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

[Adam Shostack <adam@lighthouse.homeport.org>]

	This trend towords governments saying 'This might be illegal,
we won't tell you' is very disturbing.  Doug Barnes reported on it
being the tactic of choice in forcing banks to fall in line & spy on
their customers.

	Compuserve should be encouraged to get a ruling from the
Barvarian/German government on the legality of the groups.  (Does the
EU provide freedom of speech protections, or simply freedom of
inoffensive speech?)  Also, how does this interact with the
harmonization of publications laws with places such as the
Netherlands?  The EU can't be expected to thrive if each country has
totally different publishing laws.

	Alternately, if there are cypherpunks who spend time in
alt.config, we might create groups such as alt.intimate.stories,
alt.intimate.bondage.duct-tape, etc.


Ulf Moeller wrote:

| This is today's page 1 article in the newspaper "die tageszeitung".
| 
| The article "Zensur im Cyberspace" (censorship in cyberspace)
| and the comment "Die Moral der Biederm=E4nner" are available
| http://www.prz.tu-berlin.de/~taz until tomorrow.
| 
|  From the article (my translation):
| 
| "The Bavarian department of public prosecution 'has left it to their
| discretion' to take the 'necessary steps' on their own, to avoid
| 'possible punishability of the management in Germany'. An advice that
| CompuServe has followed although there is no kind of legal obligation
| for it. Legally, it is still perfectly unclear if enterprises that
| provide access to the Internet can be held responsible in any way for
| the contents distributed there."



-- 
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once."
					               -Hume