Compuserve is Not "Censoring": Look to Governments for the Cause

[tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)]

At 4:52 PM 12/28/95, Cees de Groot wrote, speaking of Compuserve's recent
dropping of many newsgroups in response to demands by German prosecutors:

>I won't start to comment on the style of this message. The term "Suitspeak"
>comes to mind.

Perhaps it is "Suitspeak," but it is not "censorship."

Or, more precisely, it is fear that government laws will be used to
sanction the service.  Thus, it is the government of Germany in this case
which is "censoring." ("Censor" and "censorship" are notoriously overloaded
terms, of course.)

Likewise, the Telecom/Exon Bill which we are so opposed to would just make
the U.S. another player in this arena, joining Germany, Iraq, Syria,
Singapore, and other regimes in attempting to regulate what people access
on the Net. The U.S. would most like demand that a foreign-based service
operating in the U.S. comply with U.S. laws. The problem lies with the laws
themselves, as there is essentially no solution which will accommodate all
of the various conflicting standards and mores of the world's nations and
tribes while still having a Net such as we know it today. This is why I
favor "technological anarchy": have systems which allow people to read and
write what they want to read and write, not what church elders or
government officials have deemed to be approprate or wholesome.

(Note: There are ongoing debates about whether laws against obscenity,
pornography, insulting speech, and on and on, violate free speech
provisions in the U.S. Constitution. I won't get into this here. However,
the laws of Germany, Iraq, North Korea, Singapore, France, Syria,......,
Germany, Japan, Italy, and Zaire are definitely not those of the U.S. Thus,
any _global_ service, such as Compuserve, may soon be forced to remove 70%
or more of all Usenet newsgroups, and to restrict Web page access. After
all, providing access to "alt.binaries.pictures.muslim.women.nude" is
punishable by death by stoning in at least 30 countries. And providing
access to Christian recruiting groups, and most Jewish groups, is
definitely not allowed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia--better remove all
those groups.)

More than just Compuserve and AOL--which has a list of words it does not
like to see used--I expect the various attempts to crack down on
un-Christian, un-Muslim, un-chastity, etc. words and images to spread.
Singapore will have its list of things it doesn't want its "children" (=
all citizen-units) to see, Nigeria will have its list, and so on.

Germany's longstanding moves to limit images and words it considers
inappropriate and offensive are likely to force many Usenet newsgroups out
of Germany. Law enforcement there is concentrating on Compuserve, and is
trying to get U.S. officials to crack down on neo-Nazi Web sites in the
U.S.

The shape of things to come.

Technology to bypass these new laws, not even more laws, is the key.

--Tim May

Views here are not the views of my Internet Service Provider or Government.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
Corralitos, CA              | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^756839      | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."