Or will this be blocked because it has the word analogy in it?
I was reading the links that came through the nocleanfeed twitter search, and I came across an interesting quote from Our Dear Friend, Clive Hamilton in the International Herald Tribune. The specific quote by ODFCH[1] relates to the apparent water holding ability of the arguments against the filter:
“The laws that mandate upper speed limits do not stop people from speeding, does that mean that we should not have those laws?” he said. “We live in a society, and societies have always imposed limits on activities that it deems are damaging.” He said. “There is nothing sacrosanct about the Internet.”
This analogy is actually a good one. It’s a pity that it isn’t complete. Yes, we have laws against speeding. Yes, we have laws against the production of Child Sexual Abuse Images. In fact, we also have laws against Child Sexual Abuse. That is, indeed, correct. There are limits to what we find acceptable, and ODFCH and I agree that these things are damaging. But our agreement stops there.
You see, while we have laws to prevent people from speeding (and they don’t actually stop people speeding), we do not mandate the placement of speed limiters in everyone’s cars because a few people[2] break the law. There would be an outcry about this. Cars have odometers that go way beyond the speed limit as it is set in Australia. But we allow people to make that choice. Do I break the law today? Can I get away with it today?[3]
These same choices are made by a much smaller group of people. We, as a society, condemn them. And we do much to prevent their activities. We feel outrage at their activities. Perhaps we should feel similar outrage with people who speed? But, in general, we don’t.
So it’s there the analogy breaks down. No-one in their right mind would advocate a speed limiter for cars, particularly one that may not consistently work. What would be the outcome of a speed limiter that occasionally refused to recognise school zones? We’d have some cars travelling at perhaps 100 km/h where they should be doing 40 km/h. Then, perhaps on the freeway, where the speed limit is 110 km/h, everyone would be forced to travel at 40 km/h. Hardly seems a good way to run some national infrastructure.
Yes, people speed, and yes, people are caught. That’s why we have Police.
Forcing everyone to travel at 40 km on a freeway is not a good idea. It would clog the highways (and the byways), some people would be able to disable their speed filter, while others would have it randomly not working. And then the blame for the inadvertent deaths of individuals caught with a faulty filter would rest on the heads of the filter forcers.
We have laws to protect people. But we also have choice. That’s what you want to take away, Our Dear Friend, Clive Hamilton, from Charles Sturt University[4], it’s not just our freedom you are after, it’s our ability to choose!
For more details: see #9, #17, #18 (but insert “roads” for “media”), #20, #25, #26, #27, oh, fuggit, just look at the whole darn lot here!
For more details about choosing what you want to see on the internet: OpenDNS.com
- oh, that sounds like a disease [↩]
- okay probably more than a few [↩]
- This is the general I not necessarily the specific I as in me, the writer of this post. [↩]
- not from ANU, although the centre for which he works is sponsored by ANU [↩]
Tags:
nocleanfeed
Some points:
1) Why start of with a silly line about blocking?
2) Don’t some/all trucks have speed limiters?
3) Actually, you breaking of the analogy isn’t that correct. To analogies speed limiters in cars would be the equivilent of mandating filtering software on your computer rather then limiting the “road”. But I think that is to take the analogy incorrectly any way. Its not an analogy to say speed limits are like filters in the way they work. Its an analogy on the bases that just because something isn’t going to be 100% successful and that there are ways around them is no reason not to do them.
There are many reasons not to introduce filtering and most of them are good ones that need to be worked out (i.e. like in a pilot) but not getting 100% successful isn’t one (and neither is the Howard style scare tactics that the government might block political discussions).
JMTC
Reply to this Comment
alison reply on December 15th, 2008:
Some other points/answers
1) Because all analogies break down and silly lines about blocking get people to respond.
2) Yes, because trucks are big and bad, but I still see them apparently travelling over the speed limit.
3) All analogies have problems. That’s the problem with analogies, but they keep being thrown at us. If we don’t show that the analogies being used fall down somewhere, they’ll be taken as being representative of the actual case. The breaking of this analogy at any level allows people to think outside the analogy. We need to debunk anything that is being used to simplify a very complex issue.
Most of the issues have already been thoroughly worked out. People who understand how networks work generally agree that the pilot will not give us any more useful information.
Reply to this Comment
Phillip Molly Malone reply on December 15th, 2008:
You didn’t touch on the point that your breaking of the analogy actually wasn’t correct.
Also I don’t know that all the trials have shown everything. Like, some of the testing shows that there is a solution (although not the most accurate, pretty close to the best) that only had a 2% decrease in speed. Will this hold up over a bigger work load in real life trials? Who knows.
Oh and on the trucks, I wasn’t suggestion they were big and bad. In fact most of the times its cars weaving in and out that cause the problems, merely pointing out that some vehicles are speed limited.
On Point 1, I bet you have ago at (the idiot) pro filters that say anti-filters aren’t interested in the protection of children, right? Silly comments are silly comments. But link baiting works, so I guess your right about the motives for them.
Reply to this Comment
alison reply on December 15th, 2008:
Okay, as an interpretivist researcher, I know that my analysis of the analogy is but one interpretation of the analogy and that there are more. I do not seek to deny anyone their interpretation of their world. I seek only to add to the voices that debunk the oversimplification of a complex issue.
The trials *have* shown that there is a decrease in speed (depending on the filter), a range of false positives (overblocking) and a range of false negatives (underblocking). I’m not so worried about the speed, but the false positives and false negatives. I’ve posted elsewhere on the problems with that. http://vicariousconversations.com/blog/2008/11/29/needle-meet-haystack/
Philip,
I think calling out bad analogies is perfectly reasonable. The fact is, the internet cannot be filtered in the way proposed to any useful degree, and harping on about “protecting the children” will not make the technology better.
You argue “Its an analogy on the bases that just because something isn’t going to be 100% successful and that there are ways around them is no reason not to do them.” I would counter that if we lived in a world where speed limits on ALL traffic were limited at the factory and the success/failure rate was as bad as the proposed filter will be, that WOULD be reason not to do it.
I don’t think we’re arguing that it shouldn’t be done because it won’t be 100% successful, but that it shouldn’t be done because it won’t be AT ALL successful. It will fail monumentally, and cost Australians millions of dollars, and law enforcement will watch that money flow down the drain and only imagine what good it could have done in their hands to actually protect children.
Reply to this Comment
alison reply on December 15th, 2008:
I think your final points are really important, Josh. The cost will outweigh the benefits and there will be a false sense of security among some groups. It’s the falseness of that sense of security that is of concern.
Reply to this Comment
Josh, I have no problem with people pointing out the problems with the system. I also have no problem with people pointing out problems with analogies, but this analysis of the analogy (in my opinion) is wrong and put what I think the analogy suggested equates too (i.e. Filtering at the machine level).
I don’t buy that filtering is as bad as everyone makes out, but even if it is, I have issues with the use of the argument that the government will use it to block political debate. That really is just stupid!
And the other thing that I have wondered of recent times is that there is hundreds of brilliant people that are against the filter, but I haven’t seen many better ideas on how to achieve the goals that the government are trying to achieve. I seriously think that if they started to put some thought into how the government should fight this battle, it would be a win-win situation.
I don’t think there is an easy answer, but I don’t blame the government for taking it on. And it should be noted that there is two levels of the filtering that need to be considered and lot a lot of things, we tend to look at this from a “geek” level and normally find it hard to see it from the non-geek perspective. It has been shown that being able to do that is hard to do but hugely successful for those that can (look at Nintendo and the Wii. I remember when they first announced it and its controllers at E3 and the “geeks” laughed at them, now they dominate the game landscape).
I also think (from what I have read) whether what they purpose is the right solution, there testing methodologies seem quite sound. In the past it wouldn’t be suprising to see something like this just thrown into law. They have gone through one round of testing and want to go through more. I don’t see Telsta opting out of that pilot as a good thing. Its a bad thing. I think the provider that said they would do the test to show how its broken is a much more healthy attitude. I also hope they help to show other ways it could be better done.
)
JTMC (I seem to be rambling on
Reply to this Comment
alison reply on December 15th, 2008:
There *is* a sound basis for what they propose, but they seem to want a filter with a kitchen sink. Their definitions of “unwanted” content are problematic or non-existent. If they had stayed with “illegal” content, we would have less to complain about. Definitions are important.
Their methodology is not sound. They have no baseline with which to compare their results, no measures of success/failure, no controls and their “live” trial includes no “live” users. Their “closed” trials showed very problematic results with only 30 users.
I agree that iiNet’s stance is *almost* healthy, although without some measures of success, I worry that any results will be seen as success. With Telstra refusing to participate, Optus redefining the rules and iiNet playing Devil’s advocate, the government should be taking note that perhaps there is some validity to arguments against their current proposal.
Reply to this Comment
joshnunn reply on December 15th, 2008:
“And the other thing that I have wondered of recent times is that there is hundreds of brilliant people that are against the filter, but I haven’t seen many better ideas on how to achieve the goals that the government are trying to achieve.”
The problem here is that the Government isn’t asking. What hope do we have that they’ll listen, when people in the know are being ignored on technical issues that they understand better than anyone else?
As to “better ideas on how to achieve the goals” of the Government, the fact is the Government doesn’t know what it wants, and isn’t saying – one minute it’s “protecting the children”, the next it’s blocking “inappropriate” material. There IS no debate as far as Conroy is concerned, and the goals are murky and shallow. The whole thing comes across as a political manoeuvre to appease clueless parents, and show that the Govt. is “doing something”. In the end however, they’ll have done precisely nothing and wasted money, and given parents a false sense of security.
If you want a “solution”, you need to define the problem. If it’s stopping kids seeing porn, then you need to educate parents to better educate their kids. If it’s eradicating child porn, then you need to do what the police are doing and track down the perpetrators – hiding it away on the internet and pretending it isn’t there will not make it stop “in the real world”.
The geeks need to be listened to on this one. For once we have a debate that is solely within our territory, and we can tell people categorically that this filter will not achieve anything, because it is a stunt and not technically feasible. The problems it purports to tackle are social, and a technological solution will have little to no effect, and leave us worse off than when we started.
As to the idea that the testing methods are sound, well… I’m not certain how you define live trials, but a trial that doesn’t include real people is no live trial in my book. How will a trial such as this show us how a real person’s internet will be slowed or filtered? The real test will be when this cleanfeed is slapped on everyone, willing or unwilling, but by then it will be to late to register our protest. That is why we have to do it now, by pointing out every single ridiculous assertion by its advocates before this colossal mistake goes further.
Reply to this Comment
Phillip Molly Malone reply on December 15th, 2008:
The live trials thing to me sounds funny. And I don’t mean they are doing funny things but that there has been a miscommunication. If you read the pilot tend document it talks about surveying users involved and last time I looked, bots don’t handle surveys very well. And if your not having real people, why get ISPs involved?
From what I read it seems the “not real people” part is only for testing the effect of adding more URL/IPs to the mix where they want to test high volumes. Without actually going totally live, I don’t see how this could be recreated without going for bots.
Reply to this Comment
joshnunn reply on December 15th, 2008:
But isn’t the expanded list relevant? If the trials go ahead, and the customers in the pilot are happy with the level of degradation/number of false positives, will the filter be switched on for everyone? At that point, the list is expanded to include the higher number of URLs, only tested against bots and suddenly what was an acceptable level of slowdown becomes intolerable.
And why should some casual internet user, who occasionally checks their email and photos of their grandkids be able to say what is acceptable for me? I could participate in their trial, but I’d rather protest what I see as a half-arsed attempt to do my parenting for me.
Josh, I think you answered your own question! If you protest it, you are betting the house it won’t come in.
Also, you won’t have to let it do you parenting for you!
1) You can (as I will day one) opt-out of the 2nd tier of filtering
2) The filter won’t stop your good parenting.
Again, the reason for bots is normally to try to simulate real world situations where real world testing isn’t possible or are you suggesting that they just put the filter on for everyone as the test?
Swings and roundabouts, swings and roundabouts.
Reply to this Comment
joshnunn reply on December 15th, 2008:
1) And I’ll be declaring to the Govt. that I wish to access unsavoury sites.
2) The filter WILL stop my good internet speeds. Enough to make the internet worth less to me as a teaching/learning tool with my children. “Why don’t we hop on Wikipedia and look that up Kids? Oh, that’s right, it’s painfully slow”.
And no I’m not suggesting that they put the filter on for everyone to test it. I’m saying that no bot-test will show what it does to my internet when it does come in. I want to stop this senseless waste of money before the money is completely gone.
I’m done discussing this with you. I’ve read your replies on other forums and the answers people give when you challenge why they are against the feed. You seem unwilling to listen to authoritative sources. You also seem to believe that the Govt. has nothing but the best intentions and is handling this in a consultative and open manner despite all evidence to the contrary. Normally I’d be happy to continue an open discussion, but your view will not be changed by me, when smarter people have tried and failed. I’d be happy if your rosy filtered world were possible, but it just isn’t. Until people accept that we’ll never move forward.
Reply to this Comment
Phillip Molly Malone reply on December 15th, 2008:
1) You are declaring to your ISP you don’t want to be filtered as part of the 2nd tier filtering. I have nothing to hide and I will be on the phone open of business day one to opt-out.
2) You maybe right. In fact your most certainly true that it will effect speed depending on what method ISPs choose. How much, we won’t REALLY know until it is implemented. Could be 100% slower, could be as low as 2% (as was seen in testing). And yes, I am sure son will no longer be able to learn if Wikipeida takes 4 seconds to load instead of 2!! Poor kids!
It was nice debating this with you. I take in everything that people discuss with me. Just because I use my own brain, doesn’t mean I don’t listen/read. I also listen to “authoritative sources” from all fronts, not just ones that agree with thoughts I had before hand.
Merry Christmas to you and your family.
Molly
Reply to this Comment
[...] said if the flaming is constructive like this example or this one… (but not this one) then I will take on board your comments. I am used to [...]