Commentsby
Bob Brandon....
Shhh
April
17, 2000
Sometimes we forget that the internet is a relatively new innovation.
We're just beginning to fathom it's depths, and explore it's heights. Just
as the telegraph, telephone, radio and television, this new medium is changing
society. And now society is trying to change it.
First off, in the UK: Demon Internet, one of the country's leading ISPs
just settled a libel suit with far-reaching consequences. In a judgement
that found Demon liable for not responding to a complaint, the stage has
now been set for a tremendous loss of free speech.
At least one radical e-zine has been forced offline by it's British
provider. And there are sure to be more. The crux of the argument stems
from the fact that Demon did not remove allegedly defamatory postings from
two of it's usenet groups. It was a mistake that ended up costing over
$300,000. But the true price of this settlement is yet to be seen.
While Britain has always been viewed as a staunch defender of democracy,
their protections of the press are sadly lacking.
It looks as if porn may be under attack on the web as well! For many
people, the internet has been too much like a red light district. They're
worried that children are exposed to deviant sexual situations much too
easily.
Now, that may be changing. Several major credit card companies, including
VISA and MasterCharge are changing the rules on chargebacks. Those are
the charges that are refused or refuted by the cardholder. The new rules
require the adult sites keep their chargeback rates low, or face extremely
stiff fines...up to $100,000 a month for repeat offenses!
Porn sites traditionally have had very high chargeback rates, due to
fraud and poor customer service, (not to mention how hard it is to explain
certain charges to your spouse!) Not all adult sites suffer with high chargeback
rates, though, and it's likely these new rules will serve to consolidate
the smut sites, reduce the number of new sites, and weed out the shady
operators.
And while we're on the subject of sexsites and the internet, let me
make it clear, I don't have a problem with sexual content on a website
for adults. I do find it offensive that children can wander into a sexual
environment without any effort at all. For instance, if you were a 4th
grader doing a report on the Executive branch of government. You type in
http://www.whitehouse.com ...that sounds likely enough.
Ooops, this isn't Bill Clinton's house, even though there is about the
same amount of sex...it's a porn site. And there are hundreds if not thousands
more examples. Do a search for "Pokemon pictures" and a slew of adult oriented
"Kid packaged" sites come up. (Incidentally, do yourself a favor and DO
NOT click on http://pokemon-pictures.com.
It's not a porn site, but these creeps open up so many extra windows
that you have to close your entire browser to get rid of them. It's not
only annoying, it's bad design. Is this what we want? Not me. I love a
good sexy site as much as the next horny guy, but I don't think kids should
be able to go there so easily.
One solution which I think has merit is to move all sex sites to a new
"dot-sex" top level domain just like .com, .org, and .net. The implications
are obvious. If you want sex, you can get it at .sex. If you don't want
hot teen sex and lesbians, you're safe at .com. It makes too much sense
to happen though. In the meantime, the adult landscape will continue to
be rearranged by the moneymen. |
