The FCC's Kindergarden-Approved Wireless Broadband National plan involves potentially futile content-filtering effort... Last year the FCC denied a request by M2Z Networks that involved giving M2Z free spectrum in exchange for 5% of M2Z revenues. The company promised to offer 384kbps free service and a $20-$30 3Mbps tier to 95% of the country in ten years. The FCC instead proposed auctioning that spectrum with the 95% coverage condition attached. It's worth noting that both the original M2Z proposal and the FCC plan involve filtering any content on the free tier that could prove "harmful" to a five year old. From the FCC proposal (pdf), the company who wins the spectrum must implement a system that: filters or blocks images and text that constitute obscenity or pornography and, in context, as measured by contemporary community standards and existing law, any images or text that otherwise would be harmful to teens and adolescents. For purposes of this rule, teens and adolescents are children 5 through 17 years of age; An ABCNews editorial laments the fact that filtering the Internet so that it "mirrors a level of discourse commonly found in the neighborhood kindergarten" is not only a tall task (is war coverage included?), it's "blatantly unconstitutional." It's almost a moot point, since the editorial fails to mention that the handshakes are barely finished on these type of deals before some kid has wiggled his way around the filters anyway.
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 zipjay
join:2003-03-11
South Williamson, KY | why not... give the ability to turn the extreme filtering on and off.. so little jonny can use it but average adult joe can also (literally so he CAN use it(what adult goes to sites that would be 100% perfectly safe for kids? not even wikipedia is)) | |
| | | You can't legislate morality Much to the dismay of the right wing nut case religious right, you cannot legislate morality. What, are their filters going to block the word 'boobies' or 'vagina'? By all means, let them build out the system, the filters will be struck down before the ink even dries. If they can offer 3mb/sec to 95% of the country *by land mass, not by population*, then by all means let them build it. Which means that maybe if you live in the deep mountains of Idaho, or the backwoods of Montana, you don't get coverage, but everyone in Maine and everywhere else can get coverage. I want LANDMASS coverage, not population coverage.
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|  |  TzaleProud Libertarian ConservativePremium
join:2004-01-06
NYC Metro | Re: You can't legislate morality said by karlmarx:Much to the dismay of the right wing nut case religious right, you cannot legislate morality. What, are their filters going to block the word 'boobies' or 'vagina'? By all means, let them build out the system, the filters will be struck down before the ink even dries. If they can offer 3mb/sec to 95% of the country *by land mass, not by population*, then by all means let them build it. Which means that maybe if you live in the deep mountains of Idaho, or the backwoods of Montana, you don't get coverage, but everyone in Maine and everywhere else can get coverage. I want LANDMASS coverage, not population coverage. While your dream of near-nationwide coverage is nice, it won't happen anytime soon.. If we can't get 95% of America covered by electricity and phone service, how are we going to get a 3mbps internet connection there?
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| |  Romney2012Defeat Obama 2012-Chg we can believe inPremium
join:2002-03-03
USA
kudos:4 | said by karlmarx:Much to the dismay of the right wing nut case religious right, you cannot legislate morality. you cannot legislate morality?
That is an absurd statement on its face. Laws are nothing but the codification of moral principles. The whole purpose of a legal system is to legislate morality. To state you can't legislate morality is to adopt the anarchist position that there should not be any laws, except the law of the jungle. Kill or be killed and accept no limits on human activity.
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Romney2012Defeat Obama 2012-Chg we can believe inPremium
join:2002-03-03
USA
kudos:4 |  FCC filtering std not usable - service would be worthless
any images or text that otherwise would be harmful to teens and adolescents. For purposes of this rule, teens and adolescents are children 5 through 17 That std would make the free service unusable to almost every adult and would block about 99.9% of web sites, especially if setup to deliver content not harmful to a 5 yr old.
I can't think of a single news site or search engine that would pass that test.
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| |  MikePremium,Mod
join:2000-09-17
Pittsburgh, PA | Re: FCC filtering std not usable - service would be worthless I've read countless times elsewhere here that Santa Claus was not real.
This site would be totally banned. | |
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| | Kindergarden Discourse Level Kindergarden level. So potty talk should be ok. The FCC is a real poo-poo head for thinking they can require this. Chairman Martin is a "pizza pie."
BTW, that's a real "insult" that my soon-to-be-5-year-old uses to get around potty talk restrictions. (Think about the initials.) See, even 5 year old knows how to wiggle around rules. What luck will the FCC have enforcing a "G-Rated Internet Filter?"
Also, what is harmful to a 5 year old isn't the same thing as something that is harmful to a 17 year old. Who gets to decide what content is "harmful" and what the threshold is? Is a discussion about cancer harmful to a 17 year old? What about breast cancer? What about a discussion of breast cancer with a diagram of a human breast? What about the same thing only with an image of a human breast? At what point do we cross from informational to harmful?
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|  KrKHeavy Artillery For The Little GuyPremium
join:2000-01-17
Tulsa, OK | Build it--- the filters will die in legal battle.... ... and the Network will be up and running, restrictions removed. That would be OK with me. | |
| | | Ridiculous offer got a Ridiculous counter offer. The FCC was offered 5% they in my opinion felt it was ridiculous so they offered a ridiculous counter offer.
Then the two would work it out.
Ask a Stupid Question get a Stupid answer.
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| | EPS
join:2008-02-13
Hingham, MA | Kindergarten friendly? Considering the Internet being what it is, you'd almost certainly have to use a whitelist to have any chance of success at all... which ruins the point for 99% of the potential users. | |
| | | Once again... Ah, the FCC, screaming 'PROTECT THE CHILDREN!' since, well, whenever it was created.
Seriously, what our society considers 'harmful' most other societies would encourage their children to do/look at/whatever, because it's perfectly normal. It's called curiosity, though American schools sure try their best to stifle it. | |
|  SabreDi relung hatiku bernyanyi bidadari
join:2005-05-17 | Poison pill? Is it possible that the FCC is attaching this condition as a poison pill to ensure that no one takes up the offer? Then, perhaps, using the lack of interest as proof that "universal wireless broadband" isn't needed, possibly going back to the traditional argument of "we have enough options already, we don't need another one"?
Just something that randomly occurred to me just now. | |
| | | Umm The article's headline is misspelled. It should be "Kindergarten" with a T. Come on, BBR writers, let's use spell check. | |
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