HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: sbrack@jupiter.cse.UTOLEDO.edu (Steven S. Brack)
Subject: Re: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 08:50:40 GMT

From: 
: Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
: From: neuhaus@vier.informatik.uni-kl.de (Stephan Neuhaus (HiWi Mattern))
: Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
: Message-ID: <neuhaus.713788374@vier>
: Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 10:32:54 GMT
: 
:   If a University or company offers a news feed, it is offering a
: *service*.  Usenet is not yet a right, it's a privilege.  A University
: or company has every right to control how their computers are used.
: After all, they belong to the University or company, not to the
: students or employees.

	And who owns a public university?  The people.  The students.
	The employees.  A University has no business making decisions
	about what to keep on its system based strictly on content.

: In analogy, a newsstand does not have to carry
: each and every available newspaper or magazine.  If I, as the
: newsstand's owner, find magazines containing porno photos, fascist
: propaganda, leftist propaganda, etc. unacceptable, I will not sell
: those magazines which will probably only take up shelf space anyway.

	University's are not information salesplaces.  They are public
	resources.  The public *must* be able to execute control over
	the activities & affairs of the University. 

:   This does not mean that anybody should read (private) email, by the
: way.  Once a service like mail is offered, it must be available in a
: secure and unoppressive manner.  For example, I believe it's OK for a
: University or company to cancel certain newsgroups, but students or
: employees must not be punished for reading any group once it's
: available, and tracing who reads which newsgroups must not be done.

	If I own a mail box, and mail gets delivered to it, by your
	argument, I have a right to open it and decide whether to pass it
	to its intended recipient or not.  After all, if it's not important
	to me, it's only taking up space.

:   In direct answer to the original poster, I believe you should not
: play God yourself and simply cancel the groups.  You should ask for an
: official policy, if only to get your head out of the sling.  If you
: cancelled newsgroups at your own will, that would be arbitrary and
: despotic, even if those groups carried copyrighted or otherwise
: illegally published material.

	If you cancelled newsgroups at all, based solely on their content,
	you would be performing an act many, if not most, people consider
	highly unethical. 

--
Steven S. Brack                    |          sbrack@jupiter.cse.utoledo.edu
2021 Roanwood Drive                |         STU0061@uoft01.utoledo.edu
Toledo, Ohio      43620   ________/^\________  brack@uoftcse.cse.utoledo.edu 
+1 419 GR4 1010           | MY OWN OPINIONS | sbrack@maine.cse.utoledo.edu 
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 09:15:05 GMT


From: brian@ucsd.edu (Brian Kantor)
Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Date: 13 Aug 1992 18:38:50 GMT

I too am concerned about the content of some of the groups.  It is not
the bandwidth or moral issues that are the problem, but that indeed
there are copyright violations taking place.

I could wish that the pictures being sent took up less of the network
bandwidth and disk storage, but the answer to that is better data
compression, storage, and retrieval methods, not restricting posting.

I believe that we who maintain the news software should be able to treat
the material passing through our sites as though we were solely a
carrier - much like the telephone system, UPS, and other common
carriers.  In that manner, our site would not be liable for illegalities
committed by users of the system, since we do not assume to restrict
their posting content.

UUNET states that they operate in such a manner as an "enhanced service
provider" under FCC regulations.  To my knowledge, there is not legal
precedent for this (i.e., no court decisions) but apparently the UUNET
lawyers feel that it's a sound position.

However, I do believe that anyone posting copyrighted material to the
net in violation of that copyright can, will, and should be liable to
the copyright owner.  That's only fair.
	- Brian
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 05:35:43 GMT


Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
From: jbotz@mtholyoke.edu (Jurgen Botz)
Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 14:05:05 GMT

In article <AJG.92Aug13123200@sp1.ccd.harris.com> ajg@controls.ccd.harris.com (Arnold Goldberg) writes:
>>>>>> On Thu, 13 Aug 1992 15:14:31 GMT, jbotz@mtholyoke.edu (Jurgen Botz) said:
>
>Jurgen> As a news administrator for a site relatively new to the Net, I have
>Jurgen> recently been giving _much_ thought to the issues surrounding certain
>Jurgen> controversial newsgroups.
>
>[much stuff deleted]
>
>Jurgen> Furthermore, I am somewhat personally offended that such a relatively
>Jurgen> large percentage of the total bandwith used by my news feeds and
>Jurgen> store are used for such morally questionable purposes by a presumably
>Jurgen> tiny fringe group of network users who appear to feel that it is their
>Jurgen> natural right to waste everyone's resources with their trash.
>
>Before I unsubscribe this news group, let me just followup to this post.
>
>I grant you the fact that you might be offended by the supposed "waste"
>of "your" bandwidth (by way of the news feeds) by questionable news groups.
>
>Let me suggest a simple remedy, that as the supposed news administrator
>you must be aware of.
>
>Restrict the inflow of the articles!!!!
>Very creative, huh.  (An added hint for you, in case you really don't know:
>it's in the sys file for your news setup).
>
>I'd rather you censor yourself then me.

Where do all these idiots come from?  I wasn't advocating censoring
you or anyone.  I was asking the net what people thought about
CONSIDERING a policy of restricting the INFLOW of DEMONSTRABLY ILLEGAL
material into MY system.

I hope you DID unsubscribe this newsgroup... we don't need idiots who
can't objectively discuss an important issue here.
--
Jurgen Botz                  |   Internet: JBotz@mtholyoke.edu
Academic Systems Consultant  |     Bitnet: JBotz@mhc.bitnet
Mount Holyoke College        |      Voice: (US) 413-538-2375 (daytime)
South Hadley, MA, USA        | Snail Mail: J. Botz, 01075-0629
Xref: sparky alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk:2557 misc.legal:15985 alt.censorship:6923
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 09:16:02 GMT


From: wbe@bbn.com (Winston Edmond)
Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Date: 13 Aug 92 21:28:02 GMT


   I'll take your question at face value and assume this isn't a veiled way
of justifying censorship of a group whose content you dislike.

   The issue you raise is not a "free speech" issue.  You have no moral,
ethical, or legal obligation to assist others in breaking the law.  Of
course, if you believe the law is wrong, you could choose to engage in civil
disobedience and carry the illegal material anyway, but then you should
expect to be arrested and taken to court some day.  That is, of course, the
objective of civil disobedience (so the law can be overturned).

   As a practical matter, you can estimate the risk of carrying a group by
determining what percentage of the stuff in the group is clearly illegal
(copies without permission of copyrighted material in this case).  If, in
your opinion, the illegal stuff is a significant fraction of the total, don't
accept the group into your site.  At worst, anyone getting their feed of that
group from you will have to find another feed.

   The ideal solution would be to delete just those articles that are
essentially just postings without permission of copyrighted material.  So far
as I know, that's not practical.
 -WBE
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin]  Re: "Computers graphic when it comes to porn"
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 04:59:03 GMT


Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject:  Re: "Computers graphic when it comes to porn"
From: a_rubin@dsg4.dse.beckman.com (Arthur Rubin)
Date: 11 Aug 92 17:23:11 GMT

In <C28IR9A@taronga.com> peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva) writes:

>kadie@uiuc.edu (Carl Kadie writes:
>>>|A problem is that very, very, very little of the material in alt.sex
>>>|is obscene by the new Canadian definition, and yet the whole newsgroup
>>>|has been removed from several universities.

>>clewis@ferret.ocunix.on.ca (Chris Lewis) writes:
>>>When you find that the corn has individual kernels laced with strychnine,
>>>that it's not practical to screen it, and the consequences can
>>>be rather nasty of letting some of the contaminated stuff through, you
>>>have to dump the load.

>In article <1992Aug11.112000.4307@m.cs.uiuc.edu> kadie@m.cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie) writes:
>>No studies have claimed that sexual material is anywhere near as
>>dangerous as poison.

>I don't think Chris is concerned with the material itself. He's concerned
>with the criminal prosecution that would result from carrying it.

>>By analogy, considered as a whole, alt.sex has scientific, political,
>>literary, and artistic value and therefore should not be banned as
>>obscene.

>OK, you're volunteering to be the test case?

>Yes, it's a bad law. But, really, what alternative have the schools in
>question got?

In the Canadian cases, I don't see any.  In the case of public US schools,
the First Amendment does apply, and the school (probably) cannot make
content-based decisions as to which newsgroups to accept.  Note:  I am not
a lawyer, and I am also not saying that THIS situation is desirable either.
--
Arthur L. Rubin: a_rubin@dsg4.dse.beckman.com (work) Beckman Instruments/Brea
216-5888@mcimail.com 70707.453@compuserve.com arthur@pnet01.cts.com (personal)
My opinions are my own, and do not represent those of my employer.
Our news system is unstable; if you want to be sure I see a post, mail it.
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: brian@opac.osl.or.gov (BRIAN MCBEE)
Subject: Re: Limiting religious speech
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 15:51:39 GMT
From: brian@opac.osl.or.gov
Newsgroups: academic.freedom.talk
Subject: Re: Limiting religious speech
Date: 21 Aug 92 08:51:30 PST
Organization: Oregon State Library, Salem OR
News-Moderator: Approval required for posting to academic.freedom.talk

In article <57411@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>, <bernman@symphony.cc.purdue.edu> writes:
> In article <UeYz6mS00XsEA6g0Vc@andrew.cmu.edu> dh4j+@andrew.cmu.edu
> (David O Hunt) writes:
>>Same thing with prayer in schools - nobody is saying you can't pray.
>>What they're saying is that prayer cannot be organized and sanctioned
>>(purposefully or by default).
> ---
> 
> 	However, does this decision not work both ways?  If
> a school official cannot promote a prayer, he or she cannot
> discourage it, either.  Would a valedictorian, in his or her
> speech, be allowed to say a prayer or give thanks to his or her
> god?  Since the valedictorian is not a school official
> (he or she not on the government's payroll) it would not be
> a case of "government" promoting religion.  But if the school
> official tried to prevent the valedictorian from saying anything
> about god in his or her speech, would not this ruling be
> in favor of the valedictorian?
> 
> --
>                             /\/B E R N   M A N\/\
> 
> "The more I learn, the more I realize how much I do not know..."

I suspect that this is one of the basic contradictions in public funding of
schools.  SOMEONE has to decide what is or is not permissable. How do you
reconcile that with freedom of speech and academic freedom issues?  I suspect
that there is no non-contradictory way.  In private schools there is an easy
answer: those who pay the piper get to call the tune.  When we are all forced
to pay the piper through taxation, which of us calls the tune, and which is
forced to pay for something he finds abhorent? I sure don't have an answer.

-- 

----- Brian McBee ----- (503)378-4276 ----- brian@opac.osl.or.gov -----
----- Oregon State Library, State Library Building, Salem, OR 97310 -----
Above opinions are mine only.  You can have them if you like.

Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 11:40:30 GMT


Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
From: ward1@husc8.harvard.edu (Lester Ward)
Date: 13 Aug 92 19:55:30 GMT

There are two main issues brought up here, censorship and legality.  I'm
completely ignoring the censorship issue, as that did not seem to be the
original posters main issue.

As far as legality, a few comments:
o Copywrites: Although the poster originally brought up images, which have
  accepted copywrite standards, many other types of posted data is still
  a bit hazy on exactly what a copywrite is.  Can you copywrite algrothms
  for example.  I'm speaking from a vaccuum here, so someone will correct
  me, no doubt.

o Juristiction: A post from Germany shows up in the USA.  It is illegal in
the USA, but not in Germany.  Is the poster breaking the law?  There are
probably not too many precidents for this (its not that likely), but I hope
the point is clear.  Suppose the post is illegal in both countries; how is
the poster prosecuted? etc.

o The law: Recent legal decisions have taken a somewhat counter-intuitive
  slant regarding computer crime.  For example, there have been cases of
  administrators being brought to trial for reading "private" mail, but
  found not guilty because mail is not legally private.  There may be
  similar cases where the administrator was found guilty. Which brings up
  another point: law is just starting to deal with computers and networks.

I guess this is the real point: right now, we (the computer literate, network
literate community) have the ability to steer the law one way or an other.
The world at large (including most courts and lawyers) don't know much about
computers.  When dealing with legislating computers, they will have to get
advice from the experts (us) in making their decisions, decisions which will
set legal president to the day when everyone uses computers.

Les
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.admin.policy]  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 17:16:52 GMT


Newsgroups: news.admin.policy
From: arms@cs.UAlberta.CA (Bill Armstrong)
Subject:  Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 22:27:21 GMT

wbe@bbn.com (Winston Edmond) writes:

>   The ideal solution would be to delete just those articles that are
>essentially just postings without permission of copyrighted material.  So far
>as I know, that's not practical.

IMHO, when someone posts anything, he/she should take responsibility
for it.  If the poster's real name is used, and there is either in the
article, or available at the posting site, an address where the person
can be reached for the service of a summons, people who go too far will
find out about it.

A corollary of this is that all sites should try to transfer as much
responsibility onto the individual as is "reasonable" by posting
warnings about copyrighted, illegal and objectionable material and
having users sign pertinent agreements as a condition of use.

Institutions may run into a few problems in trying to encourage
dissemination of knowledge while at the same time staying on good
terms with the public regarding the definition of what constitutes
"objectionable" material.  For example, the University of Alberta's
motto is "Quaecumque Vera" = "Whatsoever Things are True".  It's going
to be a bit of a problem for the Latin translators if it has to be
changed to include a phrase "(except we won't tolerate anything
written about sex and bondage, even if true)".  I would like to think
the original motto means something, and the self-imposed *obligation*
to disseminate the truth will protect both the institution and the
individuals in it, even if some cases do end up in court.

(My own opinions, not necessarily those of my employer.)
--
***************************************************
Prof. William W. Armstrong, Computing Science Dept.
University of Alberta; Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2H1
arms@cs.ualberta.ca Tel(403)492 2374 FAX 492 1071
Newsgroups: news.admin.policy,alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,misc.legal,alt.censorship
From: ckd@eff.org (Christopher Davis)
Subject: Re: Groups used to distribute illegal material
Organization: Electronic Frontier Foundation Tech Central
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 18:48:45 GMT

Carl> == Carl M. Kadie <kadie@herodotus.cs.uiuc.edu> 

 Carl> In my opinion, it is ok to exclude a newsgroup if it is illegal.
 Carl> I think this position is supported by library policies. They say
 Carl> that 1) laws should be obeyed 2) legal advice should obtained
 Carl> from compete sources 3) restrictive laws should be challenged
 Carl> (with legal means) 4) and that challenged material should be
 Carl> given due process.

I might note that there is probably *also* a proportion of copyrighted
material in the alt.binaries.pictures.misc group (and that the whole
purpose of the alt.binaries.* hierarchy is to allow the *WHOLE THING* to
be easily blocked for reasons of disk space, transfer bandwidth, and/or
copyright problems).
--
Christopher Davis * ckd@eff.org * System Administrator, EFF * +1 617 864 0665
            ``Ed Gruberman, you fail to grasp Ti Kwan Leep.
            Approach me that you might see.'' -- The Master
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@eff.org (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: Re: NetNews as a common carrier?
Originator: kadie@eff.org
Organization: The Electronic Frontier Foundation
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 15:30:11 GMT

sbrack@jupiter.cse.UTOLEDO.edu (Steven S. Brack) writes:

>	According to my understanding of common carrier status, news carriers
>like UUnet would be common carriers, provided they carried *all* newsgroups.
[...]

I don't think it is that clear cut. Usually common carrier means that
you carry "stuff" for any customer who meet your terms (even for
competitors), not that you retail all "stuff" yourself. (Also, common
carrier often means regulations as to what the terms are.) Thus, the
common carrier model works well for email and network access, but not
so well for newgroups.

In those situations, I think the bookseller/library model is better.
In any case, as you suggest, it looks as though the more editorial
control you exercise, the more likely youq will be liable for content.
In the extreme, a system like Prodigy that screens every article is
likely as liable for content as if it had written the articles itself.

- Carl

ANNOTATED REFERENCES

(All these documents are available on-line. Access information follows.)

=================
law/cubby-v-compuserv
=================
Report of a federal district court case which said CompuServe could
not be held liable for the defamatory content because it exercised no
editorial control.

=================
law/student-publications.misc
=================
Quotes from the book _Law of the Student Press_ by the Student Press
Law Center (1985,1988). They say that four-letter words are protected
speech, that public universities are not likely to be liable for
publications that they for which they do not control the contents, and
that the _Hazelwood_ decision does not apply to universities.

=================
faq/netnews.liability
=================
q: Does a University reduce its likely liability by screening Netnews
for offensive articles and newsgroups?

=================
=================

These document(s) are available by anonymous ftp (the preferred
method) and by email. To get the file(s) via ftp, do an anonymous ftp
to ftp.eff.org (192.88.144.4), and get file(s):

  pub/academic/law/cubby-v-compuserv
  pub/academic/law/student-publications.misc
  pub/academic/faq/netnews.liability

To get the file(s) by email, send email to archive-server@eff.org.
Include the line(s) (be sure to include the space before the file
name):

send acad-freedom/law cubby-v-compuserv
send acad-freedom/law student-publications.misc
send acad-freedom/faq netnews.liability

-- 
Carl Kadie -- I do not represent EFF; this is just me.
 =kadie@eff.org, kadie@cs.uiuc.edu =
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: [news.future]  Re: reading news from multiple NNTP servers.
Originator: daemon@eff.org
Organization: EFF mail-news gateway
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 07:16:09 GMT


Newsgroups: news.future
From: jaapjl@tab00.larc.nasa.gov (J Lee Jaap)
Subject:  Re: reading news from multiple NNTP servers.
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 14:43:14 GMT

In article <1992Aug12.010716.16392@news.iastate.edu> spam@iastate.edu (mike begley) writes:

   Is there ans newsreading software that will allow me to read news from
   multiple NNTP servers?  For example, I read some news on from our local
   server, and read some groups on a remote server.  I think it would be
   to have another field in the .newsrc file that specifies what server the
   groups are to be read from.  this would

     -widen the range of groups a user may read
     -allow users to spread their use over multiple sites, thereby spreading
      the load from some overloaded sites
     -lessen the danger of censorship by giving users a choice of server; they're
      not limited to the range of groups their administrator decides to carry.

   Is this a possibility?

GNUS has this capability, but implemented a different way.  It can
use ~/.newsrc-<server>, where <server> is the name of the server....
I'm not sure where to find it (I didn't install it), but you can
probably ask on gnu.emacs.gnus.
--
J Lee Jaap <jaapjl@tab00.larc.nasa.gov> +1 804/864-2148
employed by, not speaking for, AS&M Inc, at NASA LaRC, Hampton VA 23681
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk