ICANN Meeting Passes on .com, .xxx decisions 110
Rob writes "As the Internet Corp for Assigned Names and Numbers wound up its annual meeting in
Vancouver yesterday it was inactions that were still causing all the controversy. Major
decisions on the .com and .xxx domains had been postponed until next year, as the domain
name management body seeks to balance the interests of governments
and commercial domain name organizations."
Why .xxx won't work (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, if you were hoping for a burgeoning directory of naughty stuff, then yes, you're boned
Seeking to balance the interests of who? (Score:5, Insightful)
For governments and regulatory bodies to try to assess interests for the masses, failure will always be the end result. We have the free market where the billions of consumers make decisions every second and the market continuously changes in response to the demand by consumers and the supply of a given service or product. On the other hand we have regulatory bodies and governments that change over years or even decades in order to satisfy 51% of the voting block.
Domain name extensions don't make sense anymore -- as we continue to add more, the value of the old extensions diminishes (except, maybe,
Is there a new date set for decisions? (Score:5, Insightful)
Who cares (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess no one.
BTW, ICAAN seems too weak and not able to challenge Verisign or the US governement.
.xxx and .kids (Score:3, Insightful)
You might as well have both TLDs and make it known "East is East & West is West".
Turn
As far as
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:2, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:4, Insightful)
The big problem would be that only an idiot would put their porn site on
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:2, Insightful)
I worry more about say a breast cancer site that has information of self examination or birth control sites. You even have to wonder about sites like Slashdot. Some of the children on here use language that is very offensive.
Before I get the "free speech" rants shouldn't parents have the freedom to decide what their child can read? I wouldn't want a nine year old of mine reading Penthouse or propaganda from the KKK or Nazis. Frankly I wish that Slashdot would have a filth filter. I wouldn't want a young child reading some of the posts on here. The amount of profanity and hate speech I see is at times very depressing.
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:3, Insightful)
There are many commercial filters that can filter out offending sites by keyword blocking. The things you object to on Slashdot could probably be blocked, if you truly don't want to read them. The downside is that you would probably wind up being mostly unable to read Slashdot if you applied such a filter.
Alternatively, you could write (or hire someone to write) a plugin for your browser that would find offensive words and, say, display them only in a white font, or insert the word "Smurf" every time an offensive word appears, or any other workaround that would prevent you from seeing the terms that offend you. I wouldn't be surprised if someone has already written these, or sells software that does effectively the same thing.
If, however, you meant that you think you have the right to decide what my children should be allowed to read, that's a completely different matter. I will not help you find ways to do that, and I will oppose any effort to impose your standards of what qualifies as "filth".
would adult sites object to self-monitoring? (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a benefit to self-description, as long as the registering body isn't forced by that business's government to label certain things as porn. It has to be voluntary.
Ok, I see how edge-cases might raise questions, but why not just open the TLD and see what happens?
Judging from the time for the approval process, you would think they were trying to solve Fermat's Last Theorem. Hey, guys, it's fricking three letters. What's the holdup?
Robert nagle
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:1, Insightful)
Then lock them in the basement. It's difficult as a parent to watch your children exposed to things like profanity and hate speech, but the world isn't puppies and gumdrops. All of us were exposed to profanity and sexual material when we were young and most of us turned out all right. All my parents accomplished by admonishing my use of profanity was that I don't swear in front of them. Same goes with my kids. Instead of trying to shield them from the bad or pretend it doesn't exist, I've tried to introduce them to more "productive" pursuits. No matter what I do, though, ultimately it's their decision how to spend their time.
Re:But Didnt Condi Say (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Seeking to balance the interests of who? (Score:3, Insightful)
Because the market is not your girlfriend.
Because the market is not Santa Claus.
Because the market is not a creative entity.
Because the market is dumb as shit, and easily influenced.
Because the market is not a panacea for every societial ill.
(except for extreme forms of free-market-fetishism, in which social ills are wished away)
Re:Why .xxx won't work (Score:3, Insightful)
This is not a straightforward definition (despite its brevity). Define "profanity." Define "reason." Define "hate speech." Define "anti-Semitic." Define "racist."
I am sure that you have clear conceptions of each of these (and your conceptions of them might not be all that different from mine), but I guarantee you that your definitions of each will vary widely from other people's. What's more, though I suspect we agree substantially on these definitions, I must admit that I disagree quite strongly that such things constitute "filth".
So whose definitions would you want Slashdot to use to determine "filth"? Yours? What privileges your definition over anyone else's? Why not mine? Why not Larry Flynt's? Why not those of the very people who post what you consider "filth"?
I just wouldn't want any kids under say 14 years old reading some of the posts.
So you are saying that if my kid is under 14 years old, you would prevent him from reading them? That would be my decision as a parent to allow or forbid it. I don't recall surrendering my parental rights or responsibilities to anyone else. If you want to keep your own kids under 14 from reading them, fine and dandy. That's your right as a parent. (Mind you, I'll think you're silly, and naive, and doing your kids a disservice. But I will still support your right, because they're your kids.) Don't fancy, however, that your own necessarily subjective standard should apply to other people's kids.
Finally, just to keep this even marginally on topic, the same applies to the
If it's meant to be a system whereby people can opt to register as