CNET UK Podcast 142: What do you do about Internet obscenity?

DavidRGilson
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3 July 2009, 05:35 pm

CNET UK Podcast 142: What do you do about Internet obscenity?

This week Ian and Nate asked that most ancient of all questions: is it possible to 'clean up' the Internet and should we even try? It's a debate that's been sparked off by the decision that the author of 'Girls (scream) Aloud' didn't break obscenity laws with his close-to-the-bone work of fiction. With Nate a fan of Cannibal Corpse, it's not hard to guess what his opinion on censorship is -- but is there a solution for everyone else?

There was also the usual look at the week's news and events, we discussed the new universal phone-charger agreement, Twitter trademarking 'tweet' and the Palm Pre's imminent arrival in the UK.

matthewhughes
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3 July 2009, 05:59 pm

DavidRGilson says:
CNET UK Podcast 142: What do you do about Internet obscenity?

No. We shouldn't.

Freedom of speech is the freedom to be obscene.

Don't legislate or regulate what I do online. Ever.

Pokeh
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3 July 2009, 06:02 pm

matthewhughes says:
Don't legislate or regulate what I do online. Ever.

Just to play devils advocate, what if you watched child pr0nz?

That said, I still stand by what I wrote on the Twtpoll:

Freedom of speech is exactly that. There were warnings on that piece, so surely people knew what they were getting in to?

How do you even legislate against offending people? What someone deems as offensive is subjective.

Also, this.

Edited by Pokeh (Member) on 3 July 2009 at 05:03 pm

matthewhughes
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3 July 2009, 06:33 pm

Pokeh says:
Just to play devils advocate, what if you watched child pr0nz?

There's a difference between watching child porn and, say, what's happening in Australia where there is a list which you can't see, but got leaked anyway. If an Aussie links to the list, he gets fined $10,000 per day.

The problems came when it was realized that there were a bunch of warez sites and Wikileaks on the block list, which people couldn't see and couldn't link to.

Ultimately, internet censorship only contributes to a lack of transparency in government and nanny state control over what you do, what you see and what you can read.

The internet is the best way we can assert transparency in government. Prior to the internet, you could only release information through newspapers, TV and radio, which were all controlled by a handfull of people. Now, we have a decentralised network where any information can be released. The internet is responsible for us knowing about what happened in Iran, the Clinton scandals and various other things which were either intentionally ignored or covered up by the mainstream media.

Right now, we have a kind of 'friendly' form of censorship. We all live in comfortable, relatively liberal democracies. Now, suppose that our government was a theocracy, or a fascist dictatorship. Then you wouldn't have such a kind view of censorship.

Furthermore, if we allow censorship in our liberal democracies now, it creates a precedent where censorship is regarded as essential for a society to function. Censorship could be seen as necessary as law enforcement, the NHS and the fire service. It's not. It's counter productive and it's scary.

My last point. In the UK, all ISP's are forced to subscribe to something called Clean Feed. This is a list which is supposed to block all CP, which is fair enough, to be honest. However, we can't see the list.

I'd like a jury system made up of independent people of all walks of life to monitor and audit the list to prevent the list being used to block legitimate websites.

DavidRGilson
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3 July 2009, 06:57 pm

Can I just renew my request for the ID3 genre tag to be set to Podcast please? Pretty please?

weetanhops
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4 July 2009, 12:05 am

DavidRGilson says:
Can I just renew my request for the ID3 genre tag to be set to Podcast please? Pretty please?

oh, the Podcast still has no artwork either (I don't think)

MuffinWrath
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4 July 2009, 05:05 pm

The internet doesn't need censorship, even if they did there would be hundreds of ways around it and no good way to enforce it.