From: tcmay@sensemedia.net (Timothy C. May)
Date: Mon, 31 Jul 95 10:15:52 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Sex & Crime TV filter
Message-ID: <ac425d4208021004ef6c@[205.199.118.202]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Wow! I think Ted just hit on something that could be used to quickly derail
the "V-chip":

At 4:02 PM 7/31/95, Thaddeus J. Beier wrote:

>The chip that interprets the content does it solely based on the rating
>information.  This is the so-called "v-chip" (v for violence, I think,
>not for video) that you see in the press.
...
>qualifications of most people.  Besides, what I would really
>like to filter out, what I find to be incredibly violent to the
>minds of children, is commercial advertising.  Private rating
>services could take care of these, easily, as well.

I agree, of course, about it not being the role of government/FCC/etc. to
mandate such ratings, such chips, etc.

However, to help derail this V-chip being mandated, what if we (I mean
activists, writers of columns, etc.) "insisted" that _commercials_ be
similarly labelled?

"Yes, if violence and sex is to be "voluntarily rated," we think that
commercial advertising ought to be similarly rated."

It might be hard for the legislators to avoid the logic of this.
Advertisers, fearing people would of course mute the commercials, would
then quietly urge them to drop the whole idea.

--Tim May

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