The Butt Ugly Weblog

Ombudsman calls for chat room censorship

From Helsingin Sanomat: "Ombudsman Johanna Suurpää says that if administrators and chat room moderators don't voluntarily step in to curb inappropriate discussions, then the law should be changed to require them to do so ... "Even though the Internet could never be fully controlled, this is not enough of a reason to do nothing," she days."

...right. Where do these people come from?

Don't they realize that what is already illegal in the regular public place is illegal on the internet as well? Certain kinds of verbal abuse (like libel) should just simply be reported to the police and let them deal with it. The law is there, and it is same for everyone. Heck, we pay an inordinate amount of taxes so that we don't even have to pay the police to do their job!

However, when private corporations are forced to decide what is "acceptable speech", we're going down the slippery slope and fast. Freedom means that every single site must have the ability to decide on their own what kind of discussions they tolerate. If you don't like their policy, you can go elsewhere. If someone goes over the line, you talk first to the admins, and if they don't do anything, you can always go to the police.

Now, I don't mind the law saying that "complaints from the users must be taken seriously". That highlights the responsibility of the maintainers, and should probably make them think a bit. But if the law says that all the maintainers need to proactively start censoring discussion based on their interpretation of the law - then we're no longer in a free country. Especially since there is no longer a clear line between public and private on the internet: if something is visible to only your friends, is it a public discussion? Can the moderators step in and censor things then? What if you have a hundred friends? Ten? One?

The only way a moderator can be sure that nothing illegal is going on in his system is to read all the private messages as well. This includes person-to-person messages; personal emails; everything. There would be no more online privacy, but your innermost thoughts would be read and evaluated for "appropriateness" by a stranger with no or little training, and small pay.

And that is simply too high a price to pay for a bit of temporary peace of mind.

In a free country, punishment follows crime. Let's keep it that way.