US House: Schools must block MySpace, many other sites

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1. Anthony Webb
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:24 pm

   Man, this is a bombshell! I’m just wondering how in the world they intend to try and inforce this one.

   I think I’ll create a “social proxy” to keep all the everyone in the groove.

2. Pro SEO
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:38 pm

   Great, Another stupid unworkable law…

   I think it’s about time the law makers got thier priorities straight and about time parents took some responsibility for thier kids safety.

3. Keith L. Dick
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:44 pm

   After all this I kinda really think *Computers in the Classroom* may be a Bad Idea…

   Kids these days think Everything is FREE an School is for Downloading Music, Playing Games and Chatting with their friends online or playing with their Myspace account…

   Ummm, Good place to look for the blame is the Parents…

   “Hey Marge!!, we can just buy Johnny another Video Game and get Him Broadband and never have to deal with him again”…

   I’ve played Video Games since the early 80’s when there was no “Video” in the games and I was a young adult at the time but I “NEVER” turned out like what I am seeing these days…

4. John Beales
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:46 pm

   I know that this law is pretty un-enforceable but if passed it will still have a huge impact. Many libraries and schools will abide by the law without enforcement and the broad language of the law is obsurd. It includes every blog out there, (including Techcrunch), Newsvine, Digg, even the new Netscape!

   Although I don’t live in the US I am an English-language publisher online with a very large under-18 audience. This means that I will have to watch my back adding any interactivity to my sites as they are often accessed from schools.

5. Chris Messina
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:48 pm

   Dugg.

   This is a friggin’ joke. It’s time that Internet enthusiasts and advocates got organized and infiltrated government. First we deal with Net Discrimination, then a series of tubes and now banning social networks in the last vestige of public spaces. This is wrong, wrong, wrong.

6. Search Engines Web
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 10:51 pm

   Most Libraries in the USA have a CHILDREN’s Section and a seperate ADULT Section - the children’s sections are usually monitored by staff and Security Guards and a filtering software is installed…..

   Usually during School hours, children & Teens are NOT allowed in the Libraries…and when they are there there is competition to use the computers for HOMEWORK only. The school computers are equally as valuable for doing Homework or project researches.

   Depending on the library - certain age groups under 13 are defined as children - some Libraries consider teens under 18 to be off limits to the adult sections

   So, it is possible that even if passed, the bill might not have an extreme effect for most kids or teens - unfortunately, except for the very poor.

   Some, whose parents were considering getting a PC but are one of the statistically few holdouts - might now get one due to the very low costs for both PCs and Internet Connections - if this law is passed.

   unfortunately, this would leave a relatively few whose income is just too low - even with decreasing costs - to get computers and net connections -
   who would be totally deprived of the social networking and chat sites - except if they have friends or relatives they can visit.

7. Tyler Durden
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 11:07 pm

   Just one more step on our way to fascism. All hail Dear Leader!

8. Anand Akela
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 11:26 pm

   What does this mean to companies like tagworld, Kaboodle or even various blog sites like tecchrunch or technorati?

9. Richard
   

   July 27th, 2006 at 11:30 pm

   It’s an election year, what do you expect besides feel good crap that doesn’t have any substance accept good newsbites.

10. Michael Arrington
    

    July 27th, 2006 at 11:30 pm

    Wow. This is completely ridiculous.

11. RBA
    

    July 27th, 2006 at 11:38 pm

    What a pile of crap. Anyone supporting this law please tell me what the benefits are - I see none, zero, nada.

    Sexual predators ultimately use the phone to contact their victims, so how about banning the use of cell phones (and old fashioned phones now that we’re at it) by teenagers? Unbelievable.

12. Jason Feffer
    

    July 27th, 2006 at 11:39 pm

    Typical. Congress wants to outlaw the only place guaranteed to have trained social workers monitoring kids’ access to MySpace.

13. Tollie Williams
    

    July 27th, 2006 at 11:47 pm

    To those who say this is unenforceable, I’m afraid that’s not true at all. It’s very enforceable. Most schools already have some form of filtering/blocking software installed. This law would have the FCC publish a list of sites that have to be blocked, allowing for a one-click (eg. a separate filter category to block the sites on the FCC’s banned list) “solution” for most schools.

14. Patrick
    

    July 27th, 2006 at 11:48 pm

    They would have to block Wikipedia, Live.com (which is integrating MSN spaces). Also, I could build a Social Networking site based on e-mail alone. Damn, that’s not a bad idea.

15. Edwin
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 12:07 am

    Back to the stoneage :-/

16. Eric Willis
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 12:26 am

    This still has to pass the Senate. So at this point it is not enforceable in my current understanding.

17. Marshall Kirkpatrick
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 12:31 am

    I have a hard time imagining that at 400 to 15 in the house it’s going to go down in the Senate.

18. CraveMan
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 12:36 am

    The courts will strike this down. It will never get enforced, per injuctive relief.

    If it does get enforced, then most kids will find ways around it.

    It will be, however, another way to arbitrarily arrest and fine people. Just think, soon it will be a crime just to talk to children, unless you’re the parent, and have the courts permission.

    Maybe they should just raise kids in vats, so they’ll have total control of their every formative experience.

19. Tollie Williams
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 1:03 am

    It occured to me that, as they allow people to find other people based on common interests and associations (ie. classes they’re taking) and because they have chat, mail, and comment capabilities even the popular Blackboard and other online classroom software (like the open source Moodle) would qualify for banning!

20. Kevin Marks
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 1:19 am

    Your link to the bill is expired- use
    http://www.thomas.gov/cgi-bin/.....R.5319.EH:
    (further comments on my blog)

21. KE Liew
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 2:15 am

    It’s funny how they only attempt to eradicate the problem at the top level instead of the lower level.

    Wouldn’t it be more dangerous to have people going to those sites in their own personal space without any supervision? ie. home or friend’s place? At least at schools, it’s public, it’s punishable (I hope).

    But hey…it’s all about money, fame and power. Nothing can stop it.

22. David Warlick
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 3:08 am

    What the law and law-makers completely ignore (you’d have to ask an e d u c a t o r) are the phenomenal learning experiences that can be coordinated by creative teachers with online social networks. Teachers who are now using blogging as an instructional strategy are raving about their children’s improved writing, the motivation to want to write (when at home sick, during lunch, during recess), and their engaging comversations with students in other parts of the world.

    DOPA learning, not fear!

23. Marshall Kirkpatrick
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 3:14 am

    David - what are you, European?

24. Martin Gordon
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 3:38 am

    We hear all this talk about sexual predators on MySpace, but is there any hard data on how many predators actually come in real-world contact with a kid they meet on MySpace that results in a crime?

    And does this apply to all schools, including universities? I’ve used Facebook a number of times from school computers to looking up the phone number of a group member who is late to a meeting.

25. Vicki Davis
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 4:10 am

    Thanks for the mention, marshall of my Cool Cat Teacher blog and yes, I did write about this continuing travesty in my blog today.

    We need an Online Safety Act (OSA). Predators are not a button you push that can be deleted! It is not that easy. You delete predators with education!

    We outlawed drugs, but the only thing that reduces drug us is drug education programs. We outlaw kidnapping, but the only thing keeping kids from getting into cars with strangers is educating them about “stranger danger.” We can outlaw myspace (and a plethora of useful educational tools), but the only way to reduce the number of online victims is with online safety education.

    Without access to online tools, the education goes on outside.

    The fact is, kids are not myspacing at school now! Most schools block myspace already! Kids are doing this at home. And now that public school educators cannot even access myspace, the predators can say “Yippee! I’m rid of those pesky teachers!”

    We currently have NO reporting mechanism to report predators and our only solution is to block myspace. I feel like we’re in the dark ages that we would rather burn blogs than harness them to improve education!

26. LaptopHeaven
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 4:37 am

    U.S. Constitution: First Amendment
    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

    Social Networking site are just peaceful assemblies. This is against our right to free speech.

27. Chris Messina
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:04 am

    @LaptopHeaven — that’s an interesting spin… I can’t really think of any way to dispute that point, so perhaps that is one approach — to look at social networking sites as peaceful assemblies of folks. Ironically MySpace (commercial though it is) has replaced the notion of the civic space and kids are spending more time connecting with each other online because somehow we’ve let our communities go to pot so that it’s not safe for them to meet in person.

    The more restrictions that are replaced on the public commons, the more this slide will continue.

28. nathank
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:15 am

    Wouldn’t it be nice to have people in Washington that understood technology?

    I can’t wait for that day to come.

29. Carlos Tabora
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:16 am

    Sign the SAVE YOUR SPACE petition opposing HR5319.

    Although HR5319 is titled the “Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA)”, the bill is very misleading. What most people don’t realize is that this bill is misleading. If you take a closer look at DOPA, you’ll find that this legislation actually limits your rights to access and express yourself on the Internet instead of “deleting online predators”. But before this legislation becomes law, there are several more steps including getting approval by the Senate and, ultimately, being signed by President George W. Bush.

    Unfortunately, the public only sees what the media and politicians tell them. They need to hear from the actual users of social networking sites.

    The SAVE YOUR SPACE petition is your chance to be heard and to show the public, the media and the U.S. government the importance and amazing power of social networking sites.

    Help us get 1,000,000 signatures in 1 month.

    Visit http://www.saveyourspace.org for details.

30. Richard Tator
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:26 am

    I don’t think this is going to help with sexual predators at all. First of all, childern are not going to pay attention to this at all, if they want to go to the social networking sites someone will find a way to do it. Secondly, when it comes to sexual predators the child is gennerally not innocent, the child does not use much common sense most of the time, this is what causes them to meet with sexual predators. If we want to start getting rid of sexual predators we should start punishing childern, for being stupid, and meeting with the sexual predators int the first place.

31. Marshall Kirkpatrick
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:29 am

    Richard, you’ve got to be kidding. I’m going to presume you are kidding, cause if you were serious that would be so harsh it’s stupid, that opinion there.

32. Richard Tator
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:34 am

    yea, I was mainly kidding, but I do think that we have to relize that the child involved is also partly at fault.

33. Daniel
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:48 am

    For a lot of poorer children whose only internet access is from the library (not having a home computer or net connection), this will make social integration harder. Too poor to have the net at home? No livejournal for you.

    Richard Tator- stupid is not ignorant. Ignorance isn’t solved by punishment but by education. Many sexual predators are related to their victims, so children can be victims despite behaving properly. In cases of online predators many think they are meeting someone their age… even if someone does something stupid, the responsibility for a crime still doesn’t rest with the victim. Your attitude is very strange, please reconsider.

34. Ping Liang
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 7:13 am

    There are so many anonymous proxies out there. Kids will figure it out a way to do it. I bet kids spend more time on myspace at home than at school or libraries. Ban broadband to the home next? This is a slippery slope. Plus, the brainier ones go to library.

    They are doing this for the show. They do not want to be the ones voting “against protecting children.” At least 15 of them voted no.

35. rc auto
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 8:28 am

    the roll call on the bill…
    http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2006/roll405.xml

36. Aaron Smith
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 8:56 am

    Given the very negative response to DOPA in the comments section, I wonder what is driving the politicians to have such overwhelming support for the law. I understand that no politician wants to vote against protecting children, but they must not realize that they are actually voting against engaging learning opportunities.

37. Marshall Kirkpatrick
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 8:59 am

    That may be the case here, but if you check out the comments even at Digg on this topic there are a shocking number of people commenting in defense of DOPA. I was really surprised.

38. Todd Roberts
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 9:08 am

    I’d urge everyone opposed to this to contact their senators, don’t just complain about it in some comments section to a blog (not saying you are, just encouraging some meaningful follow-through).

39. Wayne
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 9:10 am

    Ok, now working in a library, the use of myspace here is huge… and mandating this will only get the American Library Association in on this… they are the reason why CIPA has failed several times… so I think that they’ll end up having this fail as well… not to mention that mandating what people can do is never a good thing.

40. Peter
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 10:08 am

    I have no problem with schools and libraries banning the use of certain websites (MySpace, etc.), since, after all, those aren’t personal computers, but rather ones meant for educational use. If they were purchased by taxpayers’ money, they should be put to use for something other than posting a personal profile and trying to add/be added by as many friends as possible.

    However, I have a problem with the vagueness of the law. Many bills are passed into law that aren’t specific enough, IMO; it’s just like the current controversy over patents that are granted. Things like this need to be more specific.

    As it stands, I think this bill/law should be thrown out, and we should let school districts and libraries filter out websites (as they have been doing) on their own basis. They likely will know what is sensible to filter out and what isn’t, and don’t need an overbearing law to force their hand, so to speak.

41. John Beales
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 10:59 am

    @Marshall: After a quick look through your Digg link it is pretty surprising how many people support this bill.

    I know it’s a smaller community, but the folks over at the Newsvine page on this topic are pretty dead set against it, (although some wouldn’t mind a bill that just restricts the use of MySpace

42. Cash
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 11:03 am

    I think the solution is to get rid of libraries. In my town we just spent $50M on a library and, for that money, we could have purchased 3 computers and free internet access for every person in the city.

    I would be more shocked if the vote hadn’t been so lopsided. Congress doesn’t care about protecting your adstream and how readers find you … and I’d be pissed if they did.

43. SutroStyle
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 11:22 am

    Why not just ban Myspace, Friendster, and chatrooms from the internet? If the government thinks it’s a bad thing for kids, why stop at the library and school level?

    Since US still controls the internet, they can do it!

44. Ryan
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 4:23 pm

    So will the banned sites that allow “communication among users” include their campaign Web sites?

45. Zee
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 4:42 pm

    It’s only going to get worse before it gets better.

    There’s a whole generation of politicians out there who still don’t really grasp the internet in its many forms. They just don’t “get it”. Would you ask your grandfather about his opinion of various parts of the internet? And then base legislation on it?

    They are so easily swayed by the usual persuasiveness of people who either have contrary interests or who have distorted ideas of security.

    “We’re doing it for the kids!” Another flag for the ignorant to wave. Sigh.

46. Geoff
    

    July 28th, 2006 at 6:45 pm

    First off
    LaptopHeaven (Comment #26) had a very good point. The First Amendment of the Bill of Rights gurantees us the freedom to assemble. MySpace is an assembly of teenagers.

    Secondly, teenagers already have multiple ways around the current filters. Teenagers can already easily get around current filters and will just as easily if not more easily get around any new ones. Sure, the filters will block major proxy sites but what will stop them from making private undetectable ones?

47. Brian
    

    July 29th, 2006 at 4:54 am

    Sexual predation of children existed long before the internet and will exist long after this ‘ban” goes into effect. It’s an election year stunt that does nothing tangible. But hey, what do we expect from these no-nothings in government for the last ten years? Leadership on real issues? ha….

48. Anna
    

    July 29th, 2006 at 7:19 am

    The idea of this being a “freedom to assemble” is interesting, but I’m not sure that angle will work. We have a right to bear arms, too, but we can’t legal “bear” them in schools. Students/kids have limited rights because their protection and safety is more important. BUT, that said, I believe DOPA will do a lot more harm than good.

    Our district already blocks MySpace and I support that block, but a blanket ban of all sites that have profiles? Well, so much for my technology club’s blog and bbs…

    Besides SaveYourSpace.org, which I’m not convinced will have an impact but I “signed” anyway, what can we do?

49. Bob's Your Uncle
    

    July 29th, 2006 at 8:53 am

    On July 28, Peter wrote, “I have no problem with schools and libraries banning the use of certain websites (MySpace, etc.), since, after all, those aren’t personal computers, but rather ones meant for educational use. If they were purchased by taxpayers’ money, they should be put to use for something other than posting a personal profile and trying to add/be added by as many friends as possible.”

    As a librarian, I’d like to make a couple of points in response to your post.

    First, we tend to forget that young people have First Amendment rights, too, and that there’s a lenghty body of caselaw affirming a young person’s right to access constitutionally protected free speech. I don’t know about you, but I’m not comfortable violating these rights just for the purpose of making an example out of myspace.com.

    Second, young people are faced with a whole host of complicated issues in their day-to-day lives, and, truth be told, many times they simply don’t feel comfortable bringing these things up with their parents. Instead, they prefer to interact with their peers, and this is one of the benefits of social networking sites. Pretending that these difficult issues don’t exist, or wishing that they’d go away doesn’t change the fact that kids will always trust those in their own age group more than they’ll trust their parents or teachers.

    Third, while public libraries are funded by taxpayer money, no one group has any more influence over how that money is spent than any other. Libraries serve a very broad constituency, and not every one of them uses library collections–electronic or print-based–for “educational” purposes, whatever that means. Would you say that using the library’s computers to apply for a job, book a flight, or set up a free email account qualify as “educational”? And if we set limits on what constitutes “educational” when it comes to online resources, do we also apply this to our books as well? “Sorry, sir, but since we’ve decided that non-fiction serves no apparent educational purpose, you’ll need to look elsewhere for that copy of ‘The DaVinci Code’.”

    Sorry to go on, but I’m afraid that DOPA is another example of a solution looking for a problem that really doesn’t exist. The last thing I want is the federal government telling me or my kids what they can and cannot access on the Internet.

50. Rose DesRochers
    

    July 29th, 2006 at 4:29 pm

    I was surprised and disappointed that the vote was 410-15. Many of those who oppose DOPA do so because they believe that children should be educated and not restricted. I agree that they should be educated, but let us face it, not all parents do their job and the parents who are doing their job are left with schools and libraries that are not doing their job.

    I can not speak on behalf of the US, but I know that surprisingly some Canadian public libraries and schools do not monitor children’s internet access nor do they have filters in place. We were all teens once. I keep hearing the same comments. “Parents do your job.” Well I ask you this, “How many of you rebelled against your parents?”

    No matter how much we take care of our children and educate them, it only takes them making one unhealthy choice to put them at risk. You can educate your child untill you are all blue in the face. The truth is that children don’t often think of the consequences of unhealthy choices. If DOPA will save just one child, don’t you think the bill is worth it?

    I do want to add that while I support the bill, I do think that the legislation should be rewritten so it does not block sites such as Yahoo and Google. I think they need to better determine what sites will be blocked before passing the law.

    These are just my thoughts!

51. Brandon Watson
    

    July 29th, 2006 at 5:48 pm

    Rose, I understand you desire to block some sites, but you end up with the same conundrum that has vexed the filtering companies for too long. How can you possibly police the list of websites when they are so easy to create? It’s like a game of whack-a-mole, and if you whack MySpace, something (or more likely many more things) will pop up in its place. Filtering is not the solution. If we are really and truly concerned with keeping predators away from the children, perhaps we need to think of new solutions. Start with a blank sheet of paper and start over. Technology can solve many problems. Kidnappers used to use vans to grab kids. We didn’t ban kids from vans. The people (in part aided by government) created the amber alert. The goal of any solution should be to make the medium (in the case of kidnapping it was the van, but in this case it’s the Internet at large) as difficult as possible for the would be predators to use it for evil, not to keep the kids away from something that has so much potential and goodness. Over-reaching legislation is never, ever the answer.

    Just my 2 cents.

52. ben
    

    July 30th, 2006 at 6:14 am

    how about the ims? people also meet each others via ims.

53. caislas
    

    July 31st, 2006 at 11:11 pm

    amazing yes…
    and also I found really good comments in this threat

    However, my question is: Why parents do not spent QUALITY of time EDUCATING their OWN children?! TEACH THEM TO BE CRITIC !!!!

    Excuse me readers, but kids are not doom!, as a matter of fact, they are a lot smarter than some “adults”. What I had found, specially in the USA are LONELY kids, which makes a difference, and should put you to think.

    In this regulation, in case that actually out there are TONS of sexual predators will not eradicate them, isn’t it?! The only thing that practically this law is doing is to reduce the use of potential tools, that schools might use to really teach our kids to use their common sense.

    Why not POLITICIANS use their time and “knowledge” in resolve really important matters as for example, how to promote family integration, or in other words, how the state can support initiatives to support parents, that work, to spend more time in educating their kids and still keep with a decent life.

54. Michael Norman
    

    August 3rd, 2006 at 5:23 pm

    Please Let Me View This Website

55. jackie
    

    August 22nd, 2006 at 10:23 am

    look i think its bootie that we kids in high school cannot get on myspace we are responisble enough to get on it!!!! and who ever knows how tho get around the schools setings please e-mail me at redhotcutie_09@yahoo.com
    thanks if u e-mail me!! lol J/p

56. Sara
    

    August 28th, 2006 at 8:54 am

    THIS IS FREAKING LAME! it isn’t myspace’s fault that some kids are dumb enough to meet people they meet online. it is the kid’s fault. and because some kids are stupid, all of us are being punished. LAME! i think this new law sucks and anyone who thinks it’s a good idea should do a little research before supporting something so dumb.

57. Duckie
    

    August 28th, 2006 at 8:57 am

    Somehow people are still getting on myspace at my school even though it’s blocked..If anyone know how to get on please e-mail me at meltedhearts90@yahoo.com

58. Jen
    

    August 28th, 2006 at 7:30 pm

    Blocking this stuff at a school library is fine, but not fine in a dorm! Especially when this is a school that offers family housing (unnamed graduate and medical school blocks youtube, myspace).

59. giovanni
    

    August 29th, 2006 at 2:36 pm

    jgbcngnbgfghnngfngfngfngfnfg

60. nickki
    

    September 1st, 2006 at 6:35 am

    stupid you block it then they will just find more and more ways around it and if they are dumb enought to meet the people i say let them theyll learn or they wont.

61. I AGREE WITH NICKKI
    

    September 7th, 2006 at 1:35 am

    IT IS THE KIDS THAT ARE STUPID ENOUGH TO TALK TO AN ABSOLUTE STRANGE AND WONT TO TALK AND MEET THEM!!! I HAVE A MYSPACE.. AND I KNOW EVERY SINGLE PERSON ON MY FRIENDS LIST… U CHOOSE WHO UR FRIENDS ARE. IF U DONT KNOW THE PERSON THAT WANTS TO BE UR FRIEND THEN DENY THEM ACCESS TO UR PAGE AND FRIENDLIST. DONT BE MAD AT MYSPACE BE MAD AT THE CHILD BECAUSE THEY ARE THE UNEDUCATED ONES WHO ARE WILLING TO TALK TO ANYONE!! THEY ARE ALSO MOSTLY WHITE KIDS!!! HOW MANY BLACK DO U SEE TALKING TO ONLINE PREDATORS??? EDUCATE YOUR DUMB WHITE KIDS CAUSE THEY ARE THE ONE TALKING TO THESE NASTY MEN!!

62. ...
    

    September 11th, 2006 at 2:51 pm

    You people who are saying “Blocking it is stupid.” well, you’re right and wrong. Blocking it won’t help, but it won’t solve the problem.

    So, the people chose a sensible way to ignore myspace and blocked it.
    Leaving it open would mean more children browsing myspace instead of doing something important.

    This is all I hear through 1/2 of my school time is myspace. Everyone things it’s one huge deal but it isn’t.
    Just because YOU have people on your list you know ~All or 1.~ Doesn’t mean others do aswell. Which makes it THEIR fault it’s blocked.

63. Kristen
    

    September 18th, 2006 at 11:35 am

    i think that is so retarded.. if we have free time at school i believe that we should be able to get on Myspace at school also! people under 18 can have myspace and be