Declan McCullagh/Brock Meeks wrote (and quite well, I might add):
... Install the programs and Junior can't access porn. No fuss, no muss, no bother. "Parental empowerment" is the buzzword. Indeed, it was these programs that helped sway the three-judge panel in Philly to knock down the Communications Decency Act as unconstitutional.
Scenario: Mr. & Mrs. Joseph and Mary Christian buy SmutNoMore for their home computer, to protect their children Mathew, Mark, Luke, John, and Zebediah. All are happy and content. One day, Mathew and Mark go to a the home of a school chum, Bart Simpson, whose parents are products of the liberal 60's. Bart has a computer too, along with an ISDN link through a local ISP to the Internet. But --- horrors --- Bart's computer is not equipped with SmutNoMore, or any other filtering software. Bart's parents do not believe it to be fair to filter their children's access to information. During that afternoon of Internet fun, Mark clicks the mouse and follows a hyperlink link to a web site filled with nasty objectionable anti-family morally corrosive filth. Mark and Mathew run home in tears to their parents and tell all about the nightmare they've experienced. I wonder whether the Christians would be able to successfully sue the Simpsons on some sort of "corruption of a minor" deal? Indeed, couldn't it even be possible that some local prosecutor might find the Simpsons criminally involved? ______c_____________________________________________________________________ Mike M Nally * Tiv^H^H^H IBM * Austin TX * pain is inevitable m5@tivoli.com * m101@io.com * <URL:http://www.io.com/~m101> * suffering is optional