Utah Wants To Give ISPs That Filter a "G-Rating" 328
An anonymous reader writes "HB407 in Utah would create a child-friendly designation for ISPs that block out a range of prohibited materials. Google, Yahoo, and others are fighting the bill, but Rep. Michael Morley says, 'I think it's a positive thing for those who are looking for a site that is dedicated to fighting pornography.'"
Unworkable (Score:5, Interesting)
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O'course, now, children will grow up unable to see the Venus de Milo or the Vitruvian Man or any of those other naughty art bits, but that's OK, right? Because it's protecting the children?
And it's not like they'll be able to learn about STDs or how to protect oneself against 'em, but that's OK--without all those nasty naked people, why would they want to have sex?
Re:Unworkable (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Unworkable (Score:5, Funny)
Haha... I am waiting for them to actually ban evolution, not the theory but the phenomenon. That law would have to be intelligently designed.
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I'm a conservative, and a Republican, but I just gotta say this is a perfect example of conservative, Republican hypocrisy. (There, I said it.)
I understand that parents want to be able to raise their kids however they see fit - if you want your kid to never see a boobie until he's 18, then fine. If you want your kid to start masturbating to hardcore porn at
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Problem solved.
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The parent in me understands the concerns at play here; that we want to restrict the nature of the media that our children are exposed to. The geek in me understands why this short-term impossible, medium-to-long-term semi-workable on a small-scale, but undesirable for the ISPs, the search engines, and the like.
The only way you can pull this off is with a trust-system. The ratings analogy seems to conveniently skip over the existing infrastructure of that trust-system. The content producers are respons
Re:Unworkable (Score:4, Interesting)
Your typical soccer mom "doesn't know anything about computers" and has no interest in doing so--but wants to make sure the kids are safe, because anything other than total and utter safety Just Won't Do.
Now, if you decided to build yourself a cheapass firewall/filter/proxy appliance, form factor about the same as your typical cable modem and priced at about the $50 point you mentioned (with, say, $19.95/month updating service) that you could plug inline between the modem and the home LAN, you could conceivably make a profit--but if it required any activation by the parent more complicated than a typical windows "click yes" wizard and selecting a secret code, you can forget about any sort of widespread adoption.
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Plus several million hours visiting every website in existence to determine which IPs to block.
Re:Unworkable (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Unworkable (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Unworkable (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have to be "clear" to a certain level before you can know certain things, how the fuck can a living SP, the opposite of someone who is clear and leveled up, know anything that could be harmful? If the Scions were right, the SP would be dead from the knowledge, so it's absurd to give out this warning. It's just another pathetic and obvious attempt to control the gullible and sick as long as possible to get all them money they can.
Almost as pathetic is this ignorant attempt to censor the internet. Give the porn people their
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Would pornographic sites be forced to move to the domain?
Would non-pornographic sites be forced to not use the domain?
If you want to implement a flag by which sites are able to label themselves as innapropriate for minors or some viewers then that is all well and good but xxx has too strong and specific a connotation to really be workable.
Re:Unworkable (Score:4, Insightful)
What really needs to happen is for people in the US to stop being prudish. Unfortunately, it would probably take a miracle for that to happen in my lifetime.
Re:Unworkable (Score:5, Insightful)
That reminds me of a couple years back, when in one year Yahoo three times killed off their own breast-cancer support-group mailing list. Talking about breasts is porn, y'know, and we can't let impressionable children read about them. (It might be interesting to collect a list of examples of this sort of blocking.)
The problem here isn't limited to computer software. I was a student at the U of Wisconsin back in the late 60s, when there was an attempt to rescind the state's ban on birth-control pills. The problem was that even talking in public about birth control was legally considered pornographic, so the supporters of the bill couldn't get the media to broadcast or publish any of their material. People who tried distributing birth-control literature were arrested and charged with distributing porn. I recall the computer geeks calling this a bug in the legal system, and there didn't seem to be any way to debug the problem. It lasted until the US Supreme Court invalidated such laws. If they hadn't done this, we'd probably still have these laws on the books.
Once censorship becomes legal, it can be very difficult to do anything to fight it. Talking in public against the censorship also becomes illegal, as that would put illegal ideas into young minds.
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And that reminds me of waaaay back when AOL first started censoring chat room names based on a blacklist of words. For two days the "Breast Cancer Survivors Group" was the "Hooters Cancer Survivors Group" before it was fixed. Cancer is not funny, but 'hooters cancer' sure soun
Filtering (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Filtering (Score:5, Insightful)
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This is not something that everyone should be burdened with.
And they're not. The state is providing a service that over 50% of its residents desire or at least approve of. If you don't want to get filtered internet access, then use an ISP that isn't on the list. It's that easy.
why not make the parents aquire their own software for this if they want it?
Because then all the kid has to do is acquire a livecd and they're on the unfiltered internet. If you really want to filter things, you have to do it upstream where the kid doesn't have access to it. There have been ISPs providing filtered internet in Utah for over a decade, this is just the
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This is what a PARENT should be doing.
PARENTS should be telling their children what they can and can not see. Not the government, not some company, not anyone else. It's the parents job to raise their children, teach them what's right and wrong, and to allow the to see what they can and can't see. Nobody elses.
While I agree with what you're saying, the sentiment misses a really important point. That is, what these folks are proposing will not work as advertised.
The counter-argument to your point would be that the ISPs are providing a service that parents volunteer to select in the name of raising their children responsibly. The government is simply providing some expertise in flagging what ISPs are providing that service so parents can choose accordingly. But again - the problem is that it won't work as adver
Re:Filtering (Score:5, Insightful)
It IS the parents who are doing the job when they chose an ISP that will help them filter the content they don't want from entering their home. I don't see how the company or the government is forcing this on anyone. If you don't want an ISP that filters, choose a different ISP, ie. one that doesn't have a "G" rating per this bill (assuming it passes). If parents want an ISP that filters, let them have one. Just because a company provides a service doesn't mean that everyone needs to use that service. Sure, this could be done by installing a filtering program on the client computer, but that's not foolproof either. Sure, ISP filtering isn't foolproof, but if it isn't working enough to the customer's satisfaction, then they aren't obligated to continue using the service, and they aren't limited to only use the ISP filtering.
This is what capitalism is all about. The ISP is providing a service that is of value to the customer, who in turn gives them money, which is of value to the ISP. As long as there isn't coercion or deception, it sounds like a win-win to me. If the service is not of value to you, don't buy the service. Just don't complain and say that it isn't of value to anyone.
Fighting pornography? (Score:2, Funny)
Yum.
This means war! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This means war! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This means war! (Score:5, Insightful)
</rant>
tm
Re:This means war! (Score:5, Funny)
It also protects my computer from any use!
Gotta go drain-o my brain now...
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I don't see how its going to be any easier to find fighting pornography or sites dedicated to the provision thereof. Thats what Google is for, the world is you oyster with Google, Jello and copious quantities of lube.
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Well gee, you guys jump me for writing journals about drunken whores so I do one about attempted murder and how do you act? Now you're against fighting! Do I have to do one about two naked hookers catfighting? Or would you rather have me write about a couple of old ladies drinking tea? That would be a great read now wouldn't it?
Well what's on the telly then?
Looks like a penguin to me.
Damn, you CAN'T please everybody! Or, it seems, anybody. At least I
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Hey everybody, I'm looking at gay porno!
Hey everybody, I'm looking at gay porno!
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because religion is a bigger business, and they are in direct competition.
How about an "adult-friendly" rating ... (Score:4, Informative)
Hurah for Utah! (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
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They only want to certify ISPs that (claim to) block porn. Not force* everyone to use them.
*Of course, all (both of the) broadband ISPs will either be certified or not. I imagine, in Utah, it will be worth the business to become certified. So I suppose you can always get some awesome dial-up porno.
New Zealand has an interesting approach to this (Score:5, Informative)
Here in New Zealand, the government provided funds for Watchdog [watchdog.net.nz] to develop a filtering system suitable for schools. Part of the deal was that any other ISP had access to the system and could supply their own customers with internet access filtered by the system.
Whilst not perfect, it did provide schools etc with a default option and a starting point for internet access.
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Thing is that if the resulting filtering system is actually suitable for schools it will not be suitable for anyone else.
Surely... (Score:2)
Ironically... (Score:2)
It's also a positive thing for those of us looking to avoid ass-clowns and the companies that they run.
!Censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:!Censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
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What's a better use of tax dollars: fighting yet another pointless war overseas or providing something actually of (at least limited) use on the home front?
It may be a limited example, but I'm certain you have already pu
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But don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating that they actually do this - I'm saying it's not censorship either way. As an aside, I think it might actually make good business sense for an ISP to provide this kind of service. They would be much more efficient then any filte
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when someone calls your house it is something that is unexpected to you . they are the same as someone randomly walking up to you and start talking about something.
when you are on they net and going to websites - even clicking on links you are asking for something - you are the person walking up to another and start the conversation.
the diffrence is with web sites - as being a public website it is understood the site wants to be talked to so it is ok for yo
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tag war (Score:4, Insightful)
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This works so well too... (Score:2)
Oh, you want to know the clubs name? Why, it's name is EVERYBODY! We meet at the bar!
filter does not imply child friendly (Score:4, Interesting)
The reality is that not everything can be filtered. Combine that with the fact that nearly every kid over the age of 10 have access to proxy server, and the whole notion of a g-rated filtered pipe becomes quite humorous. The only way to remotely sell a legitimate rated service is to white list acceptable sites. It si time consuming, but effective. There are still tricks to get around it, but the bar is significantly raised.
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And by separating the children to a web of their own your are exposing them to everyone as children. On the web you can't tell who's a dog, but on the G-Web you know where you can find the kids.
Excellent idea! (Score:5, Funny)
We can give a bunch of ISP's g-ratings, then we can consolidate all of them and refer to it as the g-spot.
...and then wait to see how long it takes for them to notice.
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AOL? (Score:2)
Multiple issues at issue (Score:2, Insightful)
What is considered "a range of prohibited materials"? Pornography in all its forms or just porn between two men (but not two women*)? What about transvestite or shemale sex? Does
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Simple arithmetic, my friend.
Naked Woman: +1
Naked Man: -1
Sex Act: +1
So...
Man+woman+sex=+1-1+1=+1
Man+man+sex=-1-1+1=-1
Woman+woman+sex=+1+1+1=3
As is plainly demonstrated, visual representations of lesbians having sex are 3 times as good as those representing he
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Keep in mind that no one is discussing prohibiting citizens from doing anything. Many parents in general, and a lot of people in Utah in particular, have a strong interest in regulating the media their own children are exposed to. It's called being a good p
Can we give Utah (Score:2)
Let them deal with it.
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God thinks man-on-man sex is gross, but woman-on-woman sex is hot. This is why God punishes gay men with a much higher HIV rate than heterosexuals, and gay women have a lower HIV rate than heterosexuals. Duh.
No requirement for ISPs (Score:2)
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"The ability to market to the Utah Mormon population or parents who want the facade of protection under the guise of censorship?"
Yes, actually, that probably is the point. A lot of the voting population in Utah is parents who would like the ability to tell what web sites they don't want their kids accessing without becoming experts on the internet.
Technically I don't think the solution would be adequate but I
Yeah, right (Score:2)
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To the first question: you can't.
To the second question: no.
But it sure looks great on paper to the general public!
Quote from the article... (Score:2)
Candice Daly, representing the American Electronics Association testified that companies she represents, including Google and Yahoo, were opposed to the legislation. "They're very concerned about this particular piece of legislation," Daly said. "They don't see themselves as signing up for this seal."
Already typical slashdotters are crying censorship. Basically, Yahoo and Google can't possibly earn this type of seal, so they are opposed to it. But let's face it... it is voluntary for an ISP to sign
Welfare for the Intollerant (Score:2)
Ralph Yarro / CP80 are at it again. (Score:2, Informative)
This is the latest in a series who's last gem was would have essentially shut down free-wifi in Utah.
Apparently it's easier to get a Utah legislator to rubber-stamp your bill than I'd expect.
Very easy (Score:2)
double plus good! (Score:3, Insightful)
porn is never the issue "free speech" is the issue
and of course there is no "right" to not be offended ;-)
Not Censorship (Score:2)
Not sure why everyone gets up in arms because a state wants to offer services to certify certain processes so that the public can know what they are dealing with. No one is saying an ISP has to be kid friendly, just saying that if they are they you can be well informed of this in a unified fashion.
Believe it or not it's probably OK to keep your kids away from porn, violence, guns, hot stoves, etc. As an adult you are still free to view all the porn,
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Parents (Score:2, Insightful)
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Which, of course, is exactly what keeps Mormonism alive.
Wait for the day when Microsoft update get blocked (Score:2)
I can see it now a daycare, school , camp, and other places has the isp block sites then a false positive or a dumb bot that just auto lists stuff with little to no over site makes windows update / Microsoft get blocked as well as it's ip and then a hacker get in from the out side uses a hole in windows to get info one the kids, staff and others.
And this may end up costing le
Proposed branding (Score:2)
Perhaps Santorum would make the pitch?
Filter this site (Score:5, Informative)
I used to live in Cedar (Score:2)
'Site'? (Score:2)
"Accidentally" landing at a porn site these days? (Score:3, Insightful)
The only exception I can think of is spam, which is completely different than what they're trying to do here anyway.
Responsibility lies with YOU, not with those who wish to host a porn site, for legitimate reasons.
Why not? (Score:2)
Why legislate? Leave it to the market. (Score:4, Insightful)
And of course the market will provide a better solution, because different ISPs can try different kinds of blocking, and give their customers more choice and more control, and see what there's actually a market for, instead of trying to force a single government-mandated standard on everyone.
This kind of issue is a situation where there is no need, and no place, for a one-size-fits-all government-coercion approach; this is about personal choice and personal morality, not the provision of essential services. On many issues (notably healthcare) I come down on the side of government involvement, but this is just ridiculous.
Not a big deal (Score:2)
Any ISP that does go for the "G-Rating" would probably lose more subscribers than they would gain. Unless the gov't also plans on subsidising it, I don't see it as a good busin
I for one welcome our pending G-rated overlords... (Score:2)
What do the rest get, a F-rating? (Score:2)
F for Freedom!
Oh and what happened to small goverment? Isn't the goverment giving ratings to ISP another enlargment of the goverment? A rating system for ISP's operated out of taxes? Come on right wing nutcases, don't let us down, STRIKE THIS BIG GOVERMENT PROPOSAL DOWN! Your taxes are at stake!
I reckon that right wingers may care little about freedom, but we can get them excited at the prospect of having to pay more taxes.
Good for them (Score:2)
Utahans ... take back your state (Score:2)
Utahans - do something useful with your time.
What the fuck are they? "Utahians?" "Utahans?" (Score:3, Interesting)
A couple more:
- There's a link between visual stimulation and increased brain activity. This is good -- and probably helps prevent dementia and all sorts of crazy brain diseases.
- There's a link between porn and sex. This is good. Porn improves sex lives -- including residents from Utah. Everyone benefits from healthy sex lives -- even if you're doing it solo. See above.
- Exposure to porn lowers your surprise threshold. Lower surprise thresholds mean an increased ability to concentrate on the stuff that matters. Porn does not matter on the scale of "stuff that matters." Limiting porn is like limiting gambling: it's all about power and nothing about the "social ills" it purports to assist. Gamblers gamble, pornographers pornograph, and porn viewers view. This stuff is part of what it means to be a human being. Those moralists opposed to gambling could probably learn a thing or two about mathematics, social science, and spiritual balance by taking a look at gambling -- and how to gamble effectively.
And no -- gambling effectively is not an oxymoron. The best gamble is to realize when you have the best of it -- and then make the bet. Ditto for the best porn. It's understanding what you like, searching it out, finding it, and deriving pleasure. There's nothing wrong with pleasure. Pleasure is good. Winning money is good. As Paul Newmann says in the "Color of Money": "Money won is twice as sweet as money earned."
No truer words spoken. If the fucking Utahans -- or Mormons or whatever the fuck they call themselves in Utah -- if they'd zero in simply the idea of "pleasure" -- and look for ways to make the pleasure safe and even more effective -- they'd all enjoy their fucking nutty nitty lives a bit more.
Obiglatory Response (Score:5, Funny)
The Utah proposal advocates a
(*) technical (*) legislative (*) market-based ( ) vigilante
approach to fighting online porn. Your idea will not work. Here is why it won't work. (One or more of the following may apply to your particular idea, and it may have other flaws which used to vary from state to state before a bad federal law was passed.)
( ) Pornographers can easily use it to harvest email addresses
(*) It will filter out too much legitimate non-porn content
( ) No one will be able to find the guy or collect the money
(*) It is defenseless against brute force attacks
( ) It will stop porn for two weeks and then we'll be stuck with it
(*) Users of the web will not put up with it
(*) Google and other legitimate web operators will not put up with it
( ) Microsoft will not put up with it
( ) The police will not put up with it
( ) Requires too much cooperation from pornographers
(*) Requires immediate total cooperation from everybody at once
(*) Many web operators cannot afford to lose business or alienate potential viewers
( ) Anyone could anonymously destroy anyone else's career or business
Specifically, your plan fails to account for
( ) Laws expressly prohibiting it
(*) Lack of centrally controlling authority for the web
( ) Open relays in foreign countries
( ) Ease of searching tiny alphanumeric address space of all email addresses
(*) Asshats
( ) Jurisdictional problems
( ) Unpopularity of weird new taxes
( ) Public reluctance to accept weird new forms of money
(*) Huge existing software investment in the net protocols
( ) Susceptibility of protocols other than HTTP to attack
( ) Willingness of users to install OS patches received by email
(*) Willingness and ability of users to install software necessary to make it work
(*) Armies of worm riddled broadband-connected Windows boxes
(*) Eternal arms race involved in all filtering approaches
(*) Extreme profitability of porn
( ) Joe jobs and/or identity theft
(*) Technically illiterate politicians
(*) Dishonesty on the part of pornographers themselves
( ) Bandwidth costs that are unaffected by client filtering
(*) Internet Explorer
and the following philosophical objections may also apply:
(*) Ideas similar to yours are easy to come up with, yet none have ever been shown practical
( ) Any scheme based on opt-out is unacceptable
(*) Website content should not be the subject of legislation
(*) Blacklists suck
(*) Whitelists suck
(*) We should be able to talk about sex without being censored
( ) Countermeasures should not involve wire fraud or credit card fraud
( ) Countermeasures should not involve sabotage of public networks
(*) Countermeasures must work if phased in gradually
(*) Why should we have to trust you and your servers?
( ) Incompatiblity with open source or open source licenses
(*) Feel-good measures do nothing to solve the problem
( ) I don't want the government reading my email
( ) Killing them that way is not slow and painful enough
(*) It's the parent's job to watch what their kid is doing
Furthermore, this is what I think about you:
( ) Sorry dude, but I don't think it would work.
(*) This is a stupid idea, and you're a stupid person for suggesting it.
( ) Nice try, assh0le! I'm going to find out where you live and burn your house down!
It's more than filtering: it's IP number tracking (Score:4, Informative)
Quoting from the actual bill [utah.gov]:
(2) The attorney general shall award the Community Conscious Internet Provider designation to an Internet service provider that:
(3) An Internet service provider that is awarded the Community Conscious Internet Provider designation shall require its customers to enter into an agreement providing that:
Emphasis added. This is partially about filtering "objectionable" content (though the ISP can wait until after it's been reported to them), but they also have to track IP numbers for specific customers and store that information for up to two years. This is about law enforcement....
And we can call addresses to approved sites... (Score:3, Funny)
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Whether the state government tolerates polygamy is another question.
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The above statement isn't trolling ... it's just stating the obvious. Sure, torture and war are perfectly acceptable, but sex? That's bad!
Except if your name is Warren Jeffs and then it's OK to have sex with underage girls.