| William H. Magill on 12 Feb 2004 01:22:03 -0000 |
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On 10 Feb, 2004, at 22:35, Arthur S. Alexion (by way of Arthur S. Alexion <arthur@alexion.com>) wrote: Is the ISP responsible for making these assessments at its peril? Is the ISP bound by the opinion of law enforcement as to the illegality of the underlying subject material? As far as I know, ISPs still "hide behind" the "common carrier" concept -- that they are merely the conduit for the materials, as long as they do not get involved in controlling what is actually "carried." Once they get involved in determining the acceptability of what is being carried, they then loose their "common carrier" status without question, and are exposed to liability from both sides. (Those claiming censorship and those demanding it.) This then leads to all of the "terms of use" games that they play. Running a "news server" is not unlike running a "newstand" on the street corner. The newsie is not responsible for the materials sold at the newstand -- until somebody complains. But as you point out, defending principle is expensive. So the newsie removes the offending materials, wraps them in brown paper or puts them under the counter... out of sight out of mind. He's not likely to get prosecuted because there is no general consensus that what he is doing is wrong, and the case easily depends upon "which side of the bed the Judge got out of that morning." The child pornography laws are an attempt to legislate morality -- not unlike prohibition -- and as such are subject to emotional interpretation, both pro and con. At the moment, they enjoy popular support, as did prohibition when it was enacted, provide absolute definitions and so prosecution is "easy." Will that attitude last? Only time will tell. I'm old enough to remember the attitudes of the 50-60s before "Eros," "Screw," and "Hustler" (Ginzberg, Goldstein and Flint, respectively) decided to spend the money to defend the principle (and themselves) that Porn was protected under the First Amendment which finally, complements of Mike Nichols' "Carnal Knowledge," in 1973 gave us the current "standard" by which things like the Super Bowel Half Time show are judged. Will THAT attitude change? Only time will tell. There is nothing "absolute" about the Law. T.T.F.N. William H. Magill # Beige G3 - Rev A motherboard - 768 Meg # Flat-panel iMac (2.1) 800MHz - Super Drive - 768 Meg # PWS433a [Alpha 21164 Rev 7.2 (EV56)- 64 Meg]- Tru64 5.1a # XP1000 - [Alpha EV6] magill@mcgillsociety.org magill@acm.org magill@mac.com ___________________________________________________________________________ Philadelphia Linux Users Group -- http://www.phillylinux.org Announcements - http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-announce General Discussion -- http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
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