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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."
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.
The flipside of course is that everyone is on for free and the plane is slashdotted by anonymised porn.
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
The problem with censorship isn't the desire to prevent harm, but the fact that it implies that there is some moral standard by which we all should run our lives, which I find utterly offensive to my own freedom. Children will see things eventually, so instead of hiding the truth from them, as an adult give them some parallax and understanding on what they are seeing.
Religion, mysticism, and the supernatural are all rooted in this same tenet of moral superiority, and it is so unintelligent to be a proponent of it.
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
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...
So how does this relate to the issue of airlines censoring internet access? Do you expect the airlines to act as a parent to your children because you can't be bothered to look over their shoulder while they use the in-flight internet access, or tell them they aren't allowed to use it?
Because if your concern is that the person sitting next to your kid is looking at porn and your child can actually see it, then you'll be happy to know that that person is guilty of disseminating pornography to a minor, which is a felony in the US.
The laws already protect your child in that case. You don't need the airlines to add more nannying.