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Larry Sanger Tells FBI Wikipedia Distributes "Child Pornography"
Taco Cowboy writes with news that Larry Sanger, the co-founder of Wikipedia, has reported to the FBI what he says is child pornography on Wikipedia, including links (redacted in the letter just linked) to entries about pedophilia and the genre of manga known as lolicon. The Register has up an article with some analysis, which mentions the opinion of at least one attorney whose "reading of the statute [requiring reporting of child porn images] is that it does apply to the Wikimedia Foundation." Update 20100414 5:00 GMT: Larry Sanger has posted a general reply in response to critics of his report to the FBI, in which he addresses the form, content, and motivation of his complaint, and offers some discussion of the relevant statute.
Good thing the links are redacted! Its not like anyone with a brain could go to http://commons.wikimedia.org/ and search for "pedophilia" or "lolicon" and find exactly what he was talking about. Nothing in those categories looks like child porn to me, I'm not afraid to post the links. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Pedophilia http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Lolicon
I think the OP was talking about fictional images (e.g., "lolicon")? Yes, for child pornography, there's the argument that even though the simply act of viewing or possession is a victimless crime, there are reasons to criminalise all of this. But none of this applies to people downloading fictional (especially unrealistic) images, even if they then go and download more of it.