From: Alan Olsen <alano@teleport.com>
Date: Tue, 13 Feb 1996 10:25:31 +0800
To: "Deranged Mutant" <WlkngOwl@UNiX.asb.com>
Subject: Re: V-chips, CC, and Motorcycle Helmets
Message-ID: <2.2.32.19960212203533.0090a244@mail.teleport.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 07:20 AM 2/12/96 +0000, Deranged Mutant wrote:
>> Parents had that ability before.  Cable boxes have a "perental control key"
>> on the side that enables them to lock out "offensive" channels.  It works
>> quite well and is fairly hard for the kidlets to defeat.  (I used it to
>> lockout the religious stations and home shopping channels.)
>
>When I was a kid some friends down the street knew how to unlock the 
>Channel 100 XXX movies with a paper clip.  A V-chip would hopefully 
>be more sophisticated, but then again, so are today's kids...

Sshhh!  You are not supposed to tell them that!

>> The "V-Chip" debate is a mirror of the one that occured when the cable
>> channels were starting to become popular.  There was a big hue and cry about
>> kids getting to the "naughty" channels without parent concent.  Seems most
>> people do not even learn how the lockouts work.  (And are too lazy to learn.)
>
>You should check out your nearest H/P BBS or ftp-site...

Yeah, I know it can be hacked.  I also know that if they are that interested
in sex, NOTHING I do is going to stop them.  (Which is as it should be.  If
they have no exposure to any sexual material as a youth, some rather nasty
problems tend to crop up as adults. (Take a look at the studies of sexual
predators.) But that is a point avoided by the moralists...)

>> You have to remember that most of the people arguing for TV filters are
>> looking for a way to make the "offensive" stuff go away for good.  (Either
>[..]
>
>A very good point.  One that makes me wary of V-Chips...

It makes me very wary of them.  What gets me are all the people here who
talk about them as if they will have useful features.  They will be about as
useful as the ratings on video games.  ("Hey, theres a cool one!  This one
has flying mangled bodies!  Its OK though.  No sex!")

---
Alan Olsen -- alano@teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction
        `finger -l alano@teleport.com` for PGP 2.6.2 key 
                http://www.teleport.com/~alano/ 
  "We had to destroy the Internet in order to save it." - Sen. Exon
"I, Caligula Clinton... In the name of the Senate and the people of Rome!"
   - Bill Clinton signing the CDA with the First Amendment bent over.