[PLUG] XXX?

Matt McKenzie lnxknight at gmail.com
Sat Apr 10 00:55:12 UTC 2010


 On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 5:25 PM, Erik Lane <eriklane at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 5:20 PM, Michael Rasmussen <michael at jamhome.us>
> wrote:
> > On Fri, Apr 09, 2010 at 05:09:51PM -0700, Roderick A. Anderson wrote:
> >> dfhubbard at freegeek.org wrote:
> >> > I'm on the Free Geek Grant group.  One group wants to be able to stop
> the
> >> > access to porn on their grant computers.  Any suggestions?
> >>
> >> I understood your request but it took several readings.
> >
> > WT_?
> >
> > "One group wants to be able to stop the access to porn on their grant
> computers."
> >
> > That is a simple declarative sentence.
> > One only needs to retain four phrases in their short term memory to grok
> it.
> >
> > OK, not as simple as Hemingway.  Simplier than Stephanson, Dick, Carroll
> or LeGuin.
> >
> > May the linguists among us flame me if I'm wrong.
>
> It is an ambiguous sentence. It could be read to mean blocking access
> to porn that is *already* on those computers, either from people on
> the computer, or from the outside world, as well as what he likely
> meant, blocking people using those computers from accessing porn sites
> out there on the internet.


My $0.02 here.

The confusion, from my perspective at least, was this-
Is the OP asking for help setting up filtering on computers that they or
their group owns, that they received from Free Geek,
or are they asking about setting up filters on ALL computers given out by
Free Geek, regardless of whether the recipient wants such filters in place?


This is where the individual rights issue comes up, whether Free Geek has
the right to set up filters on all the computers it gives out.

This is (or at least should be) separate from the moral issue of XXX on the
internet, but the issue of the rights of the donor (Free Geek) and the
rights of the recipient of the donated computers, to control what kinds of
materials can be accessed on said computers, once the donor takes the
computers to their private home.

This is, and should be, separate from the right of, say, an employer to
control access to certain materials on the employer's computers at the
employer's place of business, using the employer's internet connection.
This type of TOS restriction is common in most workplaces. (Or also
employee's computers while accessing the employer's internet connection,
etc)

The OP mentioned being on the Free Geek Grant Group, and since I am not
involved with Free Geek I don't know what kind of control they exercise over
the computers being given out to individuals and groups, so thus the
confusion.

In other words, if this is about computers that an individual or group owns,
received from Free Geek but no longer under their control, then they should
be able to setup any kind of filtering they want for their private use.
However if this is about controlling the access to any kind of material on
all Free Geek computers after they leave Free Geek, and go into other
people's private homes, that then crosses the line into censorship by one
group over another, IMHO.  The individual (or group) owner of the computer
should decide for themselves if they want to filter content, not someone
else.

Is that clear as mud now? ;)


----------
Matt M.
LinuxKnight



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