Tim May said:
One way "voluntary" age ratings--very similar to PICS ratings--may be mandated is through the kind of "plea agreement" cited below. (I don't know if this site is real or not, but the post presents a scenario which will become more common, I think.)
In more controlled countries such as Australia which has no constitutional protections to slow down the removal of individual freedoms and rights (I won't go into discussion here that we actually do have such protections inhereted from ancient British law dating from first settlement, and in any case such arguments are ignored by the government goons) the scenario is already common and perhaps even the norm.
Someone writes something, or has a site, and is busted for some charge. (There are many, even with what remains of the First Amendment. Child porn, obscenity, the new copyright laws, the Anti-Terrorism Act, etc.) A nolo contendre or guilty plea to a lesser charge is entered, with the agreement that an age verification system will be used, or a PICS rating, etc. And so the government gets the kind of censorship it wants.
Here in Australia this bargaining process has been pre-empted by the traitors in parliament and in the recent report which mandates "voluntary" labeling they give you a possible out to charges of having rude pics, unsuitable language or whatever is the flavour of the week, passing through your server specified in their version of a voluntary (mandatory) code. As Irene states in her excellent page on the subject (http://www.thehub.com.au/~rene/liberty/label2.html): "Draft legislative proposals have suggested content providers may have a defense against provision of restricted material to minors by taking reasonable steps to prevent availability of same. It has been intimated that labeling may a defense of good intent and content providers may label material in the hope of having a defense. In fact, in terms of labeling, a clearer indication of good intent would be not to label material, thus ensuring it was not made available to those using properly configured filtering software."
(Duncan will likely argue that this is impossible to enforce. Maybe in the limit, in the sense that some will fall through the cracks. But the dangers to anyone hosting words or pictures on their sites is very real. As more and more ISPs drop controversial material--think of several recent cases, and perhaps even the case of our own John Young--and as more child porn/celebrity nude/obscenity cases are filed....by the time the Thomases are both out of prison, most sites will likely be heavily editing themselves, imposing age limits, and using PICS ratings.)
Many service providers, attempting to stay afloat here, already have such editing/age and other limits. Here is an extract of the first ISP contract I examined after reading your post (these conditions appear to be fairly standard) - Note especially cl4.2 prohibiting access to "offensive" material which is not defined and would on the face of it encompass any material, not just rude pictures, that may be offensive to..well to who knows..: [See: http://www.bit.net.au and note the proudly displayed "We rated with RSACi" logo on the lead page." "4. Compliance with Laws and other Conditions of Use 4.1 The Subscriber acknowledges that use of the Data, Databases, System and Services may from time to time be subject to certain legal regulations, conditions (including any license conditions) and restrictions. The Subscriber shall ascertain and comply with such regulations, conditions (including any license conditions) or restrictions including but not limited to those laid down by the Crimes Act 1914 (Cth) and the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth). 4.2 Without limiting clause 4.1, the Subscriber and each User shall not send, access or download any Data which is offensive, defamatory or which to the Subscriber's or User's knowledge contains any computer virus or has not been classified or approved in accordance with any applicable censorship or other laws. 4.3 Without limiting clause 4.1, the Subscriber and each User shall not, without proper authorisation, use the System or Services to gain access to information in a restricted access computer system or to use a restricted access computer system, or use the System or Services to contribute to or aid the commission of a crime or to infringe the rights of a third party." Furthermore a duty is placed on the _subscriber_ to notify the provider of the existence of certain material, including the existence of "offensive" material, computer virii etc. Failure to so notify the provider may cause you problems if a later search of your hardware or a search of the providers temp files reveals you accessed such information. No consulting fees are provided for in the agreement for the subscribers time and expense providing such valuable data: "8.1 The Subscriber shall notify the Company immediately upon becoming aware of: any infringement of any third party's intellectual property rights as a result of information being made available on a Database or by use of the System or Services, the existence of any data, code, program or other material of the kind referred to in clause 4.2 or any use of the System or Software (by the Subscriber or any other person) which may infringe clause 4.3." It would be an interesting exercise to take out an account and actually "immediately notify the Company" of such material. In just a few hours of work a flood of material could be presented meeting such a lose definition. Indeed a scan of my netscape cache for the last couple of weeks would probably be enough to get me a free trip downtown to visit the local goons with expensive court proceedings required to attempt to avoid criminal sanctions for rather innocuous web browsing habits. For an example where there was no evidence at all against the subscriber but the cops performed a dawn raid on an unsuspecting student (who was 14 months later found completely innocent) based on the word of the ISP who was actively browsing temporary files on the ISP's computer see: http://www.thehub.com.au/~rene/liberty/qcaseone.html. It appears now the student, who suffered immense financial as well as emotional strain was merely a 'test case' to see how the new (a mere few days old) net censorship laws would work. No doubt his sacrifice was for the greater good of us all and to protect the leetle chiiiildren. What amazes me is the time and money the traitors are prepared to invest in attempting to prosecute such harmless activity performed in one's own home. The fact that they are willing to do this indicates the level of threat we all face from this scum and the level of response that will be called for to surgically remove this cancer from our respective countries. The threat in this country is far greater than many might suspect in other jurisdictions as we are not schooled in the writings of revolutionaries and early American presidents and have no national psychosis of revolt nor any constitutional guarantees (I know even these in the US are being subverted or attacked but without them it's pretty grim). As can be seen from the contract already referred to corporations are only too willing to lick the rim the feeds them as they see no financial gain in attempting to go against the flow. Indeed such a corporation would, with monopoly control of telecommunications in Australia, quickly find itself bankrupt. The only conclusion I can draw is that our government and their bedmates are very worried that people, through the internet, have the ability to say (for now but not for long) what they wish about that government, about anything and get that message out to many people almost instantaneously. This must be of great concern to control freaks and those who steal money and other assets with force. It has always been that way. Howard Rheingold states in Democracy is About Communication: (http://www.well.com/user/hlr/texts/democracy.html) "The threat of uncontrollable communications among citizens, not the pornographic pictures or taboo words that a tiny portion of the online population publish, is why freedom of expression is under attack. 'Decency' is a smokescreen. It's about power." and "Communication is Political": "Porno on the Net is a sideshow. The main event, taking place far from the spotlight, is about who will control and profit from the new industry that network communication technology makes possible." Clearly in Australia the bureaucrats at the ABA hope to be a key body to write their own ticket in this, to them, brave new world. The utter cluelessness of the government and the ABA can be seen in an earlier report released in 1996 which is good reading for a laugh where the ABA clearly has difficulty coming to terms with the difference between BBS, which until recently was the bogey man the government focused on, and the net. See: Report on the Investigation into the Content of On-Line Services dated 30 June 1996 (http://www.dca.gov.au/aba/olsrprt.htm). On age limits: "14.3 The Subscriber must be a legal person. Any minor seeking access must do so as a User of a Subscriber's account. Supervision of such a User shall be the responsibility of a Parent or Guardian of the minor." Of course if the parent in question was supervising the minor then the proposed censorship laws about to go before parliament that will limit the ability of Australian _adults_ to access information would not be required (I liked a previous description of this concept in another article which described it as an "infantocracy"). -- "You have the rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe." ..John Adams, Second President of the United States.