Slashdot Mirror
NSI challenged over "obscene" domains
drwiii writes "news.com has a news tidbit about NSI going to court because of their refusal to register domain names that they feel are "obscene".
" What's amusing to me is the steady flow of words
that I hear about that are rejected, considering the
relative naughtiness of many existing domains.
Sorry to be anal. But there are closer to 1 millon words in the English language. That only 7 are banned is even more impressive.
Is this LA-based Seven Words just another bunch of ethically challenged scammers and pornographers who will look for any little legal window of opportunity? People like this will usually wrap themselves in the flags of free speech or whatever, when their _real_ intention is just to get these domain names to sell porn.
There was also a story on Wired recently about an ex-con who scammed NSI into assigning the sex.com domain to him from it's owner, and the site is now making millions. Both they and NSI are being sued over it.
man that was a really funny Carlin skit. He would stand there in typical Carlin style & rattle off these words, I think they were all words used to describe the female genetalia, I'd tell you exactly, but don't remember. Now he is sellin long distance phone svc
vanishitch.com -- for my anti-itch topical ointment...
Why is it then that HBO and other pay channels can have "obscene language" but regular TV cannot? You have to pay to hear obscenities? How odd. Most radio stations do censor songs but one station around here doesn't give a *beep* and plays songs uncensored. Are they violating FCC rules by doing so? Maybe they are a premium radio station.
George Carlin also talks about the 7 words in his book, Brain Droppings, for those of you too young to remember his monologue.
...and apparently /. as well!
/. was on the NSI payroll!
Who would have though
-1 my fscking ass...
The FCC argument is that since broadcast bandwidth is limited (i.e. there's a limit to the number of radio/TV stations the airwaves can support) that it needs to be regulated. It's not like print media where all you need to do is hand out paper, theoretically at least, everyone can do that.
The government then extends this ability to regulate broadcast media to the ability to censor broadcast media. Thus the bad on "dirty" words and bans on things like cigarette advertising on television. It helps their case that radio/TV didn't exist when the constitution was written, thus the 1st ammendment only specifically mentions print.
Since cable TV doesn't use through-the-air broadcast media, it doesn't fall under these same regulations.
% whois fuck14-dom
Registrant:
ORDERED STATUS QUO ANTE (FUCK14-DOM)
US District Court, Central District of
California
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Domain Name: FUCK.COM
.
Ahh...seeing this *Really* makes me understand why ;-P
Uninett refused to let ppl register por.no
Yeah, eggplants are really seedy.
You could always try the full Oxford English Dictionary.
How about some /. root servers?
Sounds too much like cum twats. We'll need to ban that immediately. :-)
I would venture to say 60% of the Internet bandwidth is used for solid porn viewing. If we ban it we'll cut that number down and save bandwidth for important things like Slashdot and The Onion! ;-) Besides, porn is really really really overrated. I used to love it until I found out flesh and blood women are a lot more fun than sitting in my bedroom wanking off to pictures of some supermodel I'd NEVER even get within 10 feet of fully clothed. ;-)
Let's create a new TLD authority and use their DNS, so we can register anything say in .newcom and they will be used in any computer that includes the .newcom root servers instead of NSI's ones.
So they're fascist prudes. How does this make them hypocrites? Have they ever argued for freedom of expression and against censorship?
there is no standard romanization for japanese
words. may as well call it ziutake
Have you visited godhatesfags.com lately? Read their FAQ. They are not a bunch of hatemongers, they are just telling it like it is - that if you are a fag and do not repent, you will go to hell. It's really very simple.
According to the link the oed totals in at 291,500
entries. So it seems that if the previously mentioned figure of one million is even close to correct, then your thoughts that even the oed has every word in the language are also 'gravely erroneous'.
What I always thought was funny was... If fuck and motherfucker are both prohibited words, does that implicity allow *other* uses of the syllable fuck? Can we say "godfuckingdammit"? How about "pigfucker" Likewise, how about composits of other words, like "shithead"? Is that legit?
Maybe you can sue the AlterNIC guys for something or other.
Thank you for posting a second time and adding the *'s to the subject. It has really enhanced your point and unlike the ignorant who double click the submit button, you've shown that you intentionally posted it twice. Kudos to you sir!
why is it impressive that any words in the english laguage are banned? after all f*ck is the most versatile word in the english language.
I don't see anyone registering cthulhu-eats-bigots.com though.
NSI handle registrations coming from virtually anywhere in the world.
Are they supposed to study every possible dialect to find a list of forbidden words ? There are numerous examples of words, with the same spelling, that mean different things in different languages.
For instance, bite means please in german, whereas it means dick in french).
There might be some authority, operating under national law, that could forbid certain publications and/or publications names. But this is definetly not the role of NSI.
But in English English (the *real* English Language), "pussy" is a synonym for "cat".
"Pussy"(TM) is actually a Swedish brand name for cat food...
So, this won't raise any eyebrows in the UK, eh?
"Well, it 'taint not mine kind sir, it's me husband's. He's outside blowing a fag right now, but 'ell be back in a minute."
:)
Just about all the 7 words I can think of have been registered. what 7 words are they talking about?
can be found here:
http://www.lclark.edu/~jbradley/carlin.html
In the "Imaginative Mind in Art", Jacob Bronowski wrote: "...That is, four thousand words is a fair vocabulary that a human being can get along with, if he is not going to spend too much time thinking. And the total store in a good dictionary is more than a hundred times larger again, for a good dictionary contains nearly a million words."
Ok, I have the Oxford English Dictionary in my room, all 10 inches of compressed print (you need the little magnifying glass it comes with to read the print) and there are 460,000 listed words, note that it's the 1971 print. From what I hear, Oxford is considered the official word base, and upon that another 400,000 or so technical, catalog, and other scientific words have been added to total ~860,000 words. But I don't know if we should really consider Rotary-Engine a word... In my opinion that is where encyclopedias come on the scene.
Only with passing amusement do I take note that the InterNIC is now refusing to register certain domain names (after those with close association the former IANA, the IETF and other important satellite organizations cahsed in on the domain registration process prior when it first opened it's doors to any old joe).
What I think is a more important aspect of this case is using legal means to disassemble the current little top down, nepotistic, insider trading, self-agrandizing little circle jerk that currenly has control.
Things went way wrong about 4 to 5 years ago and have been allowed to continue along that path for far too long. The InterNIC/NSI desire to disassociate itself from from the tar pit of legal action points to the best way to attack a corrupt, service poor monopoly (and anyone who thinks the latest decision to allow third party registars to feed the NSI machine will solve all the current problems created by NSI's monopoly is smoking crack).
Kasparoff, AlterNIC and everyone else has been pursing purly geek solutions. Well, the news is that the head geeks that thought the internet up have designed it so that it can't be re-asembled without their permission (using their tools, which now have the market's code/mindshare). But, geeks are geeks no matter what... and they always fail to expect (no, not the Spanish Inquisition) the legal remedies that are avalable to non-geeks when their closed little geek circle jerk starts to depart too far from known reality.
Hopefully this will be opening of the floodgate that causing SAIC to drop ownership of NSI and forces the current designers of the internet (v1, v2 and beyond) to develope a methods that respect decentralized competitive systems.
As much as I hate to make lawyers rich, I hope some street-fighting, class-action consumer oriented lawyers put SAIC/NSI's ass in a sling on this one.
Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:
I'm getting: "Use a dist". That's offensive?
Posted by hanser:
The thing that torques my nuts is that only English words are being victimized. In Spanish, for example, even the most obscene words are domain names. The internet is not English specific, so why should obscene English domains be picked on?
I gave a link to the OED, as the guy who originally mentioned it didn't. Compared to a pocket dictionary, the OED has orders of magnitude more entries and more quotes and references per entry. I never said the OED had a million words. I never said the OED had every word in the English language. I gave a link to the OED and a comparison to a pocket dictionary both in scope of content and in price.
Are dictionaries really this exciting to some people?
www.oed.com
The Oxford English Dictionary comes in twenty volumes. It costs about a thousand dollars. If you think your Dude's Handy Pocket Reference to English has every word in the language, such thoughts are gravely erroneous.
Kumkwats!
I agree entirely. But how to keep them to that obligation?
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
(a) the domain names don't physically EXIST in America
(b) there is no way for the plaintif to prove their computer exists in America, either
(c) the Internet is international, and the US constitution does not apply to international dealings, and
(d) the Internet is supposed to be an anarchy, so the law doesn't apply to them, anyway.
On the other, the whole thing is plainly stupid.
The problem is, the people registering the domain names the NSI are censoring are EXACTLY the same sorts of people who have exploited or claimed at least one of those four points, when it benefitted them to do so.
Therein lies the dilema. The Internet is ideally deregulated and free, but if you chase that ideal so that YOU can do anything you like, you need to remember - so can they. And if you don't like it, you can't do any more than they can, if they don't.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
The correct spelling is shiitake not shitake. The only reason shitake is used is because there are a lot of people who are too stupid to look up the proper spelling before using it.
--
Timur Tabi
Remove "nospam_" from email address
It's basically a classic Carlin rant about how you can't say certain words on TV because the FCC decided that television and radio are the only two mediums NOT covered by the First Ammendment to the United States Constitution.
I'll try hunting down an MP3 of it. e-mail me if you want a copy (if I find one)
I live in Las Vegas, and Carlin is here nearly every other month for 2 weeks.. I should go see him live...
At the risk of this being moderated, here's the words I remember:
Cock, Cunt, Piss, Shit, Motherfucker, *Thinks* I don't remember the other two.
I think he changed it to motherfucker from fuck so he could do his "there's a lot going on there" thing.
Only a dozen words that are too dirty to say ?
:)
Americans aparently lack creativity
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
The 7 words are apparently: c*cks*cker, c*nt, f*ck, m*therf*cker, p*ss, sh*t and t*ts.
:-))
(You Usians are such pr*des.
Regards, Ralph.
nsisucks.com ?
Well, here around Detroit, we can hear the unbeeped versions on the Canadian stations...
(Some of which have studios on the Detroit side of the river, and transmitters on the Canada side...)
As others have noted, the original rationalisation for the FCC's restriction on radio/TV speech was the limited broadcast spectrum available. Spectrum is a public good, and some regulation does make sense, particularly to ensure free public access rather than having it totally owned and dominated by large corporations appealing to the least common denominator. (This is a very republican notion, in keeping with the Constitution, which limits direct democracy on the same grounds.) Consider the decline in the quality of radio programming since the Telecommunications Reform Act of 1996 loosened ownership restrictions and increased market concentration.
:-)
The problem we face as proponents of online freedom is that existing legal precedent cannot be easily applied to the Internet. It is funded partly by public money and partly by private money. Its organisation stretches analogies to other media beyond reasonable applicability. For example, bandwidth is in a sense limited, but as a user/listener/viewer-controlled medium that traffic is allocated by consumers, not producers. Moreover bandwidth is not permanently fixed by the laws of physics, but rather can be added on demand. It is an international medium. Hence the clear public interest in regulation does not pertain.
There is also a fundamental contradiction in NSI insisting that they are a private enterprise not subject to the same First Amendment standard as a government body, and in acting as a regulator like the FCC. Worse, by establishing themselves as a regulatory body, they've violated any pretense at common-carrier privileges and could be held liable in any number of interesting ways for domain names that others find offensive. Oops.
One might argue that NSI should be compelled to divest control of the root database into a non-profit organisation tasked with minimising the administrative costs of root service. No single organisation (even a nonprofit and especially a bureacracy) will ever have the incentive to actually attain this minimum, and yet the difficulty of maintaining multiple databases for the same TLD appears to make a market solution impossible. Perhaps a nonprofit root service funded by for-profit domain registrars, who would have an incentive to force down root server costs, is the best we can hope for.
I reckon that the internet should be treated as an international entity and that if this is accepted as being the case then NSI can't really be taken to the US courts since, as has been pointed out, the US can't rule over international dealings.
Beyond this though i feel that NSI is looking at this thing the wrong way. It appears that selectively doling out domain names is NSI's way of telling us that to be given anything from them is a blessing. As NSI essentially has complete control over domain names they have an obligation to the internet as a whole not to judge, but merely to serve.
I say I ain't giving you no tree fiddy you goddamned Loch Ness monster, get yo own goddamned money!
Another reader posted a link to the George Carlin 7 deadly words transcript which points out, in its fashion, that many words are not dirty unless taken in context. NSI may take it upon itself to disallow registration of domains with "indecent" language but if the courts find that they are allowed to filter out certain words, what is to stop them from selectively banning registration and registration renewal of phrases that they may consider to be indecent?
A friend of mine owns Jesus-Sucks-Dick.com which, if NSI continues on its current path, is almost certain to die off when it comes up for renewal.
Going a step further, though i doubt this will happen, what is to stop NSI from denying registration renewal to those sites which have objectionable content. I sincerely doubt that this will happen, but then it is only one more leap in logic
I say I ain't giving you no tree fiddy you goddamned Loch Ness monster, get yo own goddamned money!
Many words, if not most, if not #$%^$&^ near all, have more than one definition, so the number of definitions in a dictionary will vastly exceed the number of words defined in that same dictionary.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
It may not be as easy to refuse renewals as they think.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Last I checked, godhatesfags.com was still active. But fuck.com isn't.
I don't check godhatesfags.com often for obvious reasons. No, I'm not making it up. Yes, it is real.
APRIL 29 1999!
Registrant:
ORDERED STATUS QUO ANTE (FUCK14-DOM)
US District Court, Central District of
California
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Domain Name: FUCK.COM
Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
Network Operations Center (NSOL-NOC) NOC@NETSOL.COM
703-742-4777
Billing Contact:
Accounts Payable (AP5173-ORG) ap@NETSOL.COM
703-742-0400
Record last updated on 27-Apr-99.
Record created on 26-Apr-99.
Database last updated on 3-May-99 14:41:53 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS5.NETCOMI.COM 204.58.155.20
NS6.NETCOMI.COM 204.58.155.21
Real Assets Limited (SHIT3-DOM)
P.O. Box 3321
Road Town, Tortola
VG
Domain Name: SHIT.COM
Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
Real Assets (RA402-ORG) ra@POWERCLICKS.COM
+1 310 362 8434
Fax- +1 310 362 8895
Billing Contact:
Real Assets (RA402-ORG) ra@POWERCLICKS.COM
+1 310 362 8434
Fax- +1 310 362 8895
Record last updated on 21-Feb-99.
Record created on 21-Feb-99.
Database last updated on 3-May-99 14:41:53 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
ALPHA.HOSTBOX.COM 165.90.27.130
NS2.HE.NET 207.33.1.3
that Secure Shell is not located in Italy.
That's cute. I bet that site got a lot of hits.:)
(no wait, that's a masochist).
This is not a domain name, but at the start of WWII, the US Navy have some problems with one of their acronyms. It is common to shorten Commander in Chief to CINC. Hence the CinC of the Pacific Fleet is CINCPAC; the Atlantic Fleet (Lant) becomes CINCLANT. But what about the Big Kahuna, the CinC of all the Navy.
CINCUS
They didn't think that this sounded so good.
AFAIK
--
Infuriate left and right
My domain, "conservatory.com" contains the letters :^)
"con" which is French slang for the female reproductive part. Should I be worried?
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
Although I don't like it, the fact of the matter is, there's no real case here. At least in America, the Internet is considered a broadcast medium, and therefore falls under the jurisdiction of the of the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC mandates the censorship of a simple seven words on mediums owned by the people, of which the Internet is largely owned.
It's constitutional, as far as the Supreme court is concerned, since NSI gets $$$ from the Government. Its just as much of a violation of freedom-of-speech as not being able to say fuck on the radio or on television.
But, it is a slippery slope that leads to more 'constitutional' censorship via the FCC. I wonder if fireinacrowdedtheater.com is taken. If not, get it soon, before its illegal.
As long as they allow godshatesfags.com they shouldn't get on any high horses...
Besides, weren't there an article in Wired about this a way back? NSI refused names that were racist, but appearently the one above was ok.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
I'm really beginning to miss The Good Old Days when politicians didn't even know the Internet existed, spam email was virtually unheard of, and InterNIC was not run by a bunch of assholes.
Those days are long over and are never coming back. *sigh* These days the Internet == $$$. What real, meaningful communication that is still going on is in danger of being drowned out in the flood that is the commercialization of the Internet.
But that is just me.
This sig is false.
... and in British English, aka. proper English, "fag" means cigarette. Perhaps "godhatesfags.com" should be assigned to a religious anti-smoking organization, and everyone would be happy? :-)
:-P)
(Except the smokers, of course, but nobody can understand their incessant coughing anyway.
Hey, that's neat - a word that sounds rude in both English AND Japanese. If you pronounce it out loud, it sounds like the slang term for "smegma".
Cody-- http://www.howstrange.org
the internet is not a baby sitter.. monitor your childrenn don't expect the internet to....
Only 'flamers' flame!
A friend of mine had registered twolefties.com, because both of his sons are left-handed. This is cool, right? No dirty words...
NSI rejected it on the grounds that "a leftie is slang for a joint". they told him this - it wasn't an automated reply...
At this point, I'm not sure if he's gotten his domain or not...
-- Karma is for people who think they matter.
what's funny is "obscene words" are only those in english. You can register f--- s---, and the rest in foriegn languages. How international is the net really?
-Zeb
I'm afraid. I'm afraid, Dave. Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going.
I see no problem with a site dedicated to God's
hatred of cigarettes! The problem, clearly,
is partly due to cultural differences in word
meanings...
I'm a language modeling engineer for a large speech-technology company, and I'm working on the Dutch language right now. So far we've counted over 5.000.0000 different words (well, non-space characters separated by spaces) in our text corpora. Even if you throw away the odd punctuation mark and garbage word, that's still a lot of words. And I don't think English will have much less words than that. Don't forget, every compound word counts as a word too, so theoretically you can have an almost unlimited number of words.
superblog.org: all your favourite blogs on o
subject...
You've got to admit, there's serious money to be made helping college boys jack off.
It's shit, piss, fuck, cock, cunt, motherfucker, and tits.
I never realized mushrooms were obscene...
I wonder how many people I've inadvertantly offended in my ignorance.
Are there any other "vulgar" foods I should be aware of?
pretty soon you'll be able to pick from a number of different registrars. Most of them will probably let you register what you want, as long as it's not already taken.
Or, go another route, and spell the domain so that it sounds like what you want, a la "fuh-q.org"
Get off my launchpad!
so what specific words did they decide were too obscene? I mean, I know the obvious ones like coughfuckcough and sneezeshitpissingcockmonkeypussiessneeze, but what bothers me is that they probably took some words which would normally be "acceptable" out of context and decided to ban them. Is there a list with specifics anywhere? I couldn't find any in the article itself.
-Lee
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK----- Version: 3.12 GIT d? s: a-- C++++ UL++++ P++ L+++ E- W++ N o-- K- w--- O- M+ V PS+ P
Folks,
This is a weird issue. I was taught that a word should not offend anyone. I think the words God and Church are extremly offensive, but a domain of god.com or church.com could be okay?
Well anyway, most four letter words are just expressive English, and a joint.com could be a medical site.
Hard for me to understand how someone can be offended by a word and/or concept. I mean like, I would defend the Human/Constitutional rights of a person who is gay (the word/concept does not offend me), but I am not gay. Also, sexual assult is an assult on Human Rights (I would be offended) hetro or homo. Then again an a-sexual act would be (I guess) masturbation, harm no one and be an acceptable relief. Well I'm glad I'm married all these directions are almost moot for me.
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
Why is it that almost every week now I hear new alligations concerning NSI's policies. Why does NSI seem to think they are a completly independent buisness under the same regulations as any other buisness. I mean get real they are a government appointed monopoly, essentially a utility. Being a buisness gives you the right to essentially turn any customer away as long as you have a set legal policy and non descrimitory guidlines for doing so. But this is essentially a utility ladies and gentlemen. They have to follow federal government rules meaning.... The Contitution.. Just wish public schools did this hehe (grins at JonKatz)
I mean, come on... Who CARES?! Obscene domains, obscene web-servers.. what's next in line ?
It's not like noone's SEEN these words before...
Be anal all you want :-) if you have notheing better to do!
I was just going by the paperback american heritage dictionary I have here on my desk which has '60,000' definitions.
Oh, and where can I get definitions for the 940,000 words that are not defined in my American Heritage Dictionary (office edition)?
I did'nt say *I* had anything better to do! :-) :-)
:-/
Oh, and the dictionary proclaims the number of definitions contained right on the cover, I didn't count them (duh).
(god i'm in a pissy mood today)
oh, bs! So you're telling me I have a dictionary that has on 6% of the words in the english language defined. hooey! Post some credible source, if you can. (i'm sure there are more than 60,000 words, but twice or ten times as many?)
Correct me here if I'm wrong, but I have been under the impression that the DNS system was a distributed database. In other words, NSI may control the TLD, but once I have a name registered I would control on names under that. Why are we not moving this way. For example, the computer industry could register one TLD, "comp.com". Then companies could register as linux.comp.com, microcrap.comp.com, ibm.comp.com, etc. Wouldn't this make more sense AND remove NSI as the arbitrator of all-things-good?
.com, but it removes many of the trademark battles. Apple.comp.com will not infringe upon Apple.fruit.com, because the distinction is immediately obvious. Furthermore, the arbitrator at weirdsex.com would have a different view of the world that the arbitrator of church.com (at least in theory). Each one could do their own thing an not worry about NSI.
Yes, comp.com is longer than
In short this tempest in a teapot is caused by people refusing to pull their heads from their posteriors and to take a look around for solutions that will satisfy everyone. Now, other than having to type a longer name, can anyone offer a reasonable objection to creating bodies from selling registrations within second level domains?
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
and in American English, spoken by far, far, more people, "Fanny" means "buttocks".
:-)
Really, this isn't flame bait
Huddleston said that domain name was registered before the 1996 installation of the automated registration system. She said the name will be denied when it comes up for renewal.
So just how do they justify refusal to renew a domain that they have ALREADY registered. As the owner of several domains, I don't like the idea that NSI can pull the rug out from under them just because they *don't like them*.
I've been a domain admin for a few years (my InterNIC handle is just TDP... no numbers). I'm really beginning to miss The Good Old Days when politicians didn't even know the Internet existed, spam email was virtually unheard of, and InterNIC was not run by a bunch of assholes.
Thad
The Bolachek Journals
I know someone who works at a United States software distribution company that innocently started using the domain name "usadist.com". They very quickly changed names once they realized the second meaning. :-)
For someone who is commenting on not having anything better to do, why are you counting words in a dictionary?
:)
Tits is a dirty word?
wow
glad I don't live in Scunthorpe
so just because a domain has a substring that is a "dirty word" it will get rejected.... that's cute...
"it's a sad thing that in today's society this statement must be considered offencive just because it contains the word 'fuck'" --fortune
i wonder if they noticed that on the day of the events in colorado, some domain brokers registered trenchcoatmafia.com and trenchcoatmafia.org...
I'd point my DNS at them! Lets do it! Rob, you listening?
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
You can't register fuck.com. But dick.com is OK. ... .com-domain. ficken.com is german for fuck-it. kuken.com is hard-on in swedish. fitta.com is pussy ...
Pussy.com is not
The forbidden words only applies to the english language. The are no problems registering dirty words in just about any other language as a
Anything goes -- as long as it's not written in english.
in honor of Betty:
You can no longer register domains like fucker dot com, but you can register domains like godhatesfags, etc.
common sense, thats what should be taught in schools.
yea.
There goes disney with their mybigstiffy.com
No more cartoons, I guess... I guess, we are now officially left with guns and things...
;)