Most of us find it useful, Some of us find it entertaining.
The Internet has dramatically changed our society. It brings together people .
and their ideas from all around the world in a short amount of time. It is expanding daily to allow new .
ideas and thought s to be transmitted quickly and easily with the single click of a button. One can find .
information on almost any subject there. Yet many people are trying to censor it. The Internet contains .
racist thoughts, sexually explicit material and much more inappropriate material. But who is it .
inappropriate for and why should it be censored? .
In 1996 the Communications Decency Amendment was passed by congress. This amendment .
imposed a $100,000 fine or a 2-year jail term on anyone who used the Internet to annoy, abuse, threaten or .
harass anyone else. Pro-censors believed the act to be necessary in order to extend the standards of .
decency to the new telecommunications device. Anti-censors thought the amendment was acting like the .
"thought police." .
Recently though the Supreme Court overturned the Communications Decency Act in the civil case .
of Reno v. ACLU. This new law states that the Internet deserves the same level of speech protection as .
books or other printed material. .
Even with this new law in effect many people are still trying and some are succeeding at censoring .
the Internet. They are creating schemes to block and rate the net. A meeting recently took place at the .
White House about this subject. Several industry leaders and the government agreed to try to originate a .
variety of systems to block and regulate controversial online speech. Despite the Supreme Court these .
leaders are inching toward the dangerous and incorrect understanding that the Internet is like television and .
should be rated and/or censored. .
During this meeting many announcements took place. Netscape, a major online server, .
proclaimed their plans to join Microsoft, a major computer company, and adopt the Platform for Internet .