Candidates' Websites Blocked by CyberPatrol, N2H2 210
Yet another topical censorware report by Bennett Haselton and myself. Is this getting repetitive? It turns out that politicians' websites are being blocked in schools and libraries as inappropriate for viewing by children (and, in many cases, adults). The report,
"Blind Ballots",
takes a look at two dozen candidates whose campaigns have been censored in our public schools and libraries. One of the products blocks pretty equally across the political spectrum; the other takes a big chunk out of Republicans, Libertarians and conservative third parties. One Republican candidate (so far) has changed his position on filters because of this report.
Re:Sounds Interesting... (Score:1)
ESR should write it "HaX0r" to avoid censorware.
This was easy to miss... don't be misled. (Score:1)
Vote for Browne! (Score:1)
Remember, voting for the Libertarians will end all of this.
Neither education or libraries are a function of government as defined in the constitution.
No further funding for libraries and schools means no more censorware.
Get out and vote today, and do the right thing.
I knew it! It wuz them damn DISCORDIANS! (Score:1)
They make funny haha like they're a joke religion, but in reality they're a drug-fueled death cult. Just be sure not to drink the coolaid after the hoo-haw.
They pretend to be uninvolved and disdain the elctoral process. Don't be fooled. They have enoromous wealth and power -- 23% of all computer programmers are Discordians! They control the computers that control the Swiss banks.
"f0ck this sh1t, illuminate them all"
That only works if idiots set up the filters. (Score:2)
It can't get better. It's inherently impossible. (Score:2)
So they can use cpu-expensive algorithms to look for meaning in phrases and censor more accurately, but doing so means they don't have enough CPU time to examine more than a small part of the WWW. So if they want to filter enverything, then they have to do it clunky and badly so they can build the lists quickly enough.
Now, you might argue that hardware will get faster and thus be able to examine content faster, but that ignores the fact that the WWW itself is also going to be growing during that time too, so the problem space will be larger when the software is faster, so you probably won't gain any ground.
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
Filtering is done at the delievery end; the goal of filtering is to limit what content that a select subgroup of the whole can see; the content still goes out regardless.
Censoring is done at the producing end; the goal of censoring is to prevent content from even being distributed to anyone.
A lot of /.ers related these two issues, and they *are* closely related. However, we are talking about filters for children (who do NOT enjoy all the rights given by the Bill of Rights, by law), which is a small subgroup of the entire internet audience.
Compare filtering in the states to what's happening in China; the government is *censoring* web sites such that only offically approved news stories and other information is carried.
The arguement that groups like Peacefire and others make is not the filtering is bad, but filter programs that are out there today are inheriently bad such that at times they will act as biased filters (blocking certain information when other similar information isn't). An excellent example is this story; if even just one political site is blocked, assuming the site to be legitamite, then the filter software is bad, because that one candidate or issue is unfairly biased against. Another example are the number of sites on abortions that tend to get blocked... are the filter writers pro-life, or is it just the software catching one word that triggers an offensive flag?
Now imaging all the possible situations of where and when you'd want filtering, and all the possible problems that could come up. You'd realize quickly that there is no way that current software today can unbiasly filter the net; the only alternative is to constantly monitor the activities of the children as they use the net such that you can evaluate the page in real time and decide if your child can look or not. Thus, making the arguement that the ideal filter program is a dream, and anything that currently claims to filter the net is a failure and should be tossed aside.
At least it's a start (Score:4)
It may not be "sufficiently idealistic" to say:
If demonstrating this pragmatic fact to be true has the effect that the "dumb politicians" see the point that they can't censor, then it can have the required result.
What do we say "when their error rates become lower"?
It's not a problem because the error rates can only move from spectacularly horrible to being terribly bad.
The software won't ever do what it's "supposed" to, because there's no good fixed definition of what "should" be censored.
Attrition.org mirror (Score:2)
Seeing as how the hacker finishes off with "As such, I must vote Gore, and I urge you to do so." and then links to Al Gore's web page, I doubt it was a Green sympathizer. Of course, it could be a Green trying to make both Democrats and Republicans look bad, but now we're in conspiracy theory territory.
Re:Sounds Interesting... (Score:2)
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
If violence and sex in media has NO influence on people, then why is advertising a multi-billion industry?
From my original post:
"I have yet to see any studies that show that the viewing of violent or sexual images has a negative effect on the majority of the viewers."
I didn't claim viewing violence or sex had no effect. If fact viewing sexual materials has a definite effect on me. A pleasurable one.
I simply pointed out that I have see no studies that show it has a NEGATIVE effect. Everyone seems to assume it does, at least on children. Show me the evidence.
The fact that those supporting such censorship don't have any sceintific evidence is rather telling. Because if there was any you can sure the pro censorship crowd would be trumpeting it.
Of course, the idea that sex = bad could be so ingrained in our culture it never occurs to most people to question it. Kinda like believing the world is flat prior to Copernicus or that commies were bad in the '50s.
Steve M
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
As a potential parent, unlike you, ...
What do ya mean I'm not a potential parent? I am too! And I'm a potential immortal as well. I'm not dead yet!
More seriously ...
If I choose to not have my children curse, or watch violence, I expect that society will not make the decision impossible.
Agreed.
I dont have any problem with the fact that kids 'end up' seeing porn, and hearing cussing. My problem is when my tax dollars are being used to PROVIDE that. I dont agree with that.
I object to my tax dollars being used to censor materials at a public terminal. Why should your objection take precedence over mine? Especially when yours violates the first amendment?
I have no problems with censoring, and I completely disagree that the internet has ANYTHING to do with it.
As you've no doubt gathered, I do have problems with censorship. And if the internet has nothing to do with it, does that mean that you also favor banning books if they have sexual or violent themes? Or use curse words?
As for the supreme court you may wish to check out the Dread Scott decision. In which the supreme court ruled that slaverly was legal and that congress could not outlaw slavery.
I doubt we'd get a similar ruling today. So perhaps it is not the case that they will always rule the same way.
Steve M
Re:Hmm. (Score:4)
The idea itself (filtering the net) is good,...
This does seem to be a popular assumption.
How does it sound when we change one word? Let's see: The idea itself (censoring the net) is good,...
It doesn't sound so innocuous anymore.
I have yet to see any studies that show that the viewing of violent or sexual images has a negative effect on the majority of the viewers. Of any age. (Just as some people are more susceptible to alcoholism it may be the case that a small segment of the population cannot safely view violent or sexual images, but the case is far from settled.)
I've heard quite a bit about protecting children from porn on the net, but I have seen no compelling reasons for doing so. We seem to take it for granted that sex = bad. This is certainly not the case elsewhere, I've seen X rated movies on the French equivelant of HBO, topless women in English newspapers, and similar elsewhere in Europe. What social problems are a result of children growing up in such an environment?
Yet both sides of the filtering debate take it as a given the children should not be exposed to sexual material. Seems to me that this assumption is flawed.
I think it was Frank Zappa (I don't have a the reference) who told congress that he wanted his children to be exposed to this stuff in the media, so that they would be inoculated against it in real life. That makes sense to me.
And despite the scape goating of the media over violent content, violent crime is down again this year. Perhaps video games serve as an outlet for violence and not a cause?
Censoring is wrong. Period. The internet doesn't change that.
SteveM
Re:Not as good as being hacked (Score:2)
That's my candidate (Score:2)
Re:Wrong criticism. (Score:2)
I sympathasize; it reminds me of when people defended DeCSS on the basis that it could never be used to pirate DVDs on the 'Net, even though we all know that someday you'll be able to download 5 Gig in a second. These types of arguments are strawmen-in-the-making.
But I think that improved filtering is a long way off (much further off than 1 second DVBD downloads), and I won't lament when it gets here. Why? Because I think that the prerequisites for good filtering are extremely high; it basically requires strong AI. Pattern matching just won't cut the mustard. You need a real AI that has gone to law school and has lived in the community for a few years. If the Cyberpatrol guys manage a breakthrough that the computer and cognitive scientists have all so far failed with, they'll have my heartfelt congratulations.
Besides, it's just so damned funny! It's like reading a threat from the CueCat guys.
So, in the mean time, I enjoy stories like this and hope they receive very wide publicity, because it makes the censors look foolish and makes Joe Schmoe at least stop and question things for a second.
---
Interesting (Score:2)
I just ran these new sites through the search engine, and again Cyberpatrol claims it's not blocking the sites! They must monitor these reports really closely, and quickly remove sites from the list when there's a question about how appropriate it is to block them.
This all ties in with their refusal to let people browse the contents of their lists. You could claim they're practicing corporate censorship, but really it just looks like incompetence on their parts, since they are banning sites regardless of political party.
--
Obscene Politicians (Score:2)
Re:One has to wonder... (Score:3)
Well, "gore" would be blocked by a violence filter, and "bush" by a sex filter.
And of course, "nader" is an obscenity in any businessman's dictionary.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Sorry, I don't buy your extremely narrow reading of one verse from the Bible. Thanks for playing.
As to your questions:
Out of wedlock pregnancies are bad because it is likely that the child will not be brought up with two loving parents, nor the appropriate emotional, moral, intellectual and financial support. It's common sense, and is being borne out in study after study that a loving mother and a loving father are your best bet for a happy childhood and a happy, successful adulthood.
We should shield our children from portrayals of sexuality (like almost all popular media) that treat women as simply a mobile carrier for things to stick your pecker in. We should shield children from the depravity of unnatural acts, out-of-wedlock sex (which drives people to kill viable unborn human beings in ways so brutal that you wouldn't even see them in an id game). We should shield our children from a view of sex that treats people as objects to be used for our own gratification, despite the strong emotional or psychological bonding that sexual congress produces. We should shield our children from a view of sex that causes the massive spread of disease and emotional damage. Instead we should teach our children that sex is something natural and beautiful, when it is used in both is unitive and procreative ways with the sacred bonds of marriage.
I'm sorry you are no longer a Christian, but it's obvious your knowledge of doctrine is extremely superficial if not out-and-out wrond, so I can understand why you left.
Experience will not being knowledge and wisdom without a thorough underpinning of logic and morality, both of which are almost completely absent in our society.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
The AIDS PSA industry is deluding you into believing you're safe simply because people would otherwise not even bother at all if they understood the real risks. Translated: They;re willing to mislead you because they know people value meaningless boinking over life itself.
I have to laugh at these PSA's that tell me AIDS can affect anybody. I can tell you it will _never_ happen to me (unless I get it through a medical procedure). On the other hand, a gay friend of mine is always getting AIDS tests and seems to have a fatalistic attitude about it all.
As far your comment about war, that is almost beneath replying to. You clearly are extremely ignorant of world history if you thing that Christians and Jews corner the market on war. Get your nose out of the computer and try reading a book.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Show me the temples being built to Diana or Zeus in the last 2000 years. Who walks around with a symbol of Mithras or Lug or Thor or Ra these days? I think you'd have to look long and hard.
Don't pretend for a minute that these religions play any significant roles in the modern world.
Christianity isn't out to control people. People do not go around shouting "Convert or Die!", nor was that ever a significant method of conversion when compared to other religions or political factions and even when it did happen, it was clearly against what Christ taught. Christianity is not about control but bring people to understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As you can see in John 6, if you don't like it, leave. No one's holding a gun to your head.
Re:Watch the Teletubbies, too (Score:2)
Just because something is an ideal that most people are unwilling to attempt to follow doesn't make it any less true. Your complications are nothing more than disagreeing with the morality.
Life is not always simple, but there is a basic morality spelled out by Christianity that is really not very hard to understand and is not hard to follow if you are really willing to try. Unfortunately, very few people are... including me sometimes (I'm not perfect either).
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Rick: If you didn't do A, B wouldn't happen.
Response: But everybody does A, so you're wrong.
Marxist dogma will always fail, because without a moral context into which the economic philosophies are placed, no one is going to do what it takes to make it work... and we all know that most Marxist societies exist/existed in a relative state of moral vacuum. It presumes that people are naturally perfect, and if treated perfectly equally, ambition, envy and greed would magically disappear.
Christianity treats everyone as naturally good, but subject to the constant temptation to do wrong, against which we all must strive to overcome with the grace of God.
Re:HOWEVER (Score:2)
You're the first person I've heard so eloquently and logically describe the issue.
Children cannot innocently walk into an adult book store... why should the Internet be any different?
No doubt that the filtering issue is sticky, what with plenty of legitimate things being filters because of the filters' stupidly primitive criteria. Nonetheless, it is perfectly acceptable and in no way falls into the realms of censorship to filter public terminals. After all, you can't get hardcopy pr0n in any library I've ever been to (not that I've asked
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Think about what you're saying.
Despite what you might think, children are not mature enough to understand certain things until there is a solid logical and moral foundation built. Otherwise they have no way of distinguishing right from wrong. Children are not completely independant and autonomous people otherwise they'd have the right to vote and we'd kick them out and let them get jobs. Your ridiculous notion that protecting your children from harmful things is wrong "infuriates" me. You might be willing to abdicate your responsibility to give kids a chance to learn the right things _before_ all this stuff comes along. I will not. Furthermore, even when my children (I have 4) are old enough to be out on their own, when I don't have total control of what they see or who they are with, there will still be the same rules at my house that there are now. And yes, I practive all the things I teach them.
As far as this creating "closed-minded" people. Well, guess what? There are some things you should be closed-minded about. Some things are wrong. Period. This moral relativism that we are constantly bathed in is intellectually bankrupt and just an excuse by people who are unwilling to stay away from immoral behavior yet somehow care about the fact that others may disapprove.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
We must shield children from what's harmful until they have the capacity to learn how make that decision for themselves. You don't hand a medical student a scalpel and set him loose in the OR before he's completed his education. Why should sending people out in a world with many real dangers be any different? We have to learn to walk before we can run. That has nothing to do with not respecting the rights and freedoms of children and everything to do with educating them in the right order.
And as far as literal Bible interpretation... it's one thing to say that the Earth was created 5000 years ago because of some tortured logic resulting from reading Genesis, and it's another entirely that when St. Paul says something is wrong to believe it is wrong (after all, Jesus granted St. Peter the right to rule on moral teaching, which has been passed down through his successors to today). Christian tradition holds that Scripture is divinely inspired and therefore transmits the message the Creator intended even through flawed human instruments, but this understanding can only be learned properly through the combined wisdom of the Magesterium, which as a whole is guided by the Holy Spirit from teaching error (again with a strong Scriptural basis, see Acts). However, just because secular customs of behavior fluctuate wildly, the underlying morality of these behaviors does not. Furthermore, eaither you believe Scripture is divinely inspired, or you don't. But if you don't I have a hard time seeing how you (not you personally) would bother to follow Christianity in any form as a religion rather than just a loose guideline of nice, but optional ideas to live your life.
The Bible can, in fact, be interpreted (or more often selectively read) to mean almost anything you say, which is why understanding Scripture must be tempered with interpretation of Tradition as passed down over the last 2000 years. Otherwise, people simply pick and choose what they like and you end up with 40,000 different sects of Christianity that differ on every conceivable aspect of anything even remotely connected to the subject.
I greatly appreciate your polite and reasoned response, but must agree to disagree.
Re:covert or die... (Score:2)
As far as the Ten Commandments go, religion aside, they are a significant basis for all moral code in the Western world, like the Magna Carta, the U.S. Constitution, the works of the ancient Greeks, Roman ideas of government, even the code of Hammurabi. I don't know exactly how the posting of these is handled, and don't necessarily agree with it from a Constitutional pointy of view, but the fact remains that they constitute an extremely important historical document.
We don't need knee-jerk reactions. (Score:2)
Re:What's the point of this? (Score:2)
Before there were Internet terminals in libraries, did you ever hear of parents complaining about their children finiding pornography at the library? Did you ever hear complaints that children are innocently or purposefully walking into adult bookstores?
Ideas and images are just that, but they can still have a very deleterious effect on immature people who are incapable of understanding them. Do you think a young child should see the commendable "Schindler's List"? I think you would just terrify the poor child and he or she would gain no understanding of what the movie is all about. Adults on the other hand will gain an understanding of the events portrayed in the movie and the significance of protecting against it happening again.
We don't let medical students perform surgery, we don't let pilot trainees land a jumbo jet, we don't let incompetant poeple write mission- critical software (well, except for Microsoft...). Similarly, you cannot expose children to every conceivable concept and expect them to assimilate and understand it all. You must walk before you can run, and I think it is in society's best interests to suffer this inconvenience and imperfect implementation in order to repsect the rights of parents to feel safe about their children using a public facility.
If public filters in libraries (however poorly- or well-implemented) used by children is censorship than so are rules against children buying pornography or seeing X-rated movies.
Re:Watch the Teletubbies, too (Score:2)
Re:We don't need knee-jerk reactions. (Score:2)
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:3)
If you think literature that exploits and objectifies women is OK, then that's fine, but don't foist your ire on religion.
The fact of the matter is, if people adhered to Christian morality regarding sex there would be no STD's, no out-of-wedlock pregnancies, AIDS would be extremely rare (or might have never gotten past a few isolated incidents), no women or children being enslaved to prositution, no sexual predators kidnapping children, no president Clinton and Monica in the Oval Office. The list goes on.
Furthermore, if those ancient fertility cults and Roman religions are so good, where are they now? The fact of the matter is Christianity and Judaism for thousands of years have had a logical, consistent, natural and workable morality of sex that, if followed, would eliminate a whole lot of suffering.
Gee, those are some pretty dangerous ideas.
Re:What's the point of this? (Score:2)
The problem is not that the moral stance of censorware proponents is that censorship is an outright good thing. The moral ideal they are normally working with is that certain things (pornography/drugs/hate/whatever) should not exist at all. Obviously, a solid moral stance against censorship will conflict with this, resulting in one ideal being chosen over the other.
Changing someone else's morals is not easy. It usually requires a desire to change from within. What you can do, however, is make slow headway on other items related to the moral question. For example, do you think the US population in, say, 1850 would do nothing if the law/tax/etc systems of the time were immediately changed to the way things are nowadays? But it wasn't an immediate change...it was a gradual change with one item at a time.
If we can convince people that current censorware solutions are wrong, then at least we've gained some ground. And with the nature of the internet, I really doubt that anyone will ever make "perfect" censorware. There will always be "bad" things that slip through the cracks, and "good" things that get blocked from view. Sure you could make a censorware product whose lists are updated daily by actual humans, but the internet is simply too big and too ephemeral for this to ever be a practical solution.
Re:What's the point of this? (Score:5)
But, if you can give a censorware advocate firm examples of the failures of such products, you run a slight chance of putting a crack in their defenses on the subject. With enough examples, you may even be able to convince them that there is no current censorware solution that doesn't have these problems. Then you can work on convincing them that automated censorware that actually has a 100% success rate is probably never going to happen. Then you can get them to realize that the only blocking software you really need is heavy parental involvement in children's lives.
Re:What's the point of this? (Score:2)
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
The reason porn is specifically targeted is because of parents. e.g. child A prints off 50 porn pics, child B prints off 50 promotional pics for children's films. The former will cause the biggest stink even though both have wasted the same amount of time and resources.
And despite the scape goating of the media over violent content, violent crime is down again this year. Perhaps video games serve as an outlet for violence and not a cause?
Hardly the newest of claims, why do you think the Romans had such violent public entertainments?
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
If it's so important that children not see nipples then best pass a law mandating bottle feeding...
Different cultures have different ritual prohibitions. In some countries it's against the law for a woman to show her hair in public. In other places, they can even show their pubic hair if they wish.
The vast majority of countries are multi-cultural anyway. Especially geographically large countries such as the USA, Canada and Australia.
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
These arguments are possibly circular or self fulfiling though.
These beliefs most likely started because parents don't feel comfortable talking about sex to others, especially their obsessively inquisitive children.
"Started" is like arguing if the chicken or the egg came first. Once such attitudes get established they will tend to self propergate.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
There are still echos of firtility cults in celebrations co-opted by Christianity. e.g. Rabbits and eggs being associated with Easter.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Except what actually is the "christian morality regarding sex", most of what people like to claim is appears to have been simply made up by priests, there is very little to find in the bible. Also remember that one of the closest friends of Jesus was a prostitue, Jesus was apparently unmarried at his death and Christian churchs have not always embraced marriage as they do now.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
With some of the fertility symbols intact too...
And Christianity and Judaism hardly have a corner on the idea of keeping it in your pants. All religions purport to deem when it is approriate to engage in sexuality and reproduction.. and all religions also wish to control people and their offspring.. coincidence?
This will give you attempts to restrict sex to procreation, it may also give rise to relationships being ratified by priests...
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
But portrays of mens sexuality which are demeaning are ok...
We should shield children from the depravity of unnatural acts,
Usually when someone says this the "unnatural acts" they refer to are actually perfectly natural. Whilst humans do plenty of unnatural things having sex isn't one of them
out-of-wedlock sex (which drives people to kill viable unborn human beings in ways so brutal that you wouldn't even see them in an id game).
Married women never have abortions?
Instead we should teach our children that sex is something natural and beautiful, when it is used in both is unitive and procreative ways with the sacred bonds of marriage.
Except that marriage is one of the "unnatural behaviours" which humans practice...
Re:how can somebody tell what is blocked? (Score:2)
Many such companies make this claim, quite a few of them have been caught telling outright lies about how they compile their lists. Where is the independant evidence that Websense does use humans?
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
You missed out Islam, anyway all these 3 religions (and many more if you consider the various sub sects) originate from Judaism.
What probably matters more is organised religion and religious dogma, rather than actual religious faiths and holy books.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Or it can raise children to behave in exactly they way they are told not to. Especially if the parents doing this are in anyway hypocritical.
Re:sex bad? (Score:2)
Depends if you have made an agreement with another person to be their exclusive tennis partner. The biblical prohibition against adultary is about dishonesty, rather than sex.
Re:Sounds Interesting... (Score:2)
Interestingly what does Websense classify the Microsoft "Linux Myths" pages as?
However, Websense is guilty of generalizing in their categorization. ESR's home page is categorized as "hacking."
Looks like they are using some sort of web spider, rather than the people they claim to use...
A common problem with using software is that there are very few words which are unique to catagories people want to block. e.g. is something refering to "toys" porn or not?
Re:Dick Armey (Score:2)
Really? I'm sure there would be a few who would see *.mil as being for the block list, possibly *.gov too...
Re:Finally hitting home.. (Score:2)
Cue story of feminist advocate who's own writings were banned under the laws she helped write...
Re:It can't get better. It's inherently impossible (Score:2)
Except that even the best such algorithms are poor compared with humans. Being unable to understand such things as satire and humor or even the difference between parts of a mammal and parts of a bird.
Re:Wrong criticism. (Score:2)
Which opens a whole other can of worms. Such an AI may well have it's own opinions as to what is important. e.g. establishing it's own citizenship rights over filtering the internet for human young.
Re:An explanation (Score:2)
They probably don't want to admit that they have far fewer human reviews than they'd like people to believe.
Re:Don't Believe the Hype (Score:2)
Do the systems concered have regular updates? Don't you think that the people involved might be monitoring such reports?
Re:Reminds Me of Montag (Score:2)
Exactly the kind of thing you expect to happen where the blocking is done by a program, with no human seeing the results (unless someone complains.) There are very few words which are used in porn and porn only. Many of the terms used in porn are also used in things completly unrelated, so attempts to bar porn also bar information on cars, buildings, toys, cooking, fixings, farming, sports, etc.
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
Maybe the filter is there to protect teachers form being embarrased when a child findd a "wack a mole" porn site and can't get out of it without help...
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Is it worst for the child to start with two parents then at some point change or to simply start with one?
Re:In other poli-website news... (Score:2)
Dick Armey (Score:3)
More information is available at http://dfn.org/Alerts/contest.htm [dfn.org]
Hmm. (Score:3)
The truth is, I highly doubt that anyone really wants students to have un-controlled access to ANYTHING on the net in school, provided by our money.
Its not like people advocate playboy (magazines) to high schools (no matter how educational it might be, grin)..
The idea itself (filtering the net) is good, its just the implementation that is, was, and will be (for a long time) crap.
At least, IMHO..
Re:Hmm. (Score:3)
I have no problems with censoring, and I completely disagree that the internet has ANYTHING to do with it.
As a potential parent, unlike you, and Frank Zappa, I DONT want my children exposed to these materials. If I choose to not have my children curse, or watch violence, I expect that society will not make the decision impossible.
I dont have any problem with the fact that kids 'end up' seeing porn, and hearing cussing.
My problem is when my tax dollars are being used to PROVIDE that. I dont agree with that.
Much like broadcast TV, movies, etc. There are areas where children should have different access than adults.
However, lemme give you the flip side..
I recently went to my first strip club. Quite enjoyable, really. However, the women were wearing SEE-THRU 'pasties' which are small devices to cover their nipples.
It seems that the laws here protect against those nipples being exposed, with the intent being that if a underage person got in, it would be no worse than a live pg-13 movie.
LET ME SAY HOW STUPID THAT IS.
Censorship exists for one reason.
BECAUSE CHILDREN *ARE* DIFFERENT THAN ADULTS.
Period.
As to whether or not it is right for children to be exposed to nudity, and sex, is not my place to say. But, BUT, the supreme court has *always* ruled that way, and ostensibly always will.
In addition, that *is* how our society is geared. The internet should not be the exception, AS YOU SAID.
Awesome! (Score:3)
Then he'd have to circumvent an access protection device to access to his own web page, and we could lock him up for 10 years for breaking a law he sponsored!
Oh my dear god, i'm nearly creaming my pants thinking about it.
how can somebody tell what is blocked? (Score:4)
I don't have the time, money, or computer systems to install, configure, and test urls with different filtering software. Is there some web site that I can go to, submit a url get a summary of what filtering software thinks of a web site?
Given that these filtering companies encrypt their lists, there probobly isn't an easy way to set up a site like this. Do the filtering companies maintain a query for their piece of software? If not, why not?
It seems to me that this is something that web masters are going to have to worry about from now on, just as they have to worry about placement in search engines now.
Re:Finally Cyberpatrol makes a good decision .. (Score:2)
Not even that clear cut, I'm afraid.. It's not illegal per se for a child to view or have material the standards say is pornography; Most laws merely state that the minor cannot purchase them. I'm assuming parental consent would be good enough, so long as the material cannot be judged to have so damaging an effect as to be 'child abuse'.
Blissfully Ignorant (Score:3)
Please. If I understand this correctly the reason why canidate web pages are being blocked is that they want to discuss some tough moral and ethical issues. Canidates have stances on contraversal issues like abortion, violence in society (gun control, violence in entertainment), gambling, law enforcement and they want to tell people about them. Unfortunately, this puts them squarely behind the taboo mongers.
What good is it to hide this information away from our kids? What is wrong with letting our children know that there are unpretty moral and ethical issues at risk that will effect their lives now and in the future? It is very true that 10 year old children don't have the right to vote nor should they but blinding children to important issues isn't the answer especially since there is a lot of hoopla around this election.
This stuff presents the biggest problem with censorware. Kids have legit, non-vulgar questions but censorware doesn't have a clue so they stay unanswered. I just hope children are smart enough to keep asking questions and their parents and teachers are good enough to answer them fairly because censorware certainly is failing them.
I'm also unclear if it is justifiable to block canidate page at the workplace. Sure it constitutes visiting web pages that have nothing to do with work but civics shouldn't be automatically ignored once you step into your cubical.
Re:One has to wonder... (Score:2)
instead of having to worry about whether a site can work on the two major browsers (at the least) on the top platforms with different monitor settings...
they'll have to worry about whether their content can make it through the majority of libraries and school systems with the different censor programs set at different levels of "accessibility" while still retaining their "message"
Re:That only works if idiots set up the filters. (Score:2)
..here's the reason (Score:2)
The censorware companies simply block all pages that come from free sites. It's just a lot easier to block all content from a site than it is to weed out the pr0n and sadism. Most of these candidates host their sites on these free services, so they are blocked. It really has nothing to do with their views (well, maybe it does: they can't or won't spend exorbitant amounts of money on a pay site, so Mattel deems them unworthy of being viewed...).
That's what you get for trusting the Tipper Gores of the world...serves them right!
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
I'm definitely a potential parent.
Let me tell you a secret. In society there are such things as nudity, porn (not the same thing), violence and curses. Wether you like it or not has nothing to do with it. If you don't want your children exposed to any of those, keep them away from society. You will do them a huge un-service, but if you want to isolate them from the world please do (now I might call that child abuse, but lets not go too far)
I dont have any problem with the fact that kids 'end up' seeing porn, and hearing cussing. My problem is when my tax dollars are being used to PROVIDE that. I dont agree with that.
Beep, wrong!
YOU want to spend tax dollars preventing it, not the other way around.
or rather: you could cut them off from the net (and other media) for a low cost, you can give them access for a moderate cost or moderate their access for a high cost. Those are your options.
The first option saves you tax dollars but ruin their exucation. The third will not keep the bad things away, and will cost your and *mine* tax money.
Censorship exists for one reason.
BECAUSE CHILDREN *ARE* DIFFERENT THAN ADULTS.
Yes. Children have not yet learned that naked bodies are exiting. They have not yet learned (much) about sex. They have not yet learned the taboos that makes porn interesting.
UNTIL A CHILD LEARNS THESE THINGS, THEY ARE JUST NOT INTERESTED!
A kid who stumbles onto a porn site will most likely simply move on to disney.com
Exeptions are a) a kid who has matured enough to be interested in sex. That is, has figured out that those body parts are good for other things than urinating.
b) a kid whos parents freaks out at the sight of skin. That kid will not know *why* this is so interesting, but since it is forbidden it must be
In addition, that *is* how our society is geared. The internet should not be the exception
Ever wondered about the "inter" part of "internet"?
That means that there is stuff there from any society. Not just yours.
Deal with it.
Re:Children are Different. So are Family Values. (Score:2)
The main problem with censorship is the censor.
A machine cannot make filtering choises by itself, and a human censor will always be subjet to his/her own values.
The only kind of censorware that i *might* accept as a compromise would:
a) be open about it's algorithms and criterias. (open data much more important than open source in this case)
b) be overridable. (have a setting that does not block teh site, but display a message "Warning, the site you requested is listed as pornographic/hate speech/etc Do you want to continue? (y/n)"
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
Censoring is done at the producing end; the goal of censoring is to prevent content from even being distributed to anyone.
Eh,... can you explain the practical difference between preventing someone from speaking and preventing people to hear what is said?
I recognize the distinction between "filtering for everyone" and "Filtering for kids" but mandatory filters at schools and libraries *does not just affect children!*
Do you really think that senior year high school students needs filtering? What if they use the same library as some ten year olds?
Perhaps we should impelement the starting questions from "leisure suit larry"
"How old are you" (18)
"To verify that you are really 18 you must answer these questions..."
What's the point of this? (Score:5)
* mild mannered physics grad student by day *
Changing views... (Score:2)
Wrong criticism. (Score:2)
I'm starting to be really bothered by this type of approach to criticizing censorware. Why are we focusing on things like effectiveness, and these cases of mistaken blocking, instead of issues of free speech? Software does get better, and eventually these errors are going to become pretty rare. What exactly are we going to say when their error rates become lower, when these types of mistakes stop happening frequently? We're going to be totally out of luck, facing a bunch of people saying "See, the software does what it's supposed to." We can't then start pointing out that what the sofware does (censorship) is wrong. We need to be saying that now. And that's something that's barely mentioned when people talk about censorware.
Eric Henry
Error rates? (Score:2)
Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
Ancient Israel was opposed to Babylon and other civilizations which had fertility cults in their religions. Therefore, "if our enemies have sex in their religions, sex must be bad". Likewise, early Christianity was opposed to the main religions in the Roman Empire, most of which had a relatively tolerant attitute towards sex.
If something has to be censored, I would vote for censoring religious teaching. Looking at the current and past wars, nothing seems to incite so much violence as religions.
Re:Read The Bible, brother! (Score:2)
But, on the other hand, it was the loathing of nudity in the Middle Ages that did away with the public baths. The ensuing proliferation of fleas caused the biggest epidemic of all recorded history, one that eliminated at least one third of the population of Europe, where those customs were held. How many people has AIDS killed? About 0.2% of the world population in 20 years?
With condoms and contraceptives, we need not fear STDs or unwanted pregnancy, so, even if those effects were a problem in the past, we are now free to engage in as much sex as we want.
Women enslaved to prostitution? Is that worse than a woman enslaved to an abusing husband?
Clinton and Monica? The funniest people in the US since the Marx brothers.
The only harmful effect I can see in sex is when people do it so much that they forget how to make war. They are then in great danger of being eliminated by war-worshippers, like Jews and Christians.
BTW, who is Chester?
Re:sex bad? (Score:2)
Let's suppose you meet someone in a tennis club. After a few minutes of talking, you find that both want to play tennis, and both have somewhat compatible skills. Would it be "bad" for you to play tennis with a stranger, with no further regard to who your partner was? Or would you want to know better you partner, have a more meaningful relation with him/her, etc?
Why can't two people agree to have a good time making sex, without further compromise? Why is it sinful, is someone being harmed?
Re:Hmm. (Score:4)
Well, yes and no. They are smaller in size, and they have less experience. Otherwise they are exactly the same. Indeed, by growing up and gaining experience, children do turn into adults.
The instinct to protect children is correct, it's what guarantees the survival of the species. The big question is, from what are we protecting our children? Seeing an adult woman's nipples? Why should the act of seeing a woman's nipples be so bad for children, while they can freely see men's nipples at any beach? And why should a larger body size protect a person from the harmful effects of seeing a woman's nipples?
Different cultures have different ritual prohibitions. In some countries it's against the law for a woman to show her hair in public. In other places, they can even show their pubic hair if they wish.
Those rules have no rational reason for being, other than letting the rulers wield their power. The priests, judges, elders, shamans, whatever, must have some way of demonstrating their power, and they must have some alleged reason for that power, or the people would simply do away with them, and tell them to find some useful task to perform.
Politicians Websites (Score:2)
Re:One has to wonder... (Score:2)
Re:how can somebody tell what is blocked? (Score:2)
This is a stupid idea, but here goes. Find a chat room or IRC channel where HS students are likely to hang out, find one, and ask him/her to hit your site from school. If the usage stats are to be believed, one or two under 18 guinea pigs should be a good test.
Re:One has to wonder... (Score:3)
So? (Score:2)
At best, you occasionally read a statement that filtering "sometimes" incorrectly blocks sites.
The decisions get made by politicians who are trying to please (or placate?) the everyday citizens. The everyday citizens just knows that there is a lot of porn on the net and that filtering software is supposed to keep kids out of it. That over-simplified perception won't change until their favorite local TV personality tells them otherwise.
What can we do to make this information well-known, rather than just preaching to the choir?
My mom is not a Karma whore!
If it really does block politics... (Score:3)
My mom is not a Karma whore!
Finally hitting home.. (Score:2)
Politicians are finally going to have to wake up and realize that no one wins when it comes to censorship. "Go ahead and burn the all the books. Whoa, hold on, those are MY memoirs. I meant burn EVERYONE ELSE'S books". Yeesh.
Now, if we could only make other geek-ish issues like DMCA, IP-law, and guaranteed anonymity hit home as clearly, we could probably get something DONE inside Beltway-gridlock-land.
Filter Logic... (Score:3)
(... ho hum... another page... should I let the kiddies see it? Hmm... it seems to be about Gore. Violence and blood is a no-no and bad. Children shouldn't be seeing this... ---CENSOR---
Celebrating Pornography Awareness Week (Score:3)
It's titled Celebrating Pornography Awareness Week [geekpress.com].
One political example is worth mentioning here. Dan's Data [dansdata.com] did a test of Pornsweeper [dansdata.com], which is supposed to filter images. This picture of George and Laura Bush [dansdata.com] was blocked. Filthy porno indeed!
-- Diana Hsieh
A Good Thing (Score:2)
The fact that these politicians' sites are being blocked is A Good Thing!
The politicians will only do something if they can plainly see that its hurting their chances for re-election.
Maybe they will finally do something about it!
Mandatory Mastercard joke (Score:3)
Internet access: $40/mo
Filtering software: $100
Republican politician's face when he sees his site has been censored: Priceless
Re:What's the point of this? (Score:2)
Well, in this case, attacking the efficacy of censorware has caused at least one congressional candidate to rethink his policy of demanding censorware in schools and libraries. Peacefire's policy of continually revealing the short-comings of censorware, especially with regard to over-censhorship, is exactly what's needed to argue against censorware products. Consider the following hypothetical scenario:
Your local library is considering installing censorware on their computers. Do you:
Re:Sounds Interesting... (Score:2)
Well, technically, they're correct. ESR's home page *is* about hacking [tuxedo.org].
note why conservative sites blocked (Score:5)
Finally Cyberpatrol makes a good decision .. (Score:2)
Now if we had a Beowulf cluster of these ..
A liberal conspiracy! (Score:2)
I fear that my right to bear arms is being infringed upon. When I get my firearms license, I want to be able to fire a shotgun, rifle, or perhaps even a Desert Eagle, and actually feel the recoil from the gun, instead of just playing another FPS and dreaming about holding the gun.
Re:One has to wonder... (Score:3)
One has to wonder... (Score:4)
Eric Gearman
--
Who is the censor? (Score:2)
Which clients select which lists and what attributes they enable is entirely their choice. The censors are the guys selecting the lists, setting up the blocking options or the guys mandating their use in libraries, schools, etc. Not the groups of little old ladies who spend their days looking for sites and rating them based on the instruction from the clients paying for the list. And neither is it the fault of the guys who created the tool, which can be used or abused. The guy who contracted me originally to write it, had in mind only the parental blocking of porn, drug and explosive recipes sites. It was a surprise to him when the primary demand came from government, libraries, schools and the groups which hate the (certain kind of) hate.
The invisible guys with the big bucks, who pay for the lists and for the "free" distribution of the filter to end-user or client machines, dictate the rating criteria for the sites. That's where this political censorship orginates from -- it is the same money which keeps these same "blocked" political candidates off the TV and the rest of mass media (other than to smear them), the same money which paid congressmen and local administrations to enact the laws and regulations requiring use of the filters.
Sounds Interesting... (Score:3)
However, Websense is guilty of generalizing in their categorization. ESR's [tuxedo.org] home page is categorized as "hacking." When I checked it later from another location, it appears that there is nothing even marginally illegal on ESR's page or linked to by it, but it does have the word "hacking" in there somewhere, albeit in the old-school context of "clever programming."
I have seen other generalizations in categorizing, including Freedom and Accuracy in Reporting [fair.org], and ironically the Bill of Rights being blocked as "activism." This is a form of soft censorship, in that Websense dodges the accusation since the decision to block is on the part of the administrator, and the administrator dodging the blame because they did not make the categorization, and it's an all-or-none deal.