This article clearly is not censorship. It is rather ironic that Slashdot users are so quick to criticize when they have often been pushing for the same goal... consumer protection.
Essentially the bill is trying to make companies who claim to provide child filtering own up to their promises.
Let's try this in reverse. Most on Slashdot hate Comcast for cutting bit torrent traffic. Comcast promises a customer 6 Mbit internet yet throttles or even severs the connections.
Government is stepping in to slap their wrist and we're all happy.
Some families in Utah want to purchase internet service that provides a filtering service so they don't have to deal with updating filters on their own computers. Companies claiming to block content get their business and families don't get what they paid for. So now the government steps in and (from the original article) "providers would be subject for fines up to $10,000 for violating requirements."
This is a completely voluntary program, so it's not censorship; it is consumer protection because people aren't getting what they think they paid for.
Ok, there have been many funny comments, but this could be very useful outside of the realm of those of us who have poor hygiene habits.
My girlfriend is currently in her third year of med school and she has repeatedly talked about the issue of doctor's ties, white coats, and other things in hospitals being harbors for germs. I'm imagining that 'cleaning stations' could be setup relatively easily around hospitals where all you do is shine some UV light or whatever activates this stuff and you could decrease the spread of germs without huge cost or inconvenience. I mean, doctors wash their hands all the time, but how often can you realistically wash a tie?
I for one would like to see this developed further and find out how low we could get mass production costs.
Slashdot Mirror
This article clearly is not censorship. It is rather ironic that Slashdot users are so quick to criticize when they have often been pushing for the same goal... consumer protection.
Essentially the bill is trying to make companies who claim to provide child filtering own up to their promises.
Let's try this in reverse. Most on Slashdot hate Comcast for cutting bit torrent traffic. Comcast promises a customer 6 Mbit internet yet throttles or even severs the connections. Government is stepping in to slap their wrist and we're all happy.
Some families in Utah want to purchase internet service that provides a filtering service so they don't have to deal with updating filters on their own computers. Companies claiming to block content get their business and families don't get what they paid for. So now the government steps in and (from the original article) "providers would be subject for fines up to $10,000 for violating requirements."
This is a completely voluntary program, so it's not censorship; it is consumer protection because people aren't getting what they think they paid for.
P.S. I don't live in Utah.
Ok, there have been many funny comments, but this could be very useful outside of the realm of those of us who have poor hygiene habits.
My girlfriend is currently in her third year of med school and she has repeatedly talked about the issue of doctor's ties, white coats, and other things in hospitals being harbors for germs.
I'm imagining that 'cleaning stations' could be setup relatively easily around hospitals where all you do is shine some UV light or whatever activates this stuff and you could decrease the spread of germs without huge cost or inconvenience. I mean, doctors wash their hands all the time, but how often can you realistically wash a tie?
I for one would like to see this developed further and find out how low we could get mass production costs.
This is the exact reason all finger print software that I have used requires that you scan at least 2 fingers.
It even advised doing fingers on different hands with the possibility of scanning all your fingers in.