Vlad: How can consumers make an informed decision as to which filter they wish to purchase, if they are not told exactly what information each product is filtering out?
Meeks et al may be guilty of flamboyant, emotionalistic prose, but I find the concept that the public is expected to buy various filters without knowing what they filter...frankly, ridiculous.
there's significant ambiguity in your language. what actually constitutes knowing or not knowing what is being filtered? Meeks discussed a case where the software clearly gave *categories* of what it filtered, and I think he focused on a case where it was clear that it was borderline (the monkey with the eye poked out). in other words, it did appear to me that the software &raters were working exactly as they were supposed to, and he was hilighting a borderline case. moreover, the categories were clear: "gratuitous depictions of violence" or whatever. for *some* consumers, knowledge of these *categories* is going to be enough. other consumers are going to be more wary and want to make sure that the actual sites blocked correspond to the categories stated. in general, though, I think many consumers do not want to know in exact detail what specific web sites are being blocked. that's what they're paying the company for: to hide that information from them in a sense so they don't have to deal with the complexity of it. my position could be misconstrued. it is: let the consumer *decide*. this is already happening. they are putting their money where they think superior services are. what Meeks has discovered is a new criteria that customers *may* want to pay more attention to: how well what the companies "say" they are doing matches what they are actually blocking. but then again, consumers are always going to have to place some amount of trust in these companies. the market is in the process of deciding right now. Meeks seems to have the opinion, "the site-blocking software is not legitimate unless they fully publicize their lists". this is a decision the market will make. I fully expect that both types of services will flourish in the future (open and closed lists), and each have their particular roles and areas of specialty.