Re: Anti-Electronic Racketeering Act of 1995 (fwd)

["Peter Trei" <trei>]

> I remember one of the sponsors of the CDA ranting about pornographers
> "profiteering" from pornographic images on the Internet, blissfully unaware
> that stuff downloaded from alt.sex.binaries.insert.your.fetish.here doesn't
> profit anyone but the phone company (for the hours you stay online to get
> it).

I called up Exon's press secretary and asked him about this. He 
claimed that BBS's were uploading advertisments to the Net, and this
was the 'profiteering' referred to. He was immune to reason on this,
and felt that the CMU 'study' was rigorous.

It's true that a some of the pics in those groups include stamped-in
BBS names and phone numbers, but my impression was always that this
was the BBS operators trying to do a little damage control - so that
when random users post their pix (on which they claim copyright, 
ignoring the fact that most of their scans rip off magazine 
publishers), they can recognize the 'piracy', and also earn a little
publicity.

For a good backgrounder on the story, check 
http://www.cybernothing.org/cno/reports/cyberporn.html

Peter Trei
ptrei@acm.org
 

Peter Trei
Senior Software Engineer
Purveyor Development Team                                
Process Software Corporation
trei@process.com