PICS: Peter Webb's speech in Singapore

[Robin Whittle]

Peter Webb: PICS Evangelist
===========================

Please check out:  

    http://www.dca.gov.au/aba/amic.htm

This is the text of a speech given by Australian 
Broadcasting Authority Chairman Peter Webb, to a 
communications conference in Singapore at the start of 
June.

He speaks about Digital Sound Broadcasting, Digital 
Terrestrial Television Broadcasting.  Then there is one and 
a half pages introducing the ABA's recent online content 
regulation inquiry and then nearly three pages devoted to 
PICS.

I think that "Internet" should be spelt with a capital "I", 
that PICS is a protocol rather than an organisation and I 
am uncertain about the idea of making PICS compulsory 
(presumably labelling of resources, not enforcing the use 
of PICS based access control software) - but these are 
minor quibbles.

Peter Webb's description of PICS and discussion of some of 
the finer points regarding context sensitive access 
control, and the desirability of some international 
coordination to create one or more widely useable ratings 
systems, is erudite and seems well targeted for this 
audience.  

Furthermore, to devote so much of his speech to PICS as an 
alternative to traditional state based censorship, is 
provocative in Singapore - where chewing gum is forbidden 
and a recently passed law imposes fines of $5000 on people 
seen naked in their own homes.  

Although he mentions the role that "national personality" 
will play in shaping policy for new technologies, he has a 
bit of a dig - "Until the death of the nation state can be 
confirmed . . " and highlights the Internet's "unbounded 
ability to ignore national boundaries".

He repeats his call for better representation of "the 
online industry", says that the ABA report will be positive 
about PICS and explores the need for flexible, multi-
dimensional ratings from both the content creators and 
third parties - and means by which such third party efforts 
might be funded.


So Hoorah for Peter Webb's interest in PICS and his 
promotion of it to an audience which is grappling with the 
threat Internet communications makes to existing state-
centric cultural control arrangements!


Anyone who thinks governments and government organisations 
are inherently fixed in their ways should read this speech, 
and then check out his previous speech and my critique of 
it, to see how much can change in a month or so.


http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/ABAWebb.html 

    http://www.ozemail.com.au/~firstpr/contreg/bigpic.htm


- Robin


. Robin Whittle                                               .
. http://www.ozemail.com.au/~firstpr   firstpr@ozemail.com.au .
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