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Miscellaneous

by Mike Masnick

Fri, Jul 18th 2003 3:01pm





Libraries Cancel Meeting On Porn Filters

from the no-legitimacy dept

This one is curious. The American Library Association, who had been planning a meeting with various filtering companies to press their demands for more open filtering tools, has now cancelled the meeting. No reason was given, but people say it's because the ALA didn't want to give any sense of "legitimacy" to the filter companies. Now, it's no secret that I'm no fan of filtering companies, but I don't see how this meeting does anything bad. The filtering companies are legitimate companies, and some libraries may want to use their technology. Ignoring them doesn't solve the issue.

5 Comments | Leave a Comment..


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  1.  

    Precisely who is legitimate?

    identicon
    Bob Bechtel, Jul 19th, 2003 @ 4:07am

    From my position of total ignorance, I'd speculate that the issue is not whether filtering software companies are legitimate, but whether meeting with some and not others (for any reason - convenience, budget, etc.) might be used by the vendors to imply an endorsement of some software and not others.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  2.  

    Re: Precisely who is legitimate?

    identicon
    Wally Choo, Jul 19th, 2003 @ 9:12pm

    Something is fishy with this. We were never contacted or invited to anything by the ALA. I think we are probably 'legitimate' (CYBERsitter), we just the PC Mag Editors' choice award for the 4th year in a row. The ALA pretty much has its own agenda and would probably only invite those vendors they think they could push around. Maybe no one wanted to come.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  3.  

    Re: Precisely who is legitimate?

    icon
    Mike (profile), Jul 20th, 2003 @ 12:05pm

    I'm wondering if they ever really contacted anyone or someone just set a date, and then they argued over whether or not to actually invite anyone.

    I'm still confused as to why they wouldn't do this. As far as I'm concerned, they should have this meeting and discuss with the filter providers what they would expect out of a filter.

    I still think it should be the library's own choice whether or not to include a filter, but I don't see what damage is done by meeting with the filtering companies.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  4.  

    Re: Precisely who is legitimate?

    identicon
    xman, Jul 21st, 2003 @ 4:37am

    CYBERsitter legitimate? Sheez! Cybersitter is one of the worst offenders in egregious blocking of sites, and of listing sites for no apparent reason and then ignoring emails asking for reasons. (I know this from experience by the way not hearsay)

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  5.  

    Re: Precisely who is legitimate?

    identicon
    Wally Choo, Jul 21st, 2003 @ 11:22am

    Just ask your Mom to turn it off for you!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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