Will the Department of Commerce OK a XXX Internet Domain?

Human Events Online ^ | June 15, 2005 | Jan LaRue

[hinterlander]

Unless the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) withholds its approval, the porn industry will have its own domain on the World Wide Web, .xxx. Proponents of the domain say that Web sites such as “Hardcore porn.xxx,” “Rape Porn.xxx,” or “XXXporn.xxx” will make it easier for parents and software filtering companies to protect kids from “adult” material. As if “Hardcore porn.com,” “Rape Porn.com,” or “XXX porn.com,” leave them clueless.

If approved, the porn industry and its allies will be free to self-regulate and operate the domain, which would be entirely voluntary. Internet porn site operators would be free to participate on the .xxx domain and be free to remain on any other Internet domain on which they are registered. Double their pleasure and double their fun while expanding their reach and making it easier for kids to find their porn.

The controversy over the .xxx domain comes in the midst of an announcement today by the Florida Family Association (FFA): “Two of the largest Internet porn companies in the world operate with alleged addresses in Miami and Orlando, Florida.” FFA’s programmed special software, dubbed “PornCrawler,” “searched the World Wide Web, identified porn sites and summarized which companies operate those sites. PornCrawler analyzed 297 million links and found that 20 companies in the United States account for over 70 percent of the pornography posted on the World Wide Web.”

[jpsb]

Well I would want some clerly defined difinition of what exactly an offensive picture is or what content meant you had to have an xxx domain. Lots of R rated moving show t&a or more, does t&a mean xxx? XXX needs a clear definition. Maybe after XXX we could do RRR?

[TheOtherOne]

I think all web pages should filter though a governemnt agency. We can have a web czar, then we can be protected from seeing things we shouldn't see.

[TheOtherOne]

©2005 Google - Searching 8,058,044,651 web pages

That should be a simple matter to force everyone to use a rating system. Especially all of the foriegn and off-shore managed servers and websites.

[evets]

I don't think that they should start putting porn on the internet. It will ruin it. Plus, that's not what Al Gore had in mind, when he invented it. Love Story.

[TChris]

Since when did Internet domain naming fall under the purview of the DoC? Hasn't this always been controlled by IANA?

[NavyCanDo]

I have been saying this all along. But it will only work if you can enforce a law stating that all XXX material has to be on the adult server. And then this law must cross borders. Can you force a vulgar German website to move their stuff to the adult domain?
You would think the Internet providers would like it because they can charge for the extra service for those who want it, and the porn industry should benefit by having their own search engines and selling ad space.

Us parents need all the help we can get to shelter our kids from the flood of porn which now dominates the web. And maybe it will also help some normally good adults with their struggles with habitual porn viewing. It happens to the best of us and it affects millions of marriages. This would be a good method and it does not limit free speech.

And NO Internet filters are not a good option - Johnnie can still go to the library, or to his friends hose to view porn if not available at home.

[so_real]

:) Sometimes i wonder how we got to the pseduo-socalist country we have today, and then I read threads like this.

I love TheOtherOne's comment in post 42. It's a great troll!

[sugarboy2971]

The only problem I have with this proposal is that we are speaking of *government* intervention. I can already see Pelosi and Reid trying to pass legislation for any site with a Christian tone to be put under a .nut domain, .duh for sites with pics of W., and .kil for any site involving guns.

[JohnnyZ]

A two-part approach might work if they introduced the .xxx domain first and then hit 'em with a restriction that they have to move their sites to .xxx

[JohnnyZ]

Lots of R rated moving show t&a or more, does t&a mean xxx?

You people are so picky! I'll do some research and get back to you ....

[AuH2ORepublican]

"A two-part approach might work if they introduced the .xxx domain first and then hit 'em with a restriction that they have to move their sites to .xxx"

---

I agree, but as a practical matter, can they force porn sites to move to a .xxx domain? And then there's the issue of exactly what constitutes a porn site, and whether sites that start off innocuously but later become porn sites will fall through the crack, and what if anything can be done about foreign porn sites. Short of requiring that all computers sold in America automatically block access to porn sites (with a monthly fee charged by the DOC for unblocking the computer, a service that would only be available to adults), I don't think the government can do much of anything about the availability of porn sites on the Internet.

BTW, it's time to change your tagline. Maybe you can tell people to say no to Mike DeWine by supporting Brinkman's candidacy in the OH GOP Senate primary (although I'd rather see John Kasich run).

[JohnnyZ]

but as a practical matter, can they force porn sites to move to a .xxx domain?

I dunno.

[Gradek]

Whatever happened to free speech and capitalism. First, I see very little wrong with porn. Sure there is some sick stuff out there, but censoring is never a good idea. Second, who gets to make the determination of what is porn? I trust no one to make that kind of decision, and whats next when the Dems get control?

[kharaku]

It probably COULD be forced (if we eliminated non complying 3rd party nations from being able to sell .xxx names, and limited which ips could register).

[HAL9000]

I'm okay with this. In fact I've been suggesting it for years. But the trick is that you need some kind of regulation to back it up so that a porn site which is not "xxx" immediately loses its site name. It sure would make filtering a whole lot easier. Think of as online zoning.

I've been pointing out for years that it will be worse than useless for filtering purposes. But dot-xxx sounds great to people who don't understand the technical and legal issues.

[traviskicks]

good info.

One small problem I see is that browsers will have to know what DNSs are porn sites and if the porn site doesn't have an equivelent xxx site (or doesn't disclose it) then the browser will have no way of knowing. If someone tried to compile a list of all porn sites it would be difficult as new ones would keep popping up etc..

I'd think if a company existed that compiled a list of these (via crawlers etc..) and developed software (of the like that already exists) it would be much more effective at stopping kids from viewing porn then a red light type district. Which is sort of what you're saying in a different way about choosing the right ISP. It seems what you're suggesting would increase the use of the xxx district, but not assure that porn couldn't be viewed outside this area.

I think this is much ado about nothing and seems to be a big deal because we are contrasting out view of the outside world to that of the internet and it is an imperfect analogy.

Perhaps my arguments are resting on faulty premises - I admit I am not a techno whiz.

[so_real]

Techno-wiz or not, you make good points and raise good concerns.

If someone tried to compile a list of all porn sites it would be difficult as new ones would keep popping up etc.

Excellent point. Today, we (I am in the industry) battle this same issue with spam advertised sites. All those junks emails you didn't ask for almost invariably point to a website trying to sell you something. We are learning (very quickly) how to identify these sites as fast as they appear and distribute the knowledge of them as quickly. We're learning and the education we gain applies to porn sites as easily as it applies to spam sites. You are correct, it is difficult, but it is getting easier every day. Furthermore, every site that pops up costs "them" money to register and host, whereas we can identify these sites and distribute our knowledge of them at no cost. The economics of the situation will force "them" to play ball eventually.

It seems what you're suggesting would increase the use of the xxx district, but not assure that porn couldn't be viewed outside this area.

The first step is to redirect all porn traffic to the red-light district. As we vote with our dollars, the ISP's will agree to funnel porn-dot-com addresses into their porn-dot-xxx equivalents. Porn-dot-com companies will ultimately migrate to the porn-dot-xxx equivalents as the traffic to the dot-com address dwindles and no longer supports the cost of maintaining them. Then, browsers like Internet Explorer and Mozilla can be improved, or add-on packages like Net-Nanny can be used to allow or disallow access to the dot-xxx sites. The control is in the hands of the parent / consumer as to whether those sites are accessible or not.

Children accessing porn in school's, libraries, and at home while the parents are at work has become common place. The time has come to curtail it, and the dot-xxx top-level-domain is a necessary tool in doing so. At least it would open the door to the possibility ... and that's not all bad.

[Androcles]

I say establish the domain and make it clear that US law (And other nations will follow suit!)will not punish attacks against porn sites operating outside that domain or allow such companies to debit American citizens credit cards, etc...

The free sites run by non profit perverts will stay, but some of the well-funded folk will head...

[Androcles]

Yeah, I remember that. Also my 8 year old nephew asked me where to get some space info. I told him try nasa. com and he came back horrified. He'd spelt it nassa or nasser which apparently is German for wet or moist. You can imagine the result...

[Modernman]

Let ANY website that has access to nude pictures of anyone be required to use the .xxx domain.

The Vatican website, along with the websites for every art museum in the world, would need to have an .xxx domain name, then.