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Editor's
notebook
Why
filter? Go right to the source
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By
Ray Barrington
Dotcom Editor
The issue
is coming up again - the right to access the Internet.
The problem comes in libraries. Traditionally supporters of
free speech and free access, libraries face the problem that
the Internet is wide-open. It takes no time at all for someone
to be somewhere they shouldn't or would prefer not to be.
And librarians, a loyal but overworked bunch, can't sit on
the shoulder of every child.
The easy solution is filtering software - but it comes with
a catch. Ask Jeffery Pollock, who ran for Congress last year
in Oregon. He was for filtering software - until he found
out his campaign Web site was blocked by a popular program,
Cyber Patrol. According to the New York Times, Pollock had
his Web site on a server that was also used in part for a
pornographic Web site, and the software blocked all access
to that server, good and bad.
It's a familiar story; sites on breast cancer blocked out,
for example. Human subtleties are too much for computers in
some areas. There are two solutions, however, that don't require
barring access to useful sites to block off the smut.
One is the use of an .xxx domain exclusively for porn. Software
could easily block out access to such sites. Anyone with porn
on a non .xxx site could be prosecuted.
Of course, the best solution is parental supervision. But
that may be less usable than filters for two reasons.
One, of course, is that many parents don't know if a computer
is stuffed or blown up.
And the other, as my wise wife likes to remind me, is that
these young users are kids, after all. Going where they aren't
supposed to go - drinking, smoking, dirty pictures - is what
kids do. Parents will never like it, of course.
But all they can do is to try to raise kids properly - and
remember there's nothing on the Internet that isn't there
in real life.
Ray Barrington is the editor of Dot Com. Send love letters,
story ideas but not spam to [email protected].
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