Novell's Eric Schmidt on rating systems

[Declan McCullagh]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 1 Jul 1997 07:27:11 -0700 (PDT)
From: Declan McCullagh <declan at well.com>
To: fight-censorship at vorlon.mit.edu
Subject: Novell's Eric Schmidt on rating systems

So I'm logged in from the library of the National Press Club (my
membership dues are finally going for something useful), where I just came
from a breakfast meeting with Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Novell. 

We talked Net-politics, from copyright to crypto to Net-taxes. But I also
pressed him on the problems of PICS-based rating systems like RSACi,
noting that other governments have started to make them mandatory -- in a
voluntary sort of way. 

"In the U.S., we're going to have all sorts of folks saying we need to
have a mandatory rating system for web content.. The industry has pushed
very hard for individuals to control things, not governments," he said. 

What about PICS making it easier for other governments to censor the Net? 
"We are not the other government's keeper... The beauty of the PICS stuff
is that it's a framework for having the debate," he said.

Next stop: the White House, where I expect this will come up again this
afternon...

-Declan