Previous |
Next |
February 16, 2007, 02:06 PM ET
Will Wikipedia Get Caught in the Web?
The U.S. Senate's desire to get tough on online predators could end up forcing public schools and libraries to keep Web surfers away from any number of interactive Web sites, say critics of a recently introduced bill.
The Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act would block minors from using public computers to view social-networking sites. But the act's definition of social networking is awfully vague: Any site that "permits registered users to create an online profile that includes detailed personal information" or "enables communication among users" appears to be a candidate for blocking. By those standards, Web sites like Wikipedia and even Amazon would seem to be in danger.
The Senate bill reads like a beefed-up version of last year's Deleting Online Predators Act, a similarly foggy piece of legislation passed by the House of Representatives (The Chronicle, July 28, 2006). The House act was widely criticized by digital-rights activists, and the new bill has already drawn fire from the same quarters -- in part, perhaps, because its sponsor is Ted Stevens, a Republican from Alaska who was famously lampooned last year for referring to the Internet as "a series of tubes."
"It's easy to characterize Stevens as little more than a buffoon," writes Preston Gralla at Computerworld, but the Senate bill has a fair chance of passing, he says.
Update: Wired News's 27B Stroke 6 blog points out that the Senate bill makes a point to go after commercial social-networking sites. Wikipedia, which is not a commercial site, should be off the hook, though some other potentially useful sites may not be. That said, since the act is worded quite nebulously, is there a chance that some libraries might err on the side of caution by blocking more sites than a strict reading of the law would seem to mandate? Please chime in, librarians and legal experts. --Brock Read
Categories: Legal-Troubles, Leadership
Add Your Comment
Commenting is closed.