CDR: Two UK news articles on censorship

[Ken Brown]

Crossposted without permission from
cyber-rights-UK at mail.cyber-rights.org
(originally posted by Yaman Akdeniz)


Web inventor denounces net censorship 
The Observer,
John Arlidge, media correspondent 
Sunday October 8, 2000 

On the tenth anniversary of the creation of the internet, the British
scientist who invented the world wide web has called for the abolition 
of censorship online. As parents' groups and politicians press for new
ways to police websites, Tim Berners-Lee rejects censorship as
'horrific'. In an exclusive interview with The Observer , Berners-Lee
dismisses the recent outcry over paedophiles targeting youngsters in web
chatrooms, child pornography and fraud, and rejects calls for a 'net
regulator'. 'I know there are some very strong feelings but you can not
banish technology or regulate content. 

'Regulation is censorship - one grown-up telling another what they can
and cannot do or see. For me, the idea is horrific. Universality is the
key. You must be able to represent anything on the web.' 

Illegal material - child pornography, 'video nasties' - should remain
illegal, but he insists 'the world is a diverse place and we should
trust people, not try to police them... There are many cultures and they
are continually changing. What somebody in Tennessee might think of as
reasonable when it comes to nudity is very different from what someone
in Finland might think. 

'Two neighbours next door to each-other might have very different ideas.
So any attempt to make a global centralised standard is going to be
unbelievably contentious. You can't do that.' 

Instead of regulation it is up to parents to 'catch up' with the new e-
generation and teach youngsters how to use the web safely. Children are
at risk because they are 'technologically ahead of most grown-ups, who
have to ask the younger generation how to turn the thing on and get it
working. Adults are slower than children. They need to catch up so they
can teach their children what to see and what to avoid.' 

Ten years ago Berners-Lee wrote the electronic code that enables
computers across the world to 'talk' to each-other down a telephone
line. The internet was born and has grown from a single website to more
than 800,000,000 , with e-commerce, chatrooms and email transforming the
way we work, shop, do business, socialise and relax. 

The Manchester-born scientist has been hailed as 'the man who invented
the future'. A decade on he says we are still 'just scratching the
surface' of what the internet can do. 'The web is far from done. Just
imagine you were back in the Middle Ages and somebody asked "Given the
full impact that paper is going to have, where will we be?" That's where
we are.' 

He describes the future as 'the semantic web... a new, more powerful
interactive network that will
really enable e-commerce and industry to hum. But I don't want to say
more or everyone will jump on the bandwagon and that  will wreck it.' 

He says his creation is 'progressing remarkably well... it's neat. It is
an achievement of a group of people who had a twinkle in their eye about
a possible future. We should celebrate the fact that we can change the
world by creating a new social tool. It gives a great feeling of hope
that we can do it again.' 



Patrolling the internet
Alan Travis, 18 September, 2000, The Guardian
Extract from Bound and Gagged, published by Profile

The British government is preparing a legal framework to control what is
available on the web. In an
exclusive extract from his new book Bound and Gagged, the Guardian's
home affairs editor Alan Travis
argues that the trend is towards censorship rather than a libertarian
approach. Britain is on the verge of a new censorship debate, this time
over how to regulate the content of the web.
A communications white paper will be published this autumn which will
set the legal framework for
delivery of net to every home in Britain within the next four years
through the domestic digital
television as well as the home computer.

Tony Blair has already said he worries about the kind of information
that his three 'very
computer-literate' children, Euan, Nicky and Kathryn, can find on the
net.

"We try to keep a careful watch on what our children are getting access
to on the internet. There are organisations that give advice to people,
but it's very difficult if the parents aren't around watching what is
going on. There are dangers. In the end I think it is more a matter for
parents than for governments. We can do what we can, but it is down to
parents," Blair has said.

For a politician this represents a very liberal stance compared with
America and Australia where
attempts to impose state regulation of the net have criminalised not
only porn sites but also those
which talk about safe sex and abortion as they curb offensive as well as
obscene sites.

The Home Office insists that it is possible to enforce the current
obscenity laws and ensure that "what is illegal offline is illegal
online". So far ministers have been content to leave it to the British
internet industry to develop its own self-regulation through the
Internet Watch Foundation - a body similar to the British Board of Film
Classification.

The IWF is at the centre of a government-backed effort to make sure 
that what is illegal is not available through the main servers, such as 
AOL, Demon, BT internet and the others, and that includes race hate 
material as well as hardcore porn.

Those who back the development of the rating and filtering systems  that
are used argue that for the first time it will give each family -
rather  than the state - the power to decide what kind of material
should enter  their home. But critics fear that the "wish of the lazy
parent to allow 
unsupervised access to their children will reduce adult browsing to the 
level of suitability of a five year old." So far American and
Australian  politicians have not been able to resist the temptation.
Will British  ministers be any different?