New Internet Draft on protecting children AND free speech

First of all, pardon me for the multiple postings of this, but this
topic has been discussed on many different mailing lists.   (If I've
failed to send it anywhere important, feel free to resend it.)  I
suggest that the best place for followup discussions is probably the
rating@junction.net mailing list, since this is more or less its
intended purpose.

As many of you know, First Virtual has been struggling, like many
others, with the role of erotica on the Internet.  The problem is one
we've had to confront head-on because our system allows *anyone* to sell
things on the Internet, and several of our sellers (about 10 to 15%,
last I looked) are selling erotica.  We've already taken quite a few
steps to isolate these people in such a way as to make their material
less accessible to children or to anyone else who will be offended by
it.  

In doing this, we have gradually refined our own notions of how this can
be done, and of course we've been following the ongoing discussions on
the various mailing lists.  As a result, we have put together a proposal
for a generalized solution to the problem, which we believe preserves
free speech while making it much easier for those who wish to protect
children or otherwise avoid "undesirable" material to do so.  We have
today asked for this to be published as an Internet-Draft by New &
Borenstein, entitled, "KidCode: Naming Conventions for Protecting
Children on the World Wide Web and Elsewhere on the Internet Without
Censorship".

As is implied by publication of an Internet Draft,  we are eagerly
soliciting comments from the Internet community, and are trying to help
the community converge on a standard set of conventions in this area. 
All input and suggested improvements will be very welcome.

The proposal is intended to be COMPLEMENTARY to the "blacklist" approach
taken by SurfWatch, and it also provides hooks for the kinds of ratings
authorities that have been discussed of late.  However, its main
function is to provide a URL naming convention by which a lot of the
intended goals can be achieved with minimal effort.

The Internet-Draft will probably take a few days to be published.  Those
of you wishing to read it sooner may download it via anonymous ftp from
ftp.fv.com, in the directory pub/nsb, where it is available in plain
text and postscript versions, named:  

	draft-fv-kidcode-00.{ps,txt}

We look forward to any and all constructive comments.  -- Nathaniel
--------
Nathaniel S. Borenstein <nsb@fv.com>    |           When privacy is outlawed,
Chief Scientist, First Virtual Holdings |     only outlaws will have privacy!
FAQ & PGP key: nsb+faq@nsb.fv.com       | SUPPORT THE ZIMMERMAN DEFENSE FUND!

---VIRTUAL YELLOW RIBBON-->> zldf@clark.net (http://www.netresponse.com/zldf)

Received on Monday, 5 June 1995 12:00:36 UTC