Thursday, March 28, 2024

GOODIES TO GO! ™
November 22, 1999 — Newsletter #55

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GOODIES TO GO! ™

November 22, 1999 — Newsletter #55

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Please visit http://www.htmlgoodies.com

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Greeting, Weekend Silicon Warriors,


Did you hear


A small feminist bookstore that has been calling itself
Amazon since 1970 settled a lawsuit with Amazon.com over
the usage of the name. The deal allows both to keep the
name by Amazon.com licensing use to the Minneapolis
bookstore.


In the ultimate computer retro statement, PONG is back.
I still remember playing pong on a small black and white
TV with those big fat bulky paddle controllers. My friend
and I would always set the controllers to their highest
point so the paddles would simple wrap around the screen
at lightening speed. Wed then sit back and watch the white
blip basically play by itself. Not Pong TNL (The Next Level)
has 20 levels of the game with different playing fields and
obstacles to make it more interesting. Of course, you can
always just play the classic pong. *yawn*


You know whats going to be big this year? Online gift
registration. Those of us whom are married know all about
this. You announce the date and then run to all the high
priced stores and choose the stuff you want people to buy
for you. Well, thanks to the Web and massive amounts of
hard drive space, sites like WishClick.com, WishConnect.com,
and eWish.com all will allow you to set up a registry for
any occasion. Just remember kids you can register all
you want, but Mom and Dad dont understand the Web enough
to read what you wrote. (At least that sounds like a
viable excuse).


If a person is building your Website, should he or she
technically be a contractor? And shouldnt you be able
to look at prices and accept bids and such? Well, now
eConstructors.com is on line just to do that. You can
pick a programmer in just the area youre looking
for or find someone to build your entire site.
That sounds fair.


Now onto todays topic


What do you think of pornography sites on the Web? Do
you even think about them? I usually bring them up in
my classes when I want a rousing discussion about
individuals rights and how those rights affect others.
It gets a solid shouting match going.


Heres the major problem. No matter what you think
about pornography sites on the Web, they are legal. That
means were not going to get rid of them, so we need to be
concerned about how and where they fit into the world
of the Web.


Heres another fact you may not know. People who design and
build for the Web actually like what pornography sites do
for the Web. No, I dont mean the pictures, I mean the
advancement of technology.


Pornography sites are one of the very few genres on the
Web that are actually making money. These sites are making
money hand over fist actually. That allows the companies
to have research and development money. That money is used
to find new, and better, methods of delivering images, video,
sound, live broadcasts, and the like. That research then
makes its way out onto the Web to be used by others.


Where the argument over pornography often goes, and where
it goes in this newsletter, is how to stop minors from
looking at the material. Here again, contrary to popular
belief, legitimate pornography sites do not want minors
looking at their pages. There is simply too much money to
be made legally. Maybe youve heard of programs called
Cybersitter and Net Nanny? They are blocking programs
that pornography sites can submit their links to, to have
them blocked. They dont want the kids in there any more
than you do.


(Please understand I am talking about the majority of
sites there will always be the peddlers that will try
to get users at any cost. Nothing will stop them.)


So why am I bringing this up? Well, a year ago, the
Child Online Protection Act (COPA) went into effect. It
stated, among other things, that to enter a site that
had material considered harmful to minors, users must
supply some kind of unique ID so that the site can be
pretty sure that the person entering the site is who he
says he is.


The problem is that the wording got in the way, harmful
to minors. We all knew that meant pornography, but it
didnt work out that way. The ACLU, on behalf of 17
plaintiffs including bookstores, and an online community
that posted information about AIDS, filed suit blocking
the order. Their reasoning was that setting up this kind
of unique ID system would infringe upon the rights of
legitimate adult users.


The ruling has sat now for a year but will be tested again
as lawyers head into court on Thursday, November 5, 1999
to argue the sides of the case.


I dont like the chances of those wanting the unique IDs
this time around. If you remember back before COPA, there
was the Communications Decency Act (CDA). Basically, it
said that sites providing obscene (whatever we might
decide that is) material must put up a firewall and ask for
some type of unique permission to enter.


The CDA didnt last a lawsuit. It was struck down as
unconstitutional as soon as it came up before a judge.


So now the fight begins again. I dont think theyll win,
but if they do then someone will have to come up with a
method of setting unique identifiers. Do you know what is
being touted as the perfect identifier? Credit card numbers.


Anyone besides me have a problem with that? It makes sense
because usually minors dont have credit cards. You have
to pay to get into a lot of these sites. If a minor does
use a card it can be tracked. Its great, right?


If credit card numbers are the answers then that means it
is a federal mandate that one has a credit card to get into
these sites. That means it is a law that you need to pay to
get into these sites. Anyone else think this sounds like a
bully being punished by being allowed to take shots at the
smaller kids?


I know what youre thinking, theyll just use the credit
card numbers and not charge the card. HA! No way. If
credit card numbers are the answer then every site that
carries pornography will require them. That will lead to
all pornography sites requesting a couple of bucks to get
in. Now, Im all for profit, but not because the government
mandates it.


And yes, there will be a cost passed along to the consumer.
A site is not going to set up unique identifier system out
of the kindness of their hearts. The cost will be passed
along. This is also bad in that a site could set up the
credit card number system, call an entry charge a cost
of doing business mandated by the government and charge
while running a free site.


Using credit card numbers will effectively make the online
pornography industry a pay-for only genre. A government
mandate that will make sure you pay for something that you
could get for free before. Thats not good.


So what next? If the site is free now, will the government
make you not charge when credit card numbers come into play?
No way again. The government cannot stop someone from making
a profit.


See where Im going with this? I just have one question…


Where are my federally mandated couple-of-bucks?


HTML Goodies sits on the Web as clean as a whistle. If
credit card numbers are the answer then all I need to do
is plop Miss March onto the homepage and Im good to go.


I believe this entire argument is moot because COPA wont
win the argument, but if they do. Please dont allow credit
card numbers to be the answer. Make the sites set up some
other kind of password/unique identifier that doesnt pull
money into the picture.


I wonder if its not best that COPA and the CDA are
unsuccessful. It always bothers me when someone or in this
case something is asked to police itself.


I had a wonderful conversation with a mother who was nervous
about her son being able to view pornography on the Web.
She asked me what programs she could buy. I told her to
save some money and simply take the monitor cable with her
when she left the house in the morning. She does.


Yes, I know. Her son can go to a friends house. He could
find bad stuff in other places, but in her words,
Im sure not going to make it easy on him.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


And thats thatthanks for listening to my little rant.


Joe Burns, Ph.D.


And Remember: Never pull bad riddles upon people who have
time on their hands to find an answer. There is a riddle
that goes: There are three words in the English language
that end in GRY. Two are HUNGRY and ANGRY. The third one
everyone uses every day and knows what it stands for. If
you listened carefully, I already told you the word.”
The riddle answer is suppose to be “Language”. Get it?
There are three words in “The English Language”.
Yes, a bad riddle, but one you can easily meet by knowing
a third word that ends in “gry”. There are actually over 100
depending on how arcane you allow your answers to get.
Here are three just for fun. Use them wisely.
aggry, a glass bead worn by people in parts of Africa.
puggry, a scarf worn around a hat or helmet for protection
meagry, a meager appearance (that would be improved by
an aggry or a puggry no doubt.)
Also “gry” itself is a word. maybe. I found two definitions:
A tenth of something (obsolete, by Locke), or the sound a
pig makes (obviously a phonic more than a word).

See:
http://einstein.et.tudelft.nl/~arlet/puzzles/sol.cgi/language/english/spelli
ng/gry
for all 100 plus.

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