.xxx domain

[c1ue]

Re: .xxx domain

The movie and magazine industries do a pretty good job. Anyone can buy Maxim or National Geographic but you have to be 18 to buy Playboy or Penthouse. The difference between PG-13 and R can be a little fuzzy but movies rated X are pretty easy to spot. Corralling XXX sites into one top level domain would help parents, even if it wasn't a perfect quarantine.

Come on cow, it's the wedge in the door. You know that.

This is how it starts. Once it's there it will be easy
for countries to come up with laws.

This also protects free speech as people can't
complain so amuch about porn because
it's so easy to filter. Win win

I don't think you've considered the ramifications of making anything easier to filter.

Or of passing laws forcing companies to stay within specific ICANN realms.

For that matter - why not extend this regime to television, cable, and movies?

All shows which show a nipple must be restricted to 'R' or 'X' related ratings...oh yeah they already are. How well is that working?

And I don't know about you - but I've NEVER meandered across an 'X' rated movie on the internet "by mistake".

If you really want to prevent kids from watching porn - you must also prevent the search engines from serving up what is being looked for.

Then you must force the yellow pages type services to stop listing 'escort services' and 'massage'.

Then you must force teens from sexting/sexvidding each other.

Throw in some more automated video surveillance - and voila! the perfect vehicle for suppressing all dissent.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: .xxx domain

Come on cow, it's the wedge in the door. You know that.

Well, I've been known to give more than ample consideration to many a conspiracy theory.

But in this case, I don't think that the presence or absence of a .xxx top level domain helps advance the other tyrannical measures you describe.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: .xxx domain

I don't think you've considered the ramifications of making anything easier to filter.

After reading your post twice, I'm still not sure your point.

But, as I noted a couple of posts earlier, I don't think .xxx makes anything easier to filter, because I expect plenty of porn to continue to be available at the existing .com and .everything-else addresses.

From a practical point of view (not that governments tending toward tyranny consider practicalities much) there are better solutions, such as various software packages one can install, to provide local filtering.

For example, if I were intending to filter content to those in my family, I would setup their computers all to use the content filtering options of OpenDNS, which can be done by setting up an OpenDNS account and then changing your DNS server on each system to use OpenDNS (208.67.222.222). This content filtering is available on their free version, as well as their higher priced options.

As for governments, I remain doubtful that this provides them any particular leverage on their evil schemes.

[c1ue]

Re: .xxx domain

After reading your post twice, I'm still not sure your point.

But, as I noted a couple of posts earlier, I don't think .xxx makes anything easier to filter, because I expect plenty of porn to continue to be available at the existing .com and .everything-else addresses.

Mooster,

The laws which force companies to segregate into various domains due to the nature of their business can equally be used on "regular" businesses as porn businesses. In this respect blazespinnaker is absolutely correct - it is a crack in the door.

In the same vein as .xxx (segregation), .org is supposed to be for non-profits, but in reality there is NO check that this is true or not even in non-astroturf situation. I also have a .org so know this is true.

Ultimately the only solution is for users to use their judgement.

I do not dispute at all that there are plenty of software solutions for filtering, but equally the filtering arms race will continue.

As for the segregation (separate but equal) affecting government's ability to filter: again I disagree.

Any degree of compartmentalization/organization of the masses of data on the Internet makes the task of government censorship easier.

Much as it was easier to attack the publishers in the newspaper era for censorship purposes, or the heralds in the oral history era for same, so too is it easier to attack the groupings within the Internet for censorship purposes. Google is an ideal vehicle in this respect - though I reserve judgement as to whether this is actually happening or not.

It is instructive, for example, that the ICQ sale - and subsequent movement of its servers to Russia, is opposed by US law enforcement because this would prevent them from easily being able to access transcripts of conversations via that service.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: .xxx domain

The laws which force companies to segregate into various domains due to the nature of their business can equally be used on "regular" businesses as porn businesses. In this respect blazespinnaker is absolutely correct - it is a crack in the door.

In the same vein as .xxx (segregation), .org is supposed to be for non-profits, but in reality there is NO check that this is true or not even in non-astroturf situation. I also have a .org so know this is true.

"In the same vein" ??

You have two paragraphs with quite distinct, almost conflicting conclusions, and connect them with "In the same vein", as if they reach similar conclusions ?

The first paragraph repeats your position, agreeing with blaze and disagreeing with mine. You speak of laws which could force companies to segregate into various domains.

In the second paragraph you acknowledge that there is no such check. I agree with this much. I am aware of no such check, no such laws. I don't expect to see any such checks or laws in the future either.

That you apparently think these two paragraphs were making a common point (In the same vein) whereas I find them quite conflicting suggests I am not understanding this latest post of yours either.

I'm 0 for 2 today.

[c1ue]

Re: .xxx domain

"In the same vein" ??

You have two paragraphs with quite distinct, almost conflicting conclusions, and connect them with "In the same vein", as if they reach similar conclusions ?

The first paragraph repeats your position, agreeing with blaze and disagreeing with mine. You speak of laws which could force companies to segregate into various domains.

In the second paragraph you acknowledge that there is no such check. I agree with this much. I am aware of no such check, no such laws. I don't expect to see any such checks or laws in the future either.

That you apparently think these two paragraphs were making a common point (In the same vein) whereas I find them quite conflicting suggests I am not understanding this latest post of yours either.

I'm 0 for 2 today.

I was speaking if such laws as blazespinnaker, jimmygu3, jtabeb, etc desire, are passed such that ICANN domains are used by government regulations to legally categorize companies.

Note the if.

That is exactly my objection: that the somewhat admirable goal of making porn access easier to restrict simultaneously gives the government the ability to restrict other areas for other reasons - much as 'anti-terror' laws are being used today to roll back centuries worth of civil liberties, 'anti-drunk driving' laws before that, and so on.

These same types of segregation activities also makes monitoring easier.

[ThePythonicCow]

Re: .xxx domain

These same types of segregation activities ...

... like the Star of David that Jews had to wear in Germany in the 1930's, huh?

There's a step that's missing in this .xxx case, however. The .xxx is more like the flag lapel that Americans sometimes wear. They wear it sometimes and don't sometimes. Those who wear it self select when and if ever to wear it. There are no objective criteria to determine who "should" wear it or not.

In the case of .xxx, major porn sites will I am sure continue their current .com and .everything-else URL's as well. If any onerous restrictions loomed over the .xxx sites, then those porn vendors could just drop those .xxx URL's and continue business with the other .com .etc URL's they use now.

Unlike the Star of David, the State lacks any a priori objective criteria by which to divide all URL's into two mutually exclusive classes - porn or not porn.

What would be more ominous, in my view, would be the creation of some quasi-official board that decreed which websites must only be in .xxx and which must not be .xxx. That, or similar, would provide a (pseudo-)objective basis for prejudicial treatment.

[c1ue]

Re: .xxx domain

Unlike the Star of David, the State lacks any a priori objective criteria by which to divide all URL's into two mutually exclusive classes - porn or not porn.

Not strictly true. There are already anti-obscenity laws:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comstock_laws

The specific interpretation of obscenity has evolved under these laws, but the existence of obscenity has not.

What would be more ominous, in my view, would be the creation of some quasi-official board that decreed which websites must only be in .xxx and which must not be .xxx. That, or similar, would provide a (pseudo-)objective basis for prejudicial treatment.

I completely agree.

But in order to attain the ability to restrict porn via segregation as evidenced by the above posts, I clearly stipulated that some form of legal requirement would be necessary, and that said law would be the entry point for reducing further liberties.

A reinterpretation of the Comstock laws to apply to internet access would do it.