Good article nonetheless.

I would hope and assume the various webbrowsers could ensure there is a ‘brain dead’, one step method for parents to configure their computer so it won’t ‘visit’ .xxx sites.

Bill Gates already created specialized software for police to use for finding child pornographers, so I’d bet that’d ensure future versions (and updates of current versions) of IE would have an easy way parents to set that up. Tons of media coverage about that new ability should be enough to inform most parents.

Of course other browsers would also have to have something similar, but it’s a pretty easy sale – simply asking they make a minor effort to keep kids and Pörń apart.

>If you’re a concerned dad, there already is a solution that works – it’s called netnanny.

That’s not fool proof either, and many parents don’t know about that software, wouldn’t know how to install and configure it properly, or want to spend the money and effort to get it. Make it a part of the browser, make it very obvious and simple to enable, and it’s more likely to be done.

>>As for:”not every site is going to buy a .kids domain”
>
>Don’t worry, I know some search engine spammers that will make sure that all information that should be available to kids will be on .kids domains. All of it.

…Until they go to a friend’s house where the parents DON’T monitor their kid’s internet usage and the computer is in their bedroom.

And the .xxx domain will help “save the children” exactly how in this case?

If you’re a concerned dad, there already is a solution that works – it’s called netnanny.

As for:”not every site is going to buy a .kids domain”

Don’t worry, I know some search engine spammers that will make sure that all information that should be available to kids will be on .kids domains. All of it.

…Until they go to a friend’s house where the parents DON’T monitor their kid’s internet usage and the computer is in their bedroom.

When I was a kid, we were LUCKY if we stumbled upon a ratty Playboy magazine in some other kids’ fort… then carefully scrapped the dirt, bugs and worms off it so we could savour the sun-bleached pages of topless and carefully posed women (this was the mid 70s or so, when the ladies in Playboy and Penthouse weren’t attempting to certify readers as gynocologists)…

Today, a kid can go to their friends house while the parents are out or engrossed in the latest episode of “Lost”, type in a few keywords, and find a website showing people engaged in sex with animals so graphic that even Catherine the Great would turn sheet-white with shock.

As a dad, that’s a little more than I want a young child or teen to have access to.

And creating a .kids domain name is one solution, but would severly limit millions of valuable and educational websites they should be able to access while studying for school or for their own curiousity (not every site is going to buy a .kids domain).

The internet is the (vastly more valuable) equivalent to the set of Encyclopedias my parents bought when I was a kid that I would go to whenever I wanted to learn more about whatever my latest interests were.

So let the XXX.coms KEEP their .coms – but they can 301 redirect them to a new .xxx they buy (they can certainly afford the extra $10), whether it has the same name or not.

Advertise sex.com to the world, and when it redirects to their .xxx site – THAT is when the parental block come up. If your kids use the computer, they won’t see the content. If an adult wants to see the .xxx site, they can.

–”this is like saying “let’s outlaw cigarettes because I don’t want my child to smoke”

NO, we now say “You have to be 16 (or whatever) before you’re old enough to be able to smoke if you so choose”. Sure kids can smoke if they really want to… but at least society is not condoning that behaviour in children – it’s a clear message that there’s something wrong with it. Kids aren’t dumb – they understand limitations like that are there for a reason, whether they ignore them or not.

So, imo, adults should make a serious effort to prevent children from finding Pörń online – whether trying to find it on purpose or by accident (ie whitehouse.com).

As it is now, kids know they can do a google search and find any kind of sex – whether natural or deviant – and adults as a whole have done nothing to stop them; even though kids know we could if we wanted to…

My 2 cents as a dad.

To an extent, your kids is going to do what your kids is going to do. They will find a way….I was a kid once too, so I know!

The responsibility is the PARENTS. You can raise your child to shape his morals and views and you can put filters on computers at home. Again, if you child wants to go elsewhere to be naughy online…they will find a way! Keep closer tabs, know where they are, what they are doing, if that makes you feel like you are protecting them.

I’m so sick of our government passing laws to supposedly “protect” us. What ever happened to personal responsibilty? If you are a parent, then YOU keep your child away from this stuff.

Not to mention it would mean *huge* revenue for anyone set up to sell domains… imagine how much cartoon.kids would go go.

“taking the material as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors.” (emphasis on the “for minors” part) I think that part alone pretty much digs the grave for this bill. Who will say that a nude photograph, such as one displayed in an art museum has artistic value for minors? After all, John Ashcroft couldn’t even handle a historical statue in the DOJ.