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New Internet Regulation Proposed
bumgutts writes "Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has suggested a mandatory website self-rating system. The system, very similar to one suggested under Clinton's administration, would require by law all commercial websites to place 'marks and notices' on each page containing 'sexually explicit' content, with penalty up to 5 years imprisonment." From the article: "A second new crime would threaten with imprisonment Web site operators who mislead visitors about sex with deceptive 'words or digital images' in their source code--for instance, a site that might pop up in searches for Barbie dolls or Teletubbies but actually features sexually explicit photographs. A third new crime appears to require that commercial Web sites not post sexually explicit material on their home page if it can be seen 'absent any further actions by the viewer.'"
It's not porn, it's art!
How exactly are they trying to enforce this ?
I'd say that the sites that still want to expose erotical/sexual content, would just move 1 inch outside the US, probably Canada. So while all american sites and their revenues are hit bigtime (the search engines will definitely start to filter on this), the other countries get the profit.
Every tenth poster about Madonna or Catherina Zeta Jones or any other female celebrity is somewhat sexual content.
Since i'm not an american and i'm nowhere near US, it won't affect me, but it still seems enormously stupid idea. The motivation could be correct, but the implementation will suck.
I'd tell you the chances of this story being a dupe, but you wouldn't like it.
While it sounds like a decent idea, I'm really all for the whole uncensored and unregulated internet. It's more interesting to me to see what people do with the total freedom granted to them. The more stuff like this that's get passed, the closer we move to real censorship. Okay, so I know I probably sound like I just put a fresh bit of tinfoil on this morning, but I really like my internet the way it is.
The Fark 'boobies' tag finally gets the nationwide recognition it deserves...
This guy's the limit!
All you have to do is know one name, one word even, and any search anywhere will return adult material. Are they gonna put something in front of that? How about just typing in a url that goes to some detail page beyond the index page? Blocking all of that takes a trememdous amount of work... way harder than just "watch your kids" and "tell them about what's there". Any kid can go into a bookstore and see books with adult material in them, in fact you can go to any commercial big-box bookstore (barnes + noble, etc) and you'll see a slew of underage kids in the adult book area. We're just people, people!
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Note: I am a conservative, but I still don't like most of what Gonzales does.
A third new crime appears to require that commercial Web sites not post sexually explicit material on their home page if it can be seen 'absent any further actions by the viewer.
This one actually makes sense. I have young students that occasionally search for school-related things using Google. Some of the sites that come up are questionable at best. I apprecite those webmasters that have the decency to place a warning and no explicit material on their portal page. Even better are those that make you agree to view the content and set a cookie. That way no matter what page you enter to (since Google doesn't give preference on most searches to a home page as opposed to one deep in the site), the cookie is checked and you get the "agree/disagree" page no matter what.
However, it seems a bit unenforcable. I mean, what about websites overseas? What about websites overseas operated by American's? What about websites in the US operated by foreigners? I think that there are still too many unresolved questions about jurisdiction on the Internet. I would think that as a lawyer, Gonzales would understand that. This is something that depends on the goodwill of the webmasters, much like most other things on the 'net.
Where EXACTLY in the Constitution of The United States is this authority delegated from The People or The States to The Damned Feds?
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During his speech, Gonzales also warned that Internet service providers must begin to retain records of their customers' activities to aid in future criminal prosecutions
Future criminal prosecutions, whenever the government deems it necessary for those who might cause problems for them. The implication is the government does not trust its own citizenry, and must have the ability to invade their privacy at any time in order to control or silence them.
What other ways can people be spied on by the government? Is this what we want, a paternalistic government and a paranoid society?
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
One of my sites features prominent images of "Tinky Winky getting it on with the Noo-Noo", "Tubby Custard Full Facials", "Over the Hills and Far Away, Hot Barely Legal Teletubbies Come to Play - With Each Other and Also With a Mysterious Large Cylindrical Object" etc. etc.
I hope that will not lead to legal misunderstandings which would put me in line for a stint of federally sponsored rectal enlargement.
Is it just me going insane, or does that actually seem like reasonable legislation?
Both.
As parent, the thought of such a regulation gave me pause--I consider myself responsible, I want my 11-year-old to have access to the Internet, and I don't want to have to sit there with her ALL the time.
But then, I came to my senses and thought, "it IS my responsibility to monitor her Internet access." The silver lining to such a regulation proposal is that it has made me rethink of my parental priorities...
Twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.
In his press release, Mr. Gonzales brought up the statistic that "one in five children has been solicited online".
To which my wife and I looked at each other and went "Uh - really. One in five."
And then I started to wonder. Was this children solicited by adults? How are we defining children? Is this just a sampling of MySpace users, assuming that all solicitees are children, and all soliciters are adults? Are we including two teenagers including lovey-dovey emails to each other, or kids hanging out in Pokemon chat rooms getting hit on my a pedophile?
I'd like to see the numbers, because I've been in lots of forums, have recieved emails from adults and teens about things I've written (like a "Xenosaga Backtracking" article), and I haven't seen a random person pop up in one of these forums "Hey, that's a nice Pikachu - now I'd like to see you naked!"
Granted, maybe I'm naive - but I have the feeling that "one in five" is either inflated, or including things that most people would never consider solicitation (again, such as minors hitting on minors).
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