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Airlines Plan To Filter, Censor In-Flight Internet Access
BlueMerle notes that the much-vaunted arrival of internet access in the friendly skies may come at the cost of heavy content filtering by the Airlines. Ars Technica's commentary is prompted by an Associated Press article which does its best to make checking your email seem sinister. "Seat 17D is yapping endlessly on an Internet phone call. Seat 16F is flaming Seat 16D with expletive-laden chats. Seat 16E is too busy surfing porn sites to care. Seat 17C just wants to sleep. Welcome to the promise of the Internet at 33,000 feet -- and the questions of etiquette, openness and free speech that airlines and service providers will have to grapple with as they bring Internet access to the skies in the coming months."
In international air space, no one can censor me...
GPLv2: I want my rights, I want my phone call! DRM: What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak?
God forbid anyone regulate behavior in a situation where they are liable for the results. The airline has 100+ strangers including children and overprotective, on edge, a little under the influence parents. They have a duty to keep order on their plane. I'm not sure that I, while I have no problem with porn and have even *gasp* watched it, would want to see a giant gangbang going on right next to me, while my rowmate eyes it longingly.
_____
Thank you.
I have a 500GB portable drive stocked full of porn and violent games.
Huzzah!
(when will they limit the size of your drive in the same way they limit liquids and gels?)
liqbase
It's their own service their providing, they can do whatever they want as far as filtering. I should have the same ability to sleep on an airplane like I did before they introduced internet access. I don't need to be sitting on a plane hearing a bunch of priests telling the passenger ahead of them how immoral pornography is, or hearing a people yell and scream if someone bring up goatse.
I mean, really, you geeks can't go without porn for 3 or 4 whole hours?
Here's a thought: close Firefox, shut the lid on the laptop, and *gasp* actually talk to the girl sitting next to you. You just might find that you'll be enjoying the real thing, rather than rubbing one out to pictures of it.
If you can't last more than a few hours with porn, you may have a problem.
Having said that, since when does someone need internet access to view porn? I have porn on my macbook pro right now, but when I flew out yesterday and pulled it out for a bit of in-flight entertainment, I watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Basic common courtesy kept people from watching porn while they travelled without internet access; the same thing will keep them from watching porn with internet access. Those few asshats who can't restrain themselves, well, they're asshats regardless of internet access.
I've also spent a fair bit of time travelling by train, which already come with free wi-fi. I've yet to see anyone browsing hotbabesxxx.com during the trip.
Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo - H. G. Wells
Will I be able to look at the Sport Illustrated swimsuit issue on my flight to Saudi Arabia?
Or will they censor based on the "community" of people in the plane?
(btw Wikipedia has some pretty "interesting" pictures too in various sections...are they going to censor an encylopedia too?)
Seat 17D is yapping endlessly on an Internet phone call. Seat 16F is flaming Seat 16D with expletive-laden chats. Seat 16E is too busy surfing porn sites to care. Seat 17C just wants to sleep.
...And seat 14C has established and maintained a single encrypted tunnel to a non-resolving IP, over which
he appears to have routed a high volume of bidirectional traffic.
Seriously, using airline-provided internet access doesn't magically take away the standard rules for the use of any public-access short-term ISP, whether libraries or coffee shops or just someone's open WAP - Encrypt everything!
Of course, in the current political climate, that would probably have the gestapo waiting to "ask" me a few questions on landing, but I refuse to give up best-practices out of fear of boogey-men.
They've got a tough task ahead of them. The thing is that in a plane you don't have privacy when surfing the web on a screen that at least two people next and two people behind you can see clearly without turning their heads much. Which, yes, gives the airlines some responsibility to make sure that there's nothing on that screen that could cause trouble. You don't want to deal with upset and angry parents and a slightly drunk porn-watcher at 30,000 feet.
Goggles seems to be the obvious answer, but they never quite caught on despite being on the market with reasonable solutions (enough for movies) for a couple years now.
No, I don't support censorship, but that's when it is about content from one private party being delivered to another private party, and what happens inside your home is your business. This isn't your home, and that's the point.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
There's a reason I keep Heavy Metal on my iPod.
Already someone could watch porn, movies or games with extreme violence, or other adult (and possibly offensive) material on their laptop. For that matter, someone could just bring a Playboy magazine on the plane to pass the time. With the possible exception of people trying to use VOIP (I wonder if the latency would be low and consistent enough), I really don't see how this brings up many etiquette questions that aren't already present on a plane. This just sounds like a lame excuse for filtering to me.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
Also, the flight crew has only so many blankets.
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
devise? or something that ?works? just as well?
/.) continues to attempt to shed some light on yOUR foibles;
micro management has never worked. it's an illness. tie that with life0cidal aggression & gangster style bullying, & what do we have? a greed/fear/ego based recipe for disaster.
we're intending for the corepirate nazis to give up/fail even further, in attempting to control the 'weather'.
http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=video+cloud+spraying
the creators will prevail. as it has always been.
corepirate nazi execrable costs outweigh benefits
(Score:-)mynuts won, the king is a fink)
by ourselves on everyday 24/7
as there are no benefits, just more&more death/debt & disruption.
fortunately there's an 'army' of light bringers, coming yOUR way.
the little ones/innocents must/will be protected.
after the big flash, ALL of yOUR imaginary 'borders' may blur a bit?
for each of the creators' innocents harmed in any way, there is a debt that must/will be repaid by you/us, as the perpetrators/minions of unprecedented evile, will not be available after the big flash.
vote with (what's left in) yOUR wallet. help bring an end to unprecedented evile's manifestation through yOUR owned felonious corepirate nazi glowbull warmongering execrable.
some of US should consider ourselves very fortunate to be among those scheduled to survive after the big flash/implementation of the creators' wwwildly popular planet/population rescue initiative/mandate.
it's right in the manual, 'world without end', etc....
as we all ?know?, change is inevitable, & denying/ignoring gravity, logic, morality, etc..., is only possible, on a temporary basis.
concern about the course of events that will occur should the life0cidal execrable fail to be intervened upon is in order.
'do not be dismayed' (also from the manual). however, it's ok/recommended, to not attempt to live under/accept, fauxking nazi felon greed/fear/ego based pr ?firm? scriptdead mindphuking hypenosys.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators. providing more than enough of everything for everyone (without any distracting/spiritdead personal gain motives), whilst badtolling unprecedented evile, using an unlimited supply of newclear power, since/until forever. see you there?
"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."
meanwhile, the life0cidal philistines continue on their path of death, debt, & disruption for most of US;
gov. bush denies health care for the little ones
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/10/03/bush.veto/index.html
whilst demanding/extorting billions to paint more targets on the bigger kids
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/12/12/bush.war.funding/index.html
all is not lost/forgotten/forgiven
yOUR elected) president al gore (deciding not to wait for the much anticipated 'lonesome al answers yOUR questions' interview here on
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3046116.ece
I can upload on you tube, the panic on the airplane as we crash. Or IM my closes friends
Martian_Kyo:Hi! ;)
Friend:Hey, what's up?
Martian_Kyo: Well, me...but not for long
Friend: Heheh What do you mean?
Martian_Kyo:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3Ar3A11G01n9+oD1e
Friend:?
Martian_Kyo has signed out
I wonder what would happen if I'd open this on an American airliner? Would people care? Probably, they'd all go nuts!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
>Besides, even when you are in another country, regardless of their less restrictive laws, you still must abide by the laws of where you claim citizenship, or risk be arrested on your return to home soil.
ehh... No... Otherwise there would be oodles of people getting arrested for smoking pot legally in Holland. When abroad you are actually subject to the laws of that country, not your country of citizenship.
Yes there are situations where a country will act even if the act is not carried out on in the country of citizenship (eg child prostitution) but that is relatively rare.
A citizen is nothing more than the right to vote and not be persecuted by your own government. With respect to the law everybody in the country regardless if they are a citizen or not has to respect them.
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
Sorry, your invocation of the over-protective parent does not inspire me to accept your censorship. Rather, it makes me think "Wow, that piece of shit parent needs to get a reality check and stop trying to reduce my liberties because they can't raise their child to be as repressed as they would like due to freedom of speech."
You kid, your problem. You don't like that Americans like porn and boobies? Move to fucking Saudi Arabia to get your theocracy fix.
Blar.
You people are forgetting that we can't even bring a pair of nail clippers on board an airplane, and you all want unfettered access to all the seedy corners of the Internet?
And pray tell, how is NO access at all better than limited access?
You had the kid knowing full well what the world was like and how it was trending. Now you want everyone else to change so your job of raising a child will be easier. Forgot to account for changes in society, eh? Did you assume that we would remain static?
It's not up to YOU to decide what I can or cannot see as an adult taxpaying citizen who subsidizes your child.
Seems we are at a crossroads here...
Blar.
>Besides, even when you are in another country, regardless of their less restrictive laws, you still must abide by the laws of where you claim citizenship, or risk be arrested on your return to home soil.
To add on my previous comment. One very simple example of where this shows to be false is Windsor and Detroit.
http://www.answers.com/topic/underage-drinking-in-america
Underage persons in the US who live in areas that border Canada and Mexico, both of which have lower drinking ages, sometimes cross the border in order to obtain alcoholic beverages. Mexico's legal drinking age is 18, while Canada's legal drinking age is either 18 or 19, depending on the province in question. They may consume it there or upon return home. In Michigan for example, a person drinking in Windsor, ON at age 19 can return to Detroit, MI and will not be legally cited because the consumption was done in Ontario. Being intoxicated under the age of 21 is not illegal (unless the person is also driving). Consuming it in Michigan is.
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
If they allow access to SSL sites, then how would they stop you from using an SSL VPN to your office/home to get to any site/service you want? If they block Skype, then use your SSL VPN and go through that...
Seat 15B is cybering in the bathroom!
FAP FAP FAP FAP
--- Do you believe in the day?
It's fucking Christmas and you idiots are whining on /.
I am sure plain old button "call the attendant, my child accidentally saw a goatse on my neighbor's screen" will work just fine. Why all this overaccerorization?
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Jet Blue can't even keep a story about the Flight you are on off there DTV.
by not giving them my money for their rip off overpriced service. I expect more air rage to be reported due to yapping on a mobile, typing on an inflight keypad etc etc. I hope they got quiet sections like our trains, anyway, as soon as they permit mobiles on planes, I use my mobile jammer :)
http://www.rense.com/general79/wdx1.htm
The problem with that is that it is not up to you to determine when I should have a teaching moment with my kid.
The problem with that is that it is NOT up to YOU to determine what I should do just because your kid is present.
The same claim you make goes in reverse, who are you to tell me how to run my life? You claim that this person who sits next to your kid on an airplane and watches a porn movie is telling you how to raise your kid, but by then limiting this person you are telling them how to live their life. What makes you so special?
A lot of parents seem to want to force the entire world to adjust for their kid. Sorry, ain't gonna happen.
You can't expect the entire world to change to your preffered child raising method.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I'm sick of all this motherfucking fucking on this motherfucking plane!!!
Airlines should be dealing with etiquette violations as they happen, not by filtering content. If someone is talking too loudly, ask them to stop. If someone is looking at porn(and another passenger can see it) ask them to stop. Porn is available everywhere, but rarely do you see someone looking at porn while at a coffee shop. I think that these stories are a little sensationalist.
Those who know, do not speak. Those who speak, do not know. ~Lao Tzu
so they can filter away for all I care!
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
Apparently you failed charm school, there is just some things that are not done in polite society (it's up to society as a whole to dictate what is to be allowed in public, that's part of the whole, society thing). Sexually some of these things that are NOT allowed in public include group Sex and sticking small furry animals in one's rectum (you're allowed to stick your head up your own ass apparently, but please stop breathing on me, your breath has a distinct odor). If you want to engage in these behaviors you do it in private, not on a 747, not on the subway, not even on a greyhound bus. I'm sorry, I will defend your rights to do this in the privacy of your home/swinging club, but I will never defend your rights to do this in front of people that don't choose to watch such activities. Doing so in front of these people is akin to rape. And outside of fantasies performed by consenting adults, rape in any way shape or form is bad.
And no, I'm not opposed to breast feeding in public, nor am I offended by nudity, I'd be happy if nude beaches were more prevalent in the US. The human body erm, most human bodies, is nothing to be ashamed of. But sexual activity should be kept private / quasi private (said swinging/swapping/whatever private clubs).
I swear, the biggest problem with society today is the "OMGWTFBBQ MY RIGHTS MY RIGHTS SCREW YOU!" attitude. Sometimes you simply CONTROL your own urges and desires for a few hours to make society flow a bit better...
Don't swear in public, don't watch porn within eye or earshot of kids, and say "pardon me", "hello", and "good day". It'll make everyone's life better.
And with that - MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
And if Seat 69 is an adult entertainment businessperson or webmaster? They won't be able to do their job!
How'd you find out about the Johnson proposal?
It's called common courtesy. Ever hear of it?
Have you? It's called minding your own business.
I swear, the biggest problem with society today is the "OMGWTFBBQ MY RIGHTS MY RIGHTS SCREW YOU!" attitude.
I suppose I could see it that way, if I were a Luddite or your garden variety prude. People who are adamant on their civil liberties are that way because of the Luddites and the "OMG WILL SOMEONE PLEAAAAASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!" crowd.
While your tips are good ones for promoting polite behavior, and I fully agree with them, I do have to agree with your opposition that you have no right to tell other people how to behave. You wouldn't like it if someone did it to you, would you?
Just yesterday I posted an opinion on a discussion forum that included no personal attacks or anything of the sort, and a responder personally attacked me using information about me that had nothing to do with my opinion, and then that person and others couldn't understand why I reacted with anger and used their inflammatory tone of voice right back at them. They apparently couldn't understand that their own prejudiced bullshit attitudes had brought my response upon them, and failed to comprehend the "do unto others" rule.
As you don't seem to. You expect someone else to conform to what YOU want them to do and are yelling "OMG THE CHILDREN!" as an excuse to justify the fact that you're all take and no give.
Sorry. Ain't gonna fly, pun intended.
i am a soviet space shuttle
People that are competent can still do what they want, since they will not be able to ban VPS due to business travellers. Of course, I can VOP to my macine at home and then do what I like.
As to poern surving, I think that people doing that in public (and an ariplane seat is public) should go straight to prison after arrival. Phoning on airplanes should be resticted to special phone booths or the like. These people can damn well do without or use text chat. There is no reason at all to tolerate this type of egoistic and disruptive behaviour. Good manners are non-optional. If you do not have them, they need to be enforced upon you.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
One of the reasons the US culture is considered so rude (especially to those living in Asia - I travel there a lot) is because of the blatant disregard of others around us. Loud cell phone calls, public swearing, etc. Sometimes a little consideration of those around you will go a LONG way, and being called out on rude behavior shouldn't be seen as a slight or "restriction" on your freedoms, but a correction to just raise the general civility of civilization.
Now, in a bar, I'd have no problem with swearing or swimsuit calendars on the wall. Adult theater, no problem with porn.
In the McDonald's playroom? Not a chance. Cursing up a storm in a preschool? Not a chance.
Common courtesy calls for you to voluntarily restrain your own urges in consideration of those around you. In fact, I believe a lot of the "morality" laws that have sprung up in the last 20 years are precisely because of the emphasis on "I'll do what I like when I want and how I want" me-first mentality that's taken root in the US. If you're going to roll through my neighborhood at 1 AM with your stereo blasting away about niggaz poppin caps in yo ass, then I'm gonna lobby to get loud stereos regulated and get you ticketed. It's not about restricting your freedoms, it's about respecting those of society at large.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
The only reason this issues haven't come up yet is because the first step is to get in-flight Internet access at all -- but they all will.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
they don't really want to offer it, and are only doing it because they're under pressure to do so and want to appear progressive, but they will neuter any deployed service so that no-one will be able to use it anyway.
Besides, a bunch of people quietly clicking away on their laptops, working, checking mail, viewing porn, or whatever else it is that people do with their computers is infinitely preferable to a gaggle of assholes yammering on their cell phones.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
There was a reason we kept telling people to encrypt everything by default, and it wasn't because we wanted to keep the Department of Homeland Security from catching terroiristes. It was because we wanted to keep these fucking content filters out of the common carrier network.
Enjoy your ubiquitous, heavily filtered, Internet access, because that's what you asked for.
jhw
I bet the on-plane censoring system is not REALLY for content. I mean, probably there IS content filtering, but I bet the real reason to have anything besides an unrestricted pipe is for bandwidth management.
There's two possible ways for planes to get service:
One is via satellite.
The second (when over land) is via a system where cell sites have upward-pointing antennas (not run by the cell company, run by a company that provides service to airplanes, renting space on the cell sites just like the cell companies do.)
I've heard of both being used, and suppose it's up to the airline which to use. I imagine both have VERY limited bandwidth, considering it's being shared among hundreds of users PER plane, and then further split among all planes in the air (or, at any rate, all subscribed to the service.) It doesn't sound so shiny for the airline to be like "Oh, we don't have enough bandwidth for VOIP, streaming videos, etc. etc." so they will phrase it in terms of enforcing politeness on planes.
Any content that you wish to keep people from downloading while on the plane, they can easily have stored on these devices called hard drives, DVDs, etc.
Do they plan to screen your storage devices and media prior to boarding? No. They plan to censor what content you're accessing, ahem, over the network.
It's just not clear what they hope to accomplish. I'm all ears, what access do they want to filter that you couldn't already have downloaded and stored on your laptop?
-HobophobE
Nothing laughs forever.
I just got back from a cruise. When we pulled into home port, out came the cell phones and Blackberries. The beeping and booping all around me nearly drove me mad. If the equivalent happens in the air -- in a confined space -- I'll give serious consideration to jumping.
Unfortunately, people are too damn scared of talking to strangers these days for that plan to work. I don't mind if someone I don't know talks to me as long as they're not an asshole, but several times recently I've walked up to a stranger to compliment them and I either get a blank stare, surprise, or a glare. Only once did I get a pleasant reaction.
If someone does something you don't like, and talking to them isn't an option, you can always move away from them or not look at the offensive thing they are doing.
i am a soviet space shuttle
At least it will allow hijacked planes to do some nice formation flying.
I've noticed that "common courtesy" is almost always defined by people who want to use it to tell other people what to do (or what not to do).
1: "Hay, don't use naughty words around my kid!"
2: "I'll swear whenever I want. Don't like it? Don't listen!"
1: "Well, not swearing in front of kids is 'common courtesy'. GOCHA!"
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Not really sure if the limits are a good thing or not. It's about time they provide internet access on planes.. I start to go into shock if can't check my email for a few hours. Who knows what kind of life changing event I may miss by not being to check while on a plane. On the other hand I do need something to do while sitting on the tarmac for 12 hours waiting to take off. I don't know about any of you, but I would love to watch live porn feeds from Tijuana, Mexico while on a plane. "Mommy what is that woman doing to that horse"...?!? Some limit is acceptable in a closed in public place.
That was the dumbest post in this whole thread. And that, my friend, is really saying something.
The "Common Courtesy" argument IS used to suggest to other people how they could act.
But it only has validity when the issue in question REALLY IS "common courtesy."
Whether you (and the other 25% of the people here arguing on your side) care for it or not, we, as a society, have established a set of customs and rules on how one should act. You may have heard of this before, it's called "ethics."
Now, your personal morality should prevent you from exposing a child to porn or offensive language. But even when it doesn't, if you intend to be a productive, respected member of society, you're expected to abide by our collective ethics.
Furthermore, it just so happens that these ethics are so widely held that MOST of them are law. And the ones that aren't may very likely still be prosecuted in a civil court.
If you don't like the fact that the huge majority of Americans have coalesced around these "rules," then you're more than welcome to remove yourself from society. People do it all the time.
And if you chose to just flaunt the collective ethic, don't be surprised if it lands you in jail, on the receiving end of a lawsuit, or at the receiving end of a fist moving at a fast clip.
Because if you decided it was your right to watch your Blondes on Blacks Part V in front of MY kid, and you refused to relocate yourself or cease your inapropos behavior, i would DEFINITELY take the matter in to my own hands. Literally. Because you can count on the fact that a parent is going to protect his child with a LOT more force than you are going to use to protect your laptop OR your nose.
And really, if that were to happen, who would you be to make issue over it? After all, you decided to flaunt the "common courtesy" of illegally exposing children to porn. How can you possibly complain when an offended parent flaunts the "common courtesy" of not swelling your face to match the ridiculous size of your head.
Get over yourself. You're part of a society. If you don't like it, leave.
When I see the word censor* I smell idiots. Today anybody can store a porn movie in their HD/IPOD/DVD and watch it in a plane... I have 1MM miles and never seen nobody watching porn aboard. Exceptions could happen, but censoring internet won't help. This kind of censorship will not help and will prevent you from accessing any kind of medical paper, article or whatever related to pregnancy and some body parts. It will also censor access to news and publications related or referencing the adult industry or even some specific websites not even related to XXX but that include some specific words. Censorship means there's a stupid running the company. AC
That is really to bad. Me and my hand wanted to join the mile high club.
What's sad is that it's true. Just opening that site on an airliner would probably result in the pilot executing an emergency landing. If not because you're immediately considered a potential terrorist (or rather, a confirmed terrorist, guilty until proven innocent), then because the rest of the plane is in a full fledged panic over the guy who pulled up a website with Arab script. On any given flight, there's going to be at least one media brainwashed citizen who's going to react to seeing anything Arab-related. If you're unlucky, there'll be more than one of them.
It seems to me like a guaranteed detainment, really. There are enough asshats that would immediately think that looking up anything not written in English means you're hiding something from those who can't translate what they're looking at. I mean, what if I don't know you're just reading some "Soviet Russia" jokes in Arabic? The population would rather you be arrested until that can be determined -- racist paranoia supersedes your right to literature. *sigh*
I mean really, if some passenger either can't get by without their porn fix or otherwise wants to get a reaction out of other passengers, wouldn't they just bring their favorites along on their laptop?
I find it interesting that the airlines automatically assume if they have unfettered internt access that everyone's going to watch porn. And the statement, "Seat 16F is flaming Seat 16D with expletive-laden chats," shows the reporter's ignorance on how chat software works.
If you've never been modded as "flamebait" or "troll," you've never tried to argue a minority viewpoint here!
You bring your child into proximity with adults, expect those adults to continue their adult behavior.
Blar.
I have no problem if they want to block hardcore porn, but what about other material that might be deemed "adult" or "offensive to some people who like to complain about it"? And surely we know here on Slashdot that blocking software is often inexact, either mistakenly or unfairly blocking things?