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From: David Schwartz on 10 Nov 2009 23:24 On Nov 10, 7:43 pm, Ben Finney <bignose+hates-s...(a)benfinney.id.au> wrote: > > Mine officially got told drop it or go to jail. > Told by whom? Whose business is it to tell an ISP to drop NNTP support? In the cases I've been involved in, it has come down to this: 1) The provider can ignore the fact that there is child pornography on USENET. They can drop complaints on the floor. They can risk legal prosecution because they "knew or should have known" and did nothing. They will be harassed and threatened by Cuomo and others. Congress will cite them as an example of why stronger laws are necessary, and those laws will likely pass. -or- 2) The provider can police their network. They can direct their employees to go looking for child pornography for them to block. When they receive complaints, they can investigate those complaints and confirm the presence of child pornography. They can then either contact the police -- confessing that they possess child pornography, or then can investigate themselves, thus failing to report the crime. Employees can sue them claiming that the presence of child pornography creates a hostile work environment. -or- 3) The provider can drop USENET support entirely. Given these three choices, it's a no brainer. DS
From: Ben Finney on 11 Nov 2009 00:12 David Schwartz <davids(a)webmaster.com> writes: > On Nov 10, 7:43 pm, Ben Finney <bignose+hates-s...(a)benfinney.id.au> > wrote: > > Told by whom? Whose business is it to tell an ISP to drop NNTP > > support? > > In the cases I've been involved in, it has come down to this: > > 1) The provider can ignore the fact that there is child pornography on > USENET. […] > -or- > > 2) The provider can police their network. […] > -or- > > 3) The provider can drop USENET support entirely. The same choice, with the same options, seems to apply to HTTP. Why is the decision different? -- \ “The industrial system is profoundly dependent on commercial | `\ television and could not exist in its present form without it.” | _o__) —John Kenneth Galbraith, _The New Industrial State_, 1967 | Ben Finney
From: David Schwartz on 11 Nov 2009 01:48 On Nov 10, 9:12 pm, Ben Finney <bignose+hates-s...(a)benfinney.id.au> wrote: > The same choice, with the same options, seems to apply to HTTP. Why is > the decision different? Not at all, for many reasons. The two most obvious are: 1) HTTP is not broadcast. 2) Not providing HTTP service is not an option since HTTP service is what most people are actually buying from you. DS
From: Ben Finney on 11 Nov 2009 02:21 David Schwartz <davids(a)webmaster.com> writes: > On Nov 10, 9:12 pm, Ben Finney <bignose+hates-s...(a)benfinney.id.au> > wrote: > > > The same choice, with the same options, seems to apply to HTTP. Why is > > the decision different? > > Not at all, for many reasons. You're not presenting reasons why the options are different; AFAICT, they're still the same. You're providing what I asked for, which is reasoning for a different decision. So, thank you. > The two most obvious are: > > 1) HTTP is not broadcast. > > 2) Not providing HTTP service is not an option since HTTP service is > what most people are actually buying from you. Yes, this latter is the likely underlying reason. In fact, it seems to be a reason that would hold even in the absence of the bogus justification about what to do when the law comes a-knocking. So I don't see why bogus rationalisations are presented. -- \ “Kill myself? Killing myself is the last thing I'd ever do.” | `\ —Homer, _The Simpsons_ | _o__) | Ben Finney
From: Xavier Roche on 11 Nov 2009 05:22
David Schwartz a �crit : > 1) The provider can ignore the fact that there is child pornography on > USENET. On binary newsgroups, yes. But binaries are for warez, pr0n and movies anyway - what else ? The current trend is to CONTINUE to provide warez, pr0n and movies to customers through outsourcing: that's why commercial usenet providers are here. Of course, the reaons are not "because we want to provide illegal content without taking the risks", the reason is "because it's too expensive for us and we don't have any interest in it" > -or- Or they can just filter binaries and continue to offer a good Usenet support for text, with spam filtering (through cleanfeed and nocem) Quality "text" servers are cheap, often FREE http://albasani.net/ http://www.glorb.com/ http://news.aioe.org/ http://www.eternal-september.org/ http://individual.net/ ... and many other ones (We're a bit off-topic here, however) |