HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy,alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution (was, Re: Does USENET condone CHILD PORNOGRAPHY?)
Date: 16 Nov 92 15:41:22 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. of Biological Sciences.

In article <1992Nov13.232452.8530@clarinet.com> brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
>So while you may not read the group or look at any one posting, I have to
>say that in my judgement, knowingly feeding a group that contains mostly
>copyright violations will make you -- your site -- liable, not just the
>people posting these violations.
>

    When you sue for copyright violation, do you have to show damage? I bet
you do. I remember when the USFL sued then NFL, they won but got only likr
$1.00 in damages.
    The argument I make for keeping a.b.p.e is that it doesn't harm any
publisher. I can make that argument here, and I would explain it to the
publishers if any of them cared for my opinion.
    Playboy, Penthouse, and Hustler at least, know about usenet, and have
had the option to sue for a long time now.

   The postings to a.b.p.e are all in good fun. I don't see that it is in
anyone's interest to shut them off. Certainly not the users. The publishers
have nothing to gain by (and free advertising to loose) by enforcing
copyright to the 4th decimal place.

DanZ

-- 
This article is for entertainment purposes only. Any facts, opinions,
narratives or ideas contained herein are not necessarily true, and do
not necessarily represent the views of any particular person.  
Xref: sparky news.sysadmin:1459 news.admin:8552 news.admin.policy:408 alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d:9203
From: dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy,alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution (was, Re: Does USENET condone CHILD PORNOGRAPHY?)
Keywords: Pedophelia Child Pornography Porn Immoral Illegal
Date: 16 Nov 92 15:50:27 GMT
Organization: Columbia University, Dept. of Biological Sciences.

In article <1992Nov16.070140.25233@clarinet.com> brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
>
>The fact that these groups are almost nothing but copyright violation after
>copyright violation doesn't cause anybody here to think, "out of respect for
>the creators of this information, perhaps we shouldn't be forwarding it?"
>
   How about "out of respect for the creator, I will help as many people
to see it as possible"?
   I mean, a view of creativness that refers specifically to monetary gain is
pretty horrendous, don't you think? The articstic impulse is supposed to be
"above" all that. If you can make a profit at it, then fine. But otherwise
you still create.
   Don't get me wrong. I don't want to strip Playboys power to control thier
images. I want them to retain copyright. I want them to have the power to
stop a.b.p.e.  But I also want a.b.p.e to continue as long as I see it as
harmless. I do see it as harmless, and would argue with the publishers about 
it. I think I could convince them to allow it to continue.

>
>I guess it is fortunate with this attitude that the penalties for getting
>caught are real.  Event Horizons BBS, which sold subscriptions and had
>lots of GIFs scanned from Playboy was sued by Playboy.  The report was they
>settled out of court for half a million dollars.

  The case is more complicated than this, I think. There are other pay BBS's
that go unsue, I am sure. I think EH was sued because they threatened 
another BBS because that BBS was carrying images EH had scanned. It was when
EH claimed ownership of the images that Playboy was provoked to act. The
case actually encourages me.

DanZ

-- 
This article is for entertainment purposes only. Any facts, opinions,
narratives or ideas contained herein are not necessarily true, and do
not necessarily represent the views of any particular person.  
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: Re: What is pornography, anyway?
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 15:18:39 GMT

>But the bottom of the line federal line in the US is:
>
>Depictions of children under the age of 18 engaged in sex or posed to
>sexually tittilate are illegal.

I don't have a copy of the law, but it is refered to in the Supreme
Court's _Keith Jacobson v. United States_ decision, 90-1124:

      "[The law] requires only knowing receipt of visual depictions
      produced by using minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
      See 18 U.S.C. 2252(a)(2); United States v. Moncini, 882 F.2d
      401, 404-406 (CA9 1989)." [Info on on-line access to recent
      Court decisions enclosed.]

This is consistent the only legitimate purpose of child pornography
laws: to stop people from sexually abusing childern in order to make
pornography.

>The government does not have to prove whether it is pornographic or not.
[...]

Huh? [Info on on-line access to the  U.S. Contitution enclosed.]

ANNOTATED REFERENCES

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

=================
law/court-decisions
=================
* Constitution -- How to access Supreme Court decisions

How to access Supreme Court decisions by anonymous ftp and WAIS. Also
an index of available Supreme Court decisions.

=================
law/constitution.us
=================
* Constitution -- U.S. -- Full Text

The Constitution of the United States

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

If you have gopher, you can browse the CAF archive with the command
   gopher gopher.eff.org

These document(s) are also 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/court-decisions
  pub/academic/law/constitution.us

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 court-decisions
send acad-freedom/law constitution.us
-- 
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy,alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution (was, Re: Does USENET condone CHILD PORNOGRAPHY?)
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 14:46:09 GMT

emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire) writes:

[...]
>As I said earlier, I am in the same position as someone who
>unknowingly bought an illegal copy of a book.  I am not required to
>destroy the book, but I should report the fact to the authorities if I
>become aware that the publisher violated copyright.
[...]

I don't believe you are legally required to report to the authorities.
I doubt if you should keep the book.

- Carl
-- 
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Xref: sparky news.sysadmin:1456 news.admin:8549 news.admin.policy:404 alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d:9200
From: mystery%tcscs@idss.nwa.com (Mystery User)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy,alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution (was, Re: Does USENET condone CHILD PORNOG
Keywords: Pedophelia Child Pornography Porn Immoral Illegal
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 10:05:06 CST
Reply-To: srcsip!tcscs!mystery
Organization: TCS Consulting Services

brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:

> I guess it is fortunate with this attitude that the penalties for getting
> caught are real.  Event Horizons BBS, which sold subscriptions and had
> lots of GIFs scanned from Playboy was sued by Playboy.  The report was they
> settled out of court for half a million dollars.

I find that nice poetic justice. :)   EH went after some private BBS 
systems with the legal system to get EH pics off those other BBS's.  
Seems that EH went with the shareware angle and BBS could not have more
than 20 EH pics total on the BBS.  A lot of BBS went and PURGED EVERY EH
file because of this.  It's about time they got  a dose of their own 
medicine.   

I'm not condoning copyright violations or anything of the like.  EH did 
not (at that time) display thier "license" so no one knew about it until 
EH decided that this big system had too many pics of his and he wasn't 
getting enough subscriptions.


Greg
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
From: styri@hal.nta.no (Haakon Styri)
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution
Reply-To: styri@nta.no
Organization: Norwegian Telecom Research
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 09:47:50 GMT

In article <EMCGUIRE.92Nov18120858@fuller.intellection.com>, emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire) writes:
|> In article <1992Nov17.101330.13534@clarinet.com> brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
|> 
|>    But the law says that your opinion about whether it is harmful is not
|>    relevant.  I know that's hard for some people to accept.   The law says
|>    that the copyright holder gets to decide who gets to copy it.  "I honestly
|>    did not feel they were harmed" is not a defence.  One can say it until one
|>    is blue in the face, but it is not a defence.
|> 
|> However, if the court determines that they were not harmed, you are
|> only going to get a cease and desist order slapped on you, not a
|> costly judgement.

But, as Bruce Wright wrote earlier, you may have to pay the plaintiff's attorney
fees and court costs.

---
Haakon Styri				*** std. disclaimer applies ***
Norwegian Telecom Research
Xref: sparky news.sysadmin:1500 news.admin:8633 news.admin.policy:551
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution
From: scott@yarc.uucp (Scott Beckstead)
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 06:22:32 GMT
Reply-To: scott@yarc.UUCP (Scott Beckstead)
Organization: Yarc Systems


In article <1992Nov18.155039.29176@news.columbia.edu> dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis) writes:
>In article <1992Nov18.114903.22262@nntp.nta.no> styri@nta.no writes:
>>In article <1992Nov17.155639.27923@news.columbia.edu>,
>>dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis) writes:
>>>
>>
>   [about obeying laws, I said don't sweat it.]
>
>>That may be your opinion, Dan. However, it's not a very good argument. The
>>fact that people violate laws every day doesn't make them right. At present
>>we've got a lot of freedom on the net. Abuse it, and we may lose some.
>
>   But obeying a bad law, or obeying a good law badly applied is worse
>that not obeying a law. 
>   What is the point of having freedom if it is secured at the price of
>never exercising it?
>
>>
>>The bad thing is that you may not be among the people who loose that freedom.
>>Users at other sites may pay for you being selfish and not very law abiding.
>>That invalidates much of your argument.
>
>   Well, I'm arguing to keep a.b.p.e. If it is lost then we loose some 
>freedom. Whether this comes from outside, or is selfimposed, it is still a
>loss. Since the sex groups are wildly popular, loosing one is about as much
>harm as you can expect to deal to the net.
>
>> When you're a part of a society or
>>organization you're required to follow the common rules and laws. If you
>>want to follow another set of rules - well, there are other societies...
>>
>   I might suggest that the common rules and laws of the net (or at least
>very common practice) is that a.b.p.e is OK.
>
>>Ignoring copyright law is to undermine the righ to own property.
>>
>   But more serious is enforcing a zero tolerance view of copyright. Then 
>everything is owned by someone, and you may not have access to it.
>
>DanZ
>
  I think that a zero tolerance view of copyright would not be that bad
a thing.  At least a LOW tolerance.  We are no talking about BAD laws
here.  I don't beleive you or anyone else has the right to decide what is
or is not a bad law, that being why we have a supreme court.  Let's not
set ourselves up as the arbiter of good and bad legislation.  If you 
beleive a law is bad and can convince enough other people (preferably
including a lawmaker or two) that it is bad there are ways to change that!
My $0.02
Scott

-- 
Reply to: scott@yarc.uucp 	|  
				|	Spin my nipple nuts and send me to   
  Smoke me a kipper, I'll be	| 	Alaska.
   back for breakfast	 	|       
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: What is pornography, anyway?
From: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)
Organization: The Man With Ten Cats
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 22:55:24 GMT
Reply-To: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)

In article <BxtEJ3.50I@cs.uiuc.edu> kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie) writes:
>>But the bottom of the line federal line in the US is:
>>
>>Depictions of children under the age of 18 engaged in sex or posed to
>>sexually tittilate are illegal.
>
>I don't have a copy of the law, but it is refered to in the Supreme
>Court's _Keith Jacobson v. United States_ decision, 90-1124:
>
>      "[The law] requires only knowing receipt of visual depictions
>      produced by using minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
>      See 18 U.S.C. 2252(a)(2); United States v. Moncini, 882 F.2d
>      401, 404-406 (CA9 1989)." [Info on on-line access to recent
>      Court decisions enclosed.]
>
>This is consistent the only legitimate purpose of child pornography
>laws: to stop people from sexually abusing childern in order to make
>pornography.
>
>>The government does not have to prove whether it is pornographic or not.
>[...]
>
>Huh? [Info on on-line access to the  U.S. Contitution enclosed.]


Guess I was thinking more of the Massachusetts state government than federal
statutes.  A depiction of a minor in the nude is considered pornography in
Mass.  Also, community standards are supported quite heavily.  Here in the
town of Framingham, selling or renting X rated films is a felony.  And there
is a list of adult magazines that may not be displayed on a magazine rack,
but must be sold from under the counter.

-- 

Rick Kelly	rmk@rmkhome.UUCP	unixland!rmkhome!rmk	rmk@frog.UUCP
Xref: sparky news.sysadmin:1471 news.admin:8569 news.admin.policy:433
From: hartman@ulogic.UUCP (Richard M. Hartman)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: What is pornography, anyway?
Date: 17 Nov 92 17:34:11 GMT
Followup-To: news.sysadmin
Organization: negligable

In article <1992Nov16.155802.25830@news.columbia.edu> dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis) writes:
>In article <9211150013.37@rmkhome.UUCP> rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly) writes:
>>
>>But the bottom of the line federal line in the US is:
>>
>   Is this a federal law? I was under the impression that it was a state
>controlled area.

I think federal enforcement may be under the postmastger general, and 
limited to pornography distributed through the us mail.  (note: this
is not a professional or legal opinion -- it's based off something I
think I remember seeing on 60 minutes a few years ago....)

>>Depictions of children under the age of 18 engaged in sex or posed to
>>sexually tittilate are illegal.
>>
>  How do you define "posed to sexually tittilate"?  Most laws on child porn

I think intention to tittilate is shown (regardless of actual pose) by
posting the pictures to the .erotica board instead of a .pics (or .art or
whatever the "generic" scanned pictures newsgroup would be)

>>The government does not have to prove whether it is pornographic or not.
>>
>  Indeed not. I think they did prior to 1982. BTW, it is not "pornographic",
>but "obscene", and that's what we were debating.

I thought we were debating "illegal" whether pornographic, obscene or 
(recently tossed (back) into the mix) copyright violation.

>  The point is that we want to stop child porn not because it is obscene, but
>because it inevitably derives from child sexual abuse. If we belive that

Not "the point", but "a point".

There are two issues here: child pornography (on which I seem to agree
with you), and culpability/responsibility of systems carrying articles
which are known to be illegal.  If you try arguing issue A and the other
guy is talking issue B your points will just be going right by each
other :)  For many news admins on the net, the second issue is the
most important, since it bears directly upon their responsibility (or
lack thereof) for such things found on their systems.

>  Ideally, child porn laws would become part of the general child abuse laws,
>and finally sever the connection between porn and child-porn.

I'll second that.


=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Why do we never get an answer		|
when we're knocking at the door?	|	-Richard Hartman	
because the truth is hard to swallow 	|	hartman@uLogic.COM
that's what the war of love is for.	|
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
From: kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie)
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: What is pornography, anyway?
Date: 17 Nov 92 16:40:35 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.BxvCzn.5qw
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL

rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly) writes:

[...]
>Guess I was thinking more of the Massachusetts state government than federal
>statutes.  A depiction of a minor in the nude is considered pornography in
>Mass.

That law was overturned:

"The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts heard an appeal by Oakes
on February 3, 1987, and on February 1, 1988 in a 4-to-3 decision
sustained his challenge to $ 272-29A. Justice Wilkins, writing for the
majority, asserted that the court need not consider Oakes's behavior
because the statute itself was fatally overbroad." [reference at end]

In response, Massachusetts amended the law to apply only to images
created with 'lascivious intent.'. The new law has not been tested in
court.

- Carl

p.s. The reference is the best discussion of child porn laws I've
read. If you want the facts (such as they are), you should read it.

ANNOTATED REFERENCES

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

=================
law/child-porn.silvers
=================
* Expression -- Child Porn -- Silvers

The Application of Child Pornography Statutes to Non-Obscene Art and
Family Photography by Jolyon Silversmith, silvers3@husc8.harvard.edu.
It is a term paper written in May, 1992 for Government 1341:
Constitutional Law at Harvard University.

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

If you have gopher, you can browse the CAF archive with the command
   gopher gopher.eff.org

These document(s) are also 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/child-porn.silvers

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 child-porn.silvers



-- 
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy,alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.d
From: emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire)
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution (was, Re: Does USENET condone CHILD PORNOGRAPHY?)
Organization: Intellection, Inc.
	<EMCGUIRE.92Nov11223031@fuller.intellection.com>
	<1992Nov13.232452.8530@clarinet.com>
	<EMCGUIRE.92Nov15183003@fuller.intellection.com>
	<BxtD0y.2Lq@cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 21:58:38 GMT

I wrote:

   >As I said earlier, I am in the same position as someone who
   >unknowingly bought an illegal copy of a book.  I am not required to
   >destroy the book, but I should report the fact to the authorities if I
   >become aware that the publisher violated copyright.

In article <BxtD0y.2Lq@cs.uiuc.edu> kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie) writes:

   I don't believe you are legally required to report to the authorities.
   I doubt if you should keep the book.

I would seriously consider trashing the book and buying a legitimate
copy, yes.  I was sticking to the question of my strict legal
obligation.  To protect my company I want to understand and discuss
the legal obligations of netnews sites.
-- 
Ed McGuire                   1603 LBJ Freeway, Suite 780
Systems Administrator/       Dallas, Texas 75234
 Member of Technical Staff   214/620-2100, FAX 214/484-8110
Intellection, Inc.           <ed@intellection.com>
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: What is pornography, anyway?
From: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)
Organization: The Man With Ten Cats
Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1992 05:13:35 GMT
Reply-To: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly)

In article <1992Nov13.153824.27660@news.columbia.edu> dan@cubmol.bio.columbia.edu (Daniel Zabetakis) writes:
>In article <BxMu36.IM9@cs.uiuc.edu> kadie@cs.uiuc.edu (Carl M. Kadie) writes:
>>===== ftp eff.org:pub/academic/law/miller =======
>>The Supreme Court's definition of obscenity (the so-called _Miller_
>>test) is:
>>
>>1) must appeal to the prurient interest
>
>   As best as I can figure this means only good porn is illegal. If a movie
>is hot, if it features healthy and attractive people, then it is illegal. If
>it is boring or crude, then it is OK.
>
>>
>>2) must describe sexual conduct in a way that is "patently offensive"
>>to community standards
>>
>   So _nothing_ is obscene until it is ruled obscene in a trial. Because
>we don't know the community standards until ruling is made.
>
>>and
>>
>>3) when taken as a whole, it "must lack serious literary, artistic,
>>political, or scientific value"
>>
>   Does this include educational value? Maybe a combination of literary
>and scientific? An intro sexuality text doesn't pass any of these specific
>tests, but has some 'value', right?
>
>   In my opinion, point #2 mean that sysadmins don't have to worry about
>judging obscenity for themselves. And don't forget that #3 specifies taking
>the work as a whole. How does that apply to a.b.p.e? IS the newsgroup a
>whole? Or is an individual posting a whole? Or is it the original publication
>used for the test? Does the fact that what is stored on your system is
>actually uuencoded mean that it can't be obscene. ASCII characters don't turn
>me on.

But the bottom of the line federal line in the US is:

Depictions of children under the age of 18 engaged in sex or posed to
sexually tittilate are illegal.

The government does not have to prove whether it is pornographic or not.

-- 

Rick Kelly	rmk@rmkhome.UUCP	unixland!rmkhome!rmk	rmk@frog.UUCP
Xref: sparky news.sysadmin:1488 news.admin:8603 news.admin.policy:491
Newsgroups: news.sysadmin,news.admin,news.admin.policy
Subject: Re: a.b.p.e. distribution
From: emcguire@intellection.com (Ed McGuire)
Date: 18 Nov 92 18:08:58 GMT
 <1992Nov16.214125.4303@clarinet.com><1992Nov16.232911.6987@news.columbia.edu><1992Nov17.101330.13534@clarinet.com>
Organization: Intellection, Inc.

In article <1992Nov17.101330.13534@clarinet.com> brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:

   But the law says that your opinion about whether it is harmful is not
   relevant.  I know that's hard for some people to accept.   The law says
   that the copyright holder gets to decide who gets to copy it.  "I honestly
   did not feel they were harmed" is not a defence.  One can say it until one
   is blue in the face, but it is not a defence.

However, if the court determines that they were not harmed, you are
only going to get a cease and desist order slapped on you, not a
costly judgement.
-- 
Ed McGuire                   1603 LBJ Freeway, Suite 780
Systems Administrator/       Dallas, Texas 75234
 Member of Technical Staff   214/620-2100, FAX 214/484-8110
Intellection, Inc.           <ed@intellection.com>
Newsgroups: news.config,ba.news.config