first place so push more visitors to their sites with value added content. Besides which, it needn't cost them much at all to monitor usage. AOL employs community volunteers to monitor their chat rooms for peanuts. MSN could do the same, but again have chosen not to.

Paid subscribers are also traceable - if someone misbehaves, you've got their real name and address. They can't hide these from you if they paid by credit card.

Unpaid visitors are traceable too. They can be required to register & periodically reconfirm using a non-free email address (or even via Microsoft's own passport system), they can be restricted to certain geographic zones (e.g. only US people only), they can be tracked with cookies, their IP addresses and conversations can be logged, they can be required to open ports via applets / controls that confound anyone hiding behind an anonymising service and so on.

To say that MSN was left with only one choice really is pretty lame. No, the whole thing was just a cost cutting exercise which they have chosen to justify with extremely dubious reasoning.

And ironically the net result of their 'moral' decision is that the paedos scatter to the four winds along with their victims. Where there was once a single, presumably cooperative ISP there are now dozens running all around the world in different jurisdictions. If I were a cop I would be cursing MSN right now for exponentially fucking things up for them to save a few bucks and then having the gall to claim it on moral grounds.

eSlashbots could get all the facts before hysterical anti-MS ranting, but they don't, do they?

Thanks I know my facts quite well. If you can't see through the statement for what it is (cynical costing cutting) I suggest you don't get a career in politics or management.

protecting children? yeah right

[Anonymous Coward]

they're protecting themselves from legal suits, and also dropping a service that uses alot of resources and doesn't gain much in return.

i`m glad they're doing it nonetheless, but it won't make a difference unless the bigger names like yahoo etc, you cannot stop chat sites unless you make them illegal, it isn't hard to code up a site then make sexchat.com.

Did anyone notice the date?

[TinheadNed]

They're closing their unmoderated chatrooms on the 14th of October, the day before they "upgrade" and kick off all the old clients. Is this a coincidence or what? I'm voting for "what".

This helps little regarding child abuse problems

[Marco Leal]

I think this is a typical "blowing smoke in your eyes" kind of situation. Child abusers aren't i most cases total strangers to the children. They aren't someone they just met on the street or in a chat room over the Internet. Most child abusers are intimate to the children they abuse: either a close family member or close friend of the family. Child abusers are, for the most part, people that are trusted by the parents. In some of the cases the parent *is* the abuser.

We should be teaching and educating our children as to "what" they should be aware of and not "who" . The "Don't talk to strangers!" slogan is just helping spread the paranoia. When the abuser is someone they know, strangers (be they psychologists, shool counselors, whatever...) are usually the only people they'll be able to talk to about it.

-- Marco.

fuddles cuts the unbillable chord?

[Anonymous Coward]

& why not? if they're just chatting away, with or without their clothes on, they're 'stealing' the softwar gangsters' 'poteNTshill' 'profits'.

coming soon to/already on, yOUR desktop/network?:

Due to excessive bad posting from this IP or Subnet, comment posting has temporarily (permanently, if we could figure out how to do it) been disabled. If it's you, consider this a chance to sit in the timeout corner. If it's someone else, this is a chance to hunt them down. If you think this is unfair, we don't care.

alert: you've been lax in yOUR payper liesense 'upgrades', you're out.

alert: there's a rumour that you've been badmouthing/lowrating the corepirate nazis, & the naykid furor of the felonious kingdumb, you're out.

alert: looks like yOUR kids have been listening to music again, you're out.

alert: although you appear to be browsing regularly, you've failed to make a purchase recently, you're out.

consider this a chance to stare at your monitor screen, & plan how you can become .compliant. if you think that you are already compliant, & it's somebody else, consider this a chance to rat them out, to gain re-admission to the onLIEn wwwhirled again, (c SourceForgerIE(tm) all rights reserved, you have none).

etc... lookout bullow. these foulcurrs haven't a clue yet, as to what J. Public can do, once he's peaced off. they live in a tiny wwworld, consisting of only their owned greed/fear based goals. they should get ready to see the light.

we're building a vessel that floats on almost any suBStance.

as to the newclear power/planet/population rescue initiative:

it's all free (as in survival), & available immediately to you/all of US.

as you can maybe already see, yOUR survival/success is not the least bit dependent on the gadgets/combinations of the greed/fear based corepirate nazis, & their phonIE ?pr? ?firm? buyassed /.puppets.

consult with/trust in yOUR creator. more breathing. vote with yOUR wallet (somtimes that means not buying anything, a notion previously unmentioned buy the greed/fear/war mongers). seek others of non-aggressive/positive behaviours/intentions. stop wasting anything/being frivolous. that's the spirit.

investigate the newclear power plan. J. Public et AL has yet to become involved in open/honest 'net communications/commerce in a meaningful way. that's mostly due to the MiSinformation suppLIEd buy phonIE ?pr? ?firm?/stock markup FraUD execrable, etc...

truth is, there's no better/more affordable/effective way that we know of, for J. to reach other J.'s &/or their respective markets.

the overbullowned greed/fear based phonIE marketeers are self eliminating by their owned greed/fear/ego based evile MiSintentions. they must deny the existence of the power that is dissolving their ability to continue their self-centered evile behaviours.

as the lights continue to come up, you'll see what we mean. meanwhile, there are plenty of challenges, not the least of which is the planet/population rescue (from the corepirate nazi/walking dead contingent) initiative.

EVERYTHING is going to change, despite the lameNT of the evile wons. you can bet your .asp on that. when the lights come up, there'll be no going back, & no where to hide.

we weren't planted here to facilitate/perpetuate the excesses of a handful of Godless felons. you already know that? yOUR ONLY purpose here is to help one another. any other pretense is totally false.

pay attention (to yOUR environment, for example). that's quite affordable, & leads to insights on preserving life as it should/could/will be again. everything's ALL about yOUR motives.

that old tune title (hope we don't get 'busted' for using it) "make the world go away", takes on new/varied meaning in these times.

the prevalent notion that 'everything will be taken care of' without yOUR knowledge/participation is insidiously misleadin

Time to move to Jabber

[oohp]

It's time to move to an open IM now that everybody is closing doors to 3rd party IM clients. Why are people using proprietary IM anyways?

Re:Time to move to Jabber

[jamshedji]

Simple. Because they're better :-)

Re:Time to move to Jabber

[oohp]

Would you care to elaborate on the subject? I just don't understand how a closed IM is better than an open IM which is also very close to becoming an open standard. Better in what way? Features nobody needs or uses? Voice chat support? Jabber will probably have that too. Jabber is also extendable. You can add features without changing the old protocol or breaking functionality. You just add stuff like you would on a Christmas tree.

I agree...

[Hogwash McFly]

What is needed here is an education programme to teach parents, not children, as to the dangers. Most parents are clueless about the Net as a whole.

What seems to be the trend is more and more parents are clueless about parenting as a whole. Time and time again I see articles in the paper that follow the same formula - child does something bad, parent blames everyone but themselves

The teachers aren't giving proper sex education so my 14 year old daughter got pregnant

On the subject of 12 year old school girls being sent home for wearing highly visible thongs to school - They're fed up of being treated like children (Well what the fuck are they then you fucking Ford Mondeo driving, Adidas wearing, Council estate dwelling scum?). They don't want VPLs

The broad, freely available radio, Internet and television media become babysitters while the parents sit on their fat backsides wtaching mind numbing reality TV. Then all of a sudden when something happens to their kids it's such a shock!

Anger not intended to taint the message of this post

(Unfinished sentence)

[Hogwash McFly]

Oh no! Now IRC will be suddenly full of immature people using some kind of weird form of English! Oh wait...

... I'm thinking of Slashdot

So if kids and sex is a big prob, what about cams?

[ahfoo]

When I first saw the blurb for this MS child protection blurb, I was also looking at ads from this year's Computex trade show.
The two side-by-side struck an interesting contrast. On the one hand we've got MS talking about how we can't trust kids to use text chatting because they're so obsessed with sex. On the other hand we've got dozens of consumer electronics firms partnering with MS to make this the year of the camera enabled wireless devices. So, what's the deal?
If kids can't be trusted not to use the keyboards for text based sex --I mean how hard up can you get-- how are wireless cameras going to be the runaway product this year?
There seems to be a real contradition between these two lines of thought. I suspect from my own memories of childhood that the answer is: yes kida are obsessed with sex and no, the camera enabled devices are not going to sell well.
Most older adults tend to be camera shy and while kids tend to love the idea of posing for the camera, there's the definite possibility they might like too much.

If you close down the unmonitered chatrooms...

[eclectro]

then the terrorists have won.

Oh wait....

Phony/Phoney

[Cybertect]

Quite right.

IIRC, Marshall McLuhan traced the origin of the word 'phony' to con artists running scams (like calling up and pretending they're someone you know for some nefarious purpose) over the newfangled telephone.

People have always found ways to abuse and been afraid of new technology.

It's what they are saying but....

[Chanc_Gorkon]

Maybe it isn't totally about the pedophila stuff. Maybe it's more about how INANE these chat rooms are. Have you ever been in one of these? Noone's talking....they are all whispering or sending pm's. IRC is the same way. Maybe on MSN chats it got to the point that noone wants to use it any more because of the SPAM and cruft that does fly. Yahoo chat rooms are even worse. You think you have seen stupid bots in IRC, try Yahoo chat rooms. ICK! Best chat room I was ever in was a local multiline MajorBBS chatroom.

The Children?

[fire-eyes]

Like George Carlin says:

"Everyone's always whining about 'what about the children?' and 'save the children' blah blah. Know what I say? FUCK the children. That's right, FUCK EM."

Or something along those lines.

Hit the nail on the fucking head

[Hogwash McFly]

Parents like to blame other people for not watching their children closely enough

That's the golden ticket. It's always the fault of other people - the teachers, the police, the social services, the Internet, the TV, the teen magazines, the child's friends, the advertisers, ad nauseum.

To parents - Wake up and take some fucking responsibility for your children

Re:Sigh.

[MeNeXT]

While I can generally agree with your statement, let me point out a few issues.

First: At no time have they said the they will ensure, regulate or be responsible for the service. They are just claiming that their subscribers are not the problem it's the others.

Second: If subscriptions = accountability then I would assume that this would apply to all subscription services. So limiting users to their products and services just proves the point that their intentions has nothing to do with responsibility but with greed. I am sure that Yahoo!, AOL and all other subscription services would also like to solve the same problem.

Third: This is coming out after weeks a bag media press.

I just have a hard time believing any PR. Remember they are there to put a positive spin on the issue. If your are expecting any PR rep to com out and just say "We wish to destroy our competition therefore we will no longer support standards." you will be waiting a very long time. There is no reason why this cannot be stopped with the cooperation of all the players. Has any attempt been made to coordinate the effort? All I see is AOL doing it's thing and MS trying to weasel into another area that they can dominate.

Just my 2 cents and all the MS lovers now will moderate this as flaimbait.

Rights?

[iii_rjm]

This is filed under my rights online? What 'rights' to I have to Micrsofts network?

Yeah, really smart, this one.

[Anonymous Coward]

This guy is a genius.

Shut down the operation to get a higher market share - that I didn't think of that first.

So much cluelessness

[Alioth]

At luchtime, I was listening to Jeremy Vine's programme on Radio 2. This programme covers many current events things, and indeed the main topic of conversation was this MSN decision.

It was astounding how incredibly clueless the top brass of childrens charities were. In fact, the word "incredibly" is simply inadequate to describe their cluelessness - "breathtakingly clueless" would probably be a better description. They were praising MSN, and saying how this helped solve so many problems, as if MSN removing their chat feature would suddenly mean there's no such thing as Internet chat any more. You don't even need to know how the Internet works to know only an idiot would think this. You now have pent-up massive demand for chat rooms with no where to go - so guess what, just as if there was massive demand for $RANDOM_GOOD in the bricks and mortar world, someone else will set up to fulfil this massive chunk of unfulfilled demand.

As it happens, you only need slightly more knowledge of the Internet than a concussed bee to know that alternatives _already_ exist, starting with the granddaddy of them all, IRC. The only reason MSN Chat had the popularity it did was that it's the path of least resistance - for IRC you have to download a client, but I assume for MSN Chat everything's just provided. This unfulfilled demand will start downloading IRC clients no doubt (probably mIRC, so those who host mIRC downloads are probably in for the MSN equivalent of a Slashdotting).

This is the reason why we shouldn't let these people have _any_ sort of power to legislate or make changes to the Internet - their understanding is so incredibly inadequate, they shouldn't even be allowed to run a high street store, let alone be involved in Internet legislation.

Re:So much cluelessness

[jasonhamilton]

Check my url. Right now there are over one million people on IRC. You can search through listings of over 600,000 chatrooms, and you don't have to download an IRC client to join them - just click on the name of a channel and a java chat brings you there. That totally blows away all the paid services. We have built it, and you are more than welcome to join the party. As for FREE chatrooms not being "safe" for kids... clearly, that is a ridiculous ploy that /.'ers can see right through. Free does not make something unsafe. IRC is self moderating. That means, the *parents* have the option to set up private chatrooms on IRC where THEY moderate their children's activities. Try doing that on MSN.

I agree SO much

[RmB303]

2 Years ago I bought a paper shop in the UK. Everyday, when I see the covers of the tabloids, I get more and more depressed about the state of the British press. ( possible excepting the Times and the Guardian. Or Private Eye ;-) )

Re:I agree SO much

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll concede Private Eye. However, in my opinion the Times is nothing but a big tabloid. The Guardian outside it's arts pages is opinion hawked as journalism a lot of the time.

The strongest papers journalistically are The Telegraph (outside the columnists - as big a bunch of extremist wingnuts as ever gathered at an AEI conference) and the FT Weekend.

The Economist is probably the best of the bunch - though it's pro-capitalist stance tends to make it rather emotionally attached to the US. The lack of bylines have in the past tamed the worst excesses - though these have started to affect parts of the magazine.

-- ac

Re:I agree SO much

[Handpaper]

August 2000 : Private Eye carries a cartoon of a man in doctor's whites being chased down the street by an angry mob, captioned "But I'm a paediatrician".
August 29 2000 this happens. I live 200 yards from this victim of rampant stupidity.

They brought this on themselves

[Rik Sweeney]

A few months ago, whenever I logged onto Hotmail there'd be adverts telling people to chat to strangers online. The person who made the most friends in a month would win a prize. Trouble brewing? You tell me.

This story is getting a lot of play

[aastanna]

Just as I was reading this headline the story was mentioned on the radio. Weird.

Yeah, right.

[Realistic_Dragon]

A better translation of the MSN press release would be:

"Chat rooms too expensive, scape goat for closure found."

By blaming pedophilia and advertising they can shut off the service with little user backlash.

This is roughly in line with the changes to MSN messenger taking place on Oct 15th - no non-Windows/MS clients will be allowed to connect. An exemption may be arranged for Trillian, but no Linux or BSD clients will be available. This is apparently because of "security concerns and virus risk" - although if that was what you wanted to stop you would be more sensible disconnecting all of the Windows clients from the network :D

Re:Yeah, right.

[Anonymous Coward]

Gaim 0.69 will be in the ports for freebsd and available for linux. It will indeed have new msn protocol support, but why use MSN when Jabber exists?

Re:Yeah, right.

[RPoet]

why use MSN when Jabber exists?

Smilies. Emoticons. MSN has WAY more of them than Jabber will ever have!

good point

[Anonymous Coward]

Freeloaders AREN'T traceable, they use stolen credit cards. This crap will continue.

So just what is MS saying to the world?

This sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

No more MSN chat? Time to go back to AOL.

Isn't this irrelevant?

[tkrotchko]

AIM is the messenger of choice for anyone not associated with MSN; isn't this just a way of marketing their online service?

They're going for the "technically inept parent who is afraid fo the internet" market.

Didn't you just?

[s4f]

... I say this now not because it's not obvious to those who read the article, but that because this is slashdot and people won't :)

Hmmm. This is slashdot, alright, and you just did! I guess you were wrong.

Rant

[salesgeek]

You know what? I'm glad microsoft is shutting down it's chat rooms. Why?

* I don't like MSN Service.
* I never cared much for anonymous chat. I remember working in a computer lab in college and walking around the room and finding out who was who in the different chats hostend on our vax. You'd have a little skinny 98 pound no sunlight no food no life guy with an ident of jockstud. Then you'd have a 400 pound girl called supermodel01. When they hooked up, look out! LOLx3
* Parents who let their kids play with this stuff are playing with fire. Remember about that rule about talking to strangers? Applies online too.
* Instant messaging is becoming less and less relevant. Banned in a lot of workplaces. Especially Microsoft variety.

All in all, this is a who cares. IM is not the killer app -- it's more like that pointcast "push" deal that was the next big thing in 1998-1999.

Re:Rant

[Tackhead]

> I never cared much for anonymous chat. I remember working in a computer lab in college and walking around the room and finding out who was who in the different chats hostend on our vax. You'd have a little skinny 98 pound no sunlight no food no life guy with an ident of jockstud. Then you'd have a 400 pound girl called supermodel01. When they hooked up, look out! LOLx3

Yeah, I remember when dumb terminals were around 98 pounds, but how'd you get a VAX to weigh less than 1000?

(And why not call the VAX supermodel750? There was never a VAX 11/101, man!)

Let the scams begin

[harley_frog]

So Microsoft wants chattroom users to register (for a small fee, of course) with credit cards? Oh, and pedophiles would never, ever use bogus credit cards or phony IDs. Add to that the no identity thief would think to create a bogus MS chatroom page or send out bogus emails to lure unsuspecting people to hand over their credit card numbers.

Yeah. Right.

Won't anyone think of the children?

[eclectic4]

Yes, we are providing a "public service" by removing our free chat room services. In other words, yes, we are saving money by this move, but we needed to come up with a reason other than pure financial gain... and what better reason than to "save the children".

Great PR, but some of us see right through it. You may argue they are being fiscally responsible, but damn I hate how they do it. I mean, who can argue that "saving children from pedophiles" isn't a noble cause? How many people are going to hear this story and think, "wow, Microsoft is such a caring company"?

Yes, they are good, but seeing how good they are at deception makes my skin crawl at times.

Microsoft Attacked

[arclightfire]

An alternative look at this from VUNet; "But because MSN will continue to operate moderated chatrooms in the US, Canada and Japan as a subscription-based service, industry experts are suggesting that the real motive is financial. Ian Brown, director of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, which promotes public debate about the policy implications of new developments in technology, called the announcement an 'hysterical' overreaction if the motive is to protect children online."

Media spin utility?

[Mostly a lurker]

I almost wonder if Microsoft (and other large organisations, politicians etc.) has a computer program to generate these press releases:

1) ... based on consumer experiences Meaning consumers no longer want chat rooms?

2) ... child protection Sure: get those kids away from the computer in their front room and out to the malls and parks.

3) ... our strategic investment Meaning that they need to dramatically reduce chat room use in order to justify the developments in the software used for it; or meaning that they need to charge money for the service in order to make it pay and all talk of "consumers" and "child protection" is just spin.

They missed the opportunity to include anti terrorism, increased choice and lower TCO. Their inclusion would be nonsensical? No more so than those their spin utility actually selected.

NineMSN

[POds]

You forgot to mention Australia (no i dont consider Australia part of Asia). NineMSN will also be removing the chat services it offers.

I have no link. I heard about this on the radio.

About MSN Messenger security

[its_the_muppet_show]

Previous versions of MSNP used md5 to code the password. With the latest version (msnp9) you are being send thru a bunch of Passport servers, and you have to logon using an SSL Socket.

I don't know about sending messages. But I guess they will have some kind of security measure (I HOPE!)... sending plain html requests over the internet, doesn't seem very secure to me...

Remarks from Chatmag.com

[Chatmag]

I'm Pete Carr, owner of Chatmag.com, the leading chat directory and safety site (google "chat safety", we're the second result). For the most part, the comments of other /.ers that MSN is closing their chat rooms due to financial concerns are right on target. It has been long known that chat is not generally a medium to "make a sale". I believe that the decision to close is the result of falling ad revenues in their chat section and potential liability suits.

Operating a good safe kids chat network is a full time job, not something to just put up and forget. MSN and several other major chat networks have been lax in assisting users with help and safety issues. Operating a help desk for chat means hiring trained personnel, taking a proactive stance to addressing help requests, and educating users to the potential hazards of chat.

There are numerous good, safe chat networks that cater to children and teens. Talk City went to a subscription only chat service, which on the one hand goes against the principle of free chat, but helps eliminate trollers and spammers. In addition, several law enforcement agencies, such as Operation Blue Ridge Thunder, regularly cruise chat rooms to search out pedophiles, and child porn filesharers.

This decision by MSN will certainly not be the "death knell" for chat. There are several dozen major IRC networks, and the estimated chat rooms now available via IRC and The Web are over 1.3M, including discussion boards and interactive sites such as Slashdot. Internet chat goes to the heart of what the Internet was designed for, communications. There will be new chat networks starting up, and the networks with a bad business model such as MSN closing.

Re:What is worse...

[benzapp]

is that children today have no real threat what so ever to their existence. It is pretty much guaranteed that if your child is born without birth defects, it will live at least to an age where it too can procreate.

These children who are the supposed victims of paeodphilia are either mentally deficient to a degree where it is questionable they should have been born, or they were raised by foolish parents and are in dire need of the intimacy the paedophile promises. In both instances, we see a failure of the state to ensure the proper upbringing of its future citizens. We believe that parents have the absolute right to reproduce, and yet we place no standards of responsibility upon their behavior. Rights are not innate, they are made possible by circumstances. In this case, their foolishness is allowed because millions worked and died to establish the bountiful civilization they enjoy. Do they respect this civilization and work to uphold it? No.

Let's not let democracy drown at the hands of a few.

This is what democracy does. It is mob mentality reactionism. No rational person can argue that the threat of paedophilia is so great that freedom restricting measures are necessary. As other posters have mentioned, a child has about the same risk of getting struck by lightning as getting abused by a paedophile. You of course mention the car accident statistics. An enlightened leader would be keenly aware of this fact. In our media dominated world of voter education however, we don't have enlightened leadership.

We have the masses, glued to the television caring nothing of the world or their nation besides what is presented to them in a 30 minute news program.

This is but one more example of the excesses of the mob we allowed to govern our existence.

Saving The Kids From Terrorists... Again!

[webzombie]

Cut the chat rooms for the security of our children...

Instead give them all MS Messenger cause we all know they can't get hurt using that piece communication software!?

Block all their terrorist friends...Did we (MS) mention terrorists... Oh ok we did

Anyway its for the kids...Did we (MS) say kids... oh ok good.

Fuck this is getting almost too stupid to comment on but I'm sure there be plenty more /. masturbation over this story...
...sigh...

Forget chat rooms. Just use Slashdot!

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

17/f/NYC, wanna chat and swap kewl nekid pics? OGM!

Profit!

[Amomynos Coward]

1. Open free worldwide chat system
2. s/free/not free/
s/worldwide/few countries/
3. Profit!

It's really about liability

[kitzilla]

Shutting down free and unmoderated chatrooms is really about putting an end to something that doesn't make money and represents a legal liability to Microsoft. I'm not one to give M$ a pass on much, but I can hardly blame them for pulling the plug. How long can it be before some outraged advocacy group stages a class action suit against Microsoft for "knowingly providing a forum" for file-swappers and other naughty people? I'm thinking the days of wide-open chatrooms are coming to an end. And IRC isn't next: it will be AOL.

Did you pay for chat?

[kyoko21]

Considering the fact that MSN Messenger is free, and the chat room environment is free, and I never paid a penny to Microsoft to gain access for MSN Messenger or MSN Chatrooms, Microsoft has every right to do whatever they want to do with it. If anything, they have the right to close it off to paid customers of MSN (any slashdot readers out there on MSN Service?)

If they want to monitor the chatrooms they can and they should. Compared to AOL and Yahoo! chatrooms, MSN chatrooms are much cleaner and much more strict. Even though it is still populated with p0rn bots idling around, at least they have bots and hosts of their own in the chatroom that will kick users out.

Re:Did you pay for chat?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Free"? With MS, nothing comes for free. I guess we pay for the service by looking at their partners ads.

Here's what really happened

[Anonymous Coward]

the guys at perverted-justice.com got ahold of this teacher who was trolling Yahoo chat looking for young girls to talk to. He ended up chatting with some guy (Agent) at www.p-j.com, who got him to say all kinds of sexually explicit things.

The teacher had on his webcam and everything. They even got his phone number, called to confirm it was him, and then posted his pic, phone number, and full name on the site.

Another forum I frequent (FC mean anything to you?) found this stuff and called/faxed/emailed every person this poor guy knew and told them about it. It made the local Detroit news that day.

Within hours, MSFT says they're pulling down their unmoderated chat rooms.

Connection? Maybe.

Unmoderated chat... don't forget about IRC.

[jasonhamilton]

With websites like SearchIRC giving anyone who wants it, instant access to over a thousand IRC networks, I don't see that MSN unmoderated chat going away as being a big deal to the overall scheme of things on the internet.

Naiive Question...

[Lord of the Fries]

Why doesn't everyone just use IRC? I know my wife used to AIM chat with her sister, but it quickly wore off (talking on the phone is so much more effective). My recollections are I get far more out of IRC than I ever did out of AIM. Is it the point-2-point nature of AIM (and others) that separates them from the more group based IRC?

Email is next

[One Louder]

Next will be elimination of email to be replaced by a new store-and-forward version of Messenger ("Leave messages for people even when they're offline!").

The PR justification will be protection from spam and viruses but it will be all about turning email into a proprietary Microsoft protocol.

why just one?

[Dr. Molf]

Why does it just have to be one of those options? Why couldn't it be a combination of several?

the real reason is money

[wannasleep]

So, let's take a closer look at the facts:
M$ keeps open its bigger markets, the ones the actually had more problems with pedophyles;
I assume that subscribers means paying subscribers, as getting a credit card information is the best way of identifying somebody: so they will make money;
Yesterday Yahoo launched a revamped service and msn is less popular than Yahoo;

Sounds to me that they are closing unprofitable markets and raising the price in their biggest markets with the excuse of a noble cause.

I despise the quality of their software, but I envy their marketing.

Via Google News

[decairn]

Is this the first thread to be linked on the front page summary in Google News? I wonder if /. will be /.ed via a reference from Google.

What I find weird....

[/dev/trash]

The rooms stay open in the US BUT you need to provide a credit card to verify ID.

Internet predators are a concern

[bheerssen]

The internet has made it vastly easier for sexual predators to stalk children. Of course, the answer to the problem is education and diligent enforcement of current law, not more unwieldy regulation. Microsoft is free to close it's free services, and it can even play the liability card (I think it's valid), but nobody should imply from that that all unmoderated chat systems should be regulated. Far from it. Unmoderated chat systems offer a valid means of free and open communication. The obvious social advantages of that outweigh the risks, IMO.

There will always be free chat

[Anonymous Coward]

There have been and will always continue to be free chat out there. For instance IRC. It has been around longer than any of the currently popular instant messenging and live chat services, as a free and unrestricted medium, and will probably continue to be popular for a long time to come.

No corporate decision can be a substitute for good parental awareness of their child's activities, whether outside or on the computer.

It doesn't affect me either way. My friends and I will move. In a lucky stroke perhaps we anticipated it - we have an IRC network now to call home that is happy to have us.

Jonathan Zerulik
DarkeIRC Administrator
http://www.darkeirc.net

what a job

[butane_bob2003]

this is probably a little off topic, but who has the crappy job of monitoring chat rooms? I thought my job was getting boring. Eventually this should mostly be handled by AI, but until then, someone actually has to do it. I remember thinking the same thing back in the early days of monitored chat rooms. How does that job work? Are they on salary? Do they work from home?

Jesus Christ, you're desperate.

[Anonymous Coward]

:P

She sodomized me most brutally!

[Anonymous Coward]

....I got better.

Re:She sodomized me most brutally!

[Nordrick Framelhamme]

Did you manage to get the newt out of your butt?

Though I know this probably won't be read

[DaLiNKz]

I used to be one of the 'warriors' on MSN's Chat Network. This is BEFORE they went to full java, back when they had MSNChat clients in Windows 98. Kiddie Porn traders were EVERYWHERE, with only a few channels kids went to. Often, they would come in and offer sex / porn for sex / self pictures back. We all had our war tools, massive amounts of socks bots that we could connect in a matter of seconds.. bringing in 30-40 bots into the trader channels, flooding everyone out, and close down the channel. I destroyed over 20 channels a day, in pure boredom. But sure enough 40 new ones with loads of new traders comes along..

/list >80
/loadsocks 30
/join #biggestchannel
/attack #biggestchannel
/killsocks
/mode #biggestchannel +ik

+k was knock, they would knock but even worse, they'd leave messages like "I'll give you good young porn to let me in".. I was like 14 at the time.. so..

...i flooded him off the network too :D

we did what MSN staff would not. These servers were never used for anything good.

Push for new software

[Anonymous Coward]

"This is a decision based upon consumer experiences, child protection and our strategic investment to build up MSN Messenger,"

Could this be the beginning for the push to 3 degrees?

Who needs MSN chat rooms anyway?

[Kumochisonan]

MSN and AOL chatrooms are jammed to the brim with angst ridden teens whose grasp of basic language structure appears to be comparable to that of an ironing board.

I used to use IRC on a regular basis, and although I occasionally met people of a similar ilk, the ratio was a tad lower. Because of the relative obscurity of IRC compared to Yahoo, MSN and AOL, the users tend to have an active interest in using the servers, rather than MSN and AOL users who are simply hammering the free coaster they got in the mail...

For the record, I only pop onto the Undernet now and again to talk to an old friend I met when I first started out on this Internet Rollercoaster, Chat rooms bore me now. Besides, I have Slashdot.

This child protection stuff is total nonsense

[Anonymous Coward]

Read beyond the headline. From an article on Yahoo about this event:

The changes also should help Microsoft shed some nonpaying users that have dragged on profits, said an analyst who follows the software giant.

and this:

In the United States, MSN will require users of its chat service to subscribe to at least one other paid MSN service. That way, the company will have credit card numbers to make it easier to track down users who violate MSN's terms of use. The sessions will not be moderated, Microsoft said.

(how convenient, they make more money protecting the kids)

and this:

The move also may help MSN trim the number of free users and help boost its overall revenue, said Rob Helm, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, an independent research firm.

"I think this change will have welcome side effects, like keeping spammers out of the chat rooms," he said. "But fundamentally I believe this is a move to make MSN more profitable. It will allow the company to get rid of some infrastructure that was supporting chat, and to make more money on what it leaves in place."

The amount of child luring going on in chat rooms is insignificant, and I doubt that any problems with perverts would be blamed on them; it's a known danger of chatting on the net. No one else is shutting down their chat services.

This is about money, plain and simple. The service is unprofitable, and MS is dumping it for anyone who doesn't pay. Then to avoid criticism they wave the child protection flag, which is what the headline reads because its more interesting than "Unprofitable chat service discontinued". Anyone even discussing the child protection side of this article is buying into an obvious MS ploy. Corporations are strictly self interested, MS would not shut down a large service used worldwide just for fear of a few pedophiles.

Push towards 3 degrees

[tipsymonkey]

It looks to me like this is the beginning for the push towards 3 degrees This will be safe for the kids, and they could do alot more..... gimme money!

Only on Slashdot...

[Overly Critical Guy]

Only on Slashdot is it an evil monopolistic conspiracy when a company wants to get rid of its unmonitored chatrooms known for being rampant with child pornography and other abuses.

It's Microsoft! It MUST be an evil ruse!

We're moving to a fee based system to protect kids

[popo]

What they're basically saying is: "We're moving to a fee based system to protect kids".

Did anyone hear their statement and *not* guffaw?

Brass Eye == Noel's Gotcha Mk 2

[Anonymous Coward]

Brass Eye... reminded me a bit of "Noel's Gotcha" (remember that) with it's baiting of celebrities.

Darn

[Solokron]

Darn, now I can't get 100 porn bot messages every minute! :(

Varied thoughts on this.

[sllim]

I am not sure what to think about this.

I read the article, MS said that the affect in the US would be only chat to paid subcribers of MSN so they can track the billing information.
How many more steps does Micro$oft have to take before they can make the claim that if you have a family you should subscribe to them because they are family safe?
In that respect it sounds like a marketing gimmick.

On the other hand there are the usual band of idiots making claims of free speech and such. Good shit people, freedom of speech doesn't really apply here, MSN is a business and in the same way that Wal-Mart cannot (and should not) be forced to carry Hustler MSN cannot be forced to provide chat features at all.
For the simple sake of capitalism I support Micro$oft in there choices here. If the free speech zealots think they can force Microsoft to carry chat channels then I want to force libraries to carry Barley Legal.

Finally there is the side of simple competition. If Micro$oft doesn't use this as a marketing tool then they are leaving themselves wide open. The 14 year old market is very demanding about chat tools. It is entirely possible they may start a chant of 'I want my AOL'.

No advertising on Gaim / Triallian / etc.

[OneNonly]

I'm a big user of Gaim's M$N plugin.. Gaim doesn't show the advertisments which pop up in M$N / Windows Messenger..

This seems to me the only *real reason* Micro$oft would want to stamp out 3rd party clients.. Loss of advertising revenue...

MSN cuts

[howiefl]

"MSN Israel does not offer MSN INTL Chat services directly, but works with a local chat solution to offer a chat product to its users. This service will be remaining open, unaffected by the changes to MSN Chat."

So less hassles and fewer paedophile lurkers in MSN Israel's chatrooms, then? "

Unfair Bias

[F'Nok]

It's funny, but here in Australia it's been hailed as a good move by all the papers and media.

When asked what they would do about such abuse of their networks, Telstra remarked, "We'll be expanding out chat networks". Avoiding the question, and only serving to give the 'I don't give a f*** impression'.

At least MS has been remotely honest this time.

Illegal use of credit cards as identification

[SgtChaireBourne]

IIRC it was illegal to use credit cards as identification, which is what one aspect of this move boils down to.

DRM Opening

[IBitOBear]

I, in my role as Amazing Kreskin standin, predict that "very shortly" there will be new DRM based chatroom system in place within MSN. Using the DRM to remove anonomus nature of chats to "protect the children" and thus get the DRM software into a "must use" niche.

You just watch...

Sneaky, sneaky.

Re:Great now we have to be spyed on all the time?

[Second Vampyre]

Why are you hating on the Taliban? Have you ever been to Afghanistan? Do you have any Talabani friends? Have you ever seen how happy people were under their iron rule? Oh, you got all of your information about the Taliban from CNN and Fox news? Don't you know they are big companies? You can't trust them.