Techdirt. Stories filed under "censor" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories filed under "censor"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Mon, 27 Apr 2009 07:22:00 PDT Inside The UK's Web Blacklist Keeper Carlo Longino http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090424/1325484642.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090424/1325484642.shtml got yanked) has taken an interesting look inside the Internet Watch Foundation, the organization that runs the UK's child-porn blacklist. The piece does little to counter the negative press the IWF has received in light of its misguided blocks on Wikipedia and the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, with the group's CEO appearing to gloss over the failures because he doesn't "want to dwell" on them, instead trying to hide behind the moral cover of stopping child porn. But the group's efforts on that front don't appear to be particularly fruitful, either: one of its "analysts" who looks into complaints the group receives about images online says that few of the images it finds are in the UK, so it just reports them to sister groups in the countries where they are hosted, if such groups exist. The aim of the IWF -- to stop child porn -- is laudable, but its techniques, and their collateral damage, leave much to be desired.

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]]> sounds-like-a-fun-job http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20090424/1325484642 Wed, 11 Mar 2009 13:08:00 PDT NZ Censor Threatens To Jail Parents Who Buy Violent Video Games For Kids Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090310/0231144053.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090310/0231144053.shtml interested in prosecuting parents who have bought their kids violent video games. Apparently parenting is no longer for parents, but for Bill Hastings to determine what is, and what is not appropriate:
"There would certainly be some shock value to prosecuting a parent who gives their under-18 child access to a restricted game. It would send out a message that the enforcement agency means business."
Based on the law, parents prosecuted could face $10,000 fines or be put in jail for three months. Which do you think would do more harm to a child? Playing GTA or having their parent dragged through a show trial, for "shock value," and dumped in jail for three months?

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]]> shock-value http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20090310/0231144053