On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 1:47 PM, Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)fairpoint.net> wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
No-one knew about the IWF before this. Once people knew, they despised
them and their existence.
You go too far. We censor actual child pornography out of Wikipedia too.
There are limits and someone enforces them.
I agree with Fred. Not many had heard of the IWF before this except for the
people who go looking for child pornography; probably one of the bad effects
of their attempt to target Wikipedia is that if they were tracing UK
internet users trying to look at blocked child pornography, the list has
been swamped by the vast number of users who were just looking in to see if
Wikipedia really was censored.
It may also have highlighted which UK ISPs don't act on IWF warnings, and in
effect advertised them to people who are looking for an ISP which will allow
them to view illegal material. It's done them severe damage on their public
relations. The fact that an IWF mistake led to a brief struggle with them
should not make us their enemy.
--
Sam Blacketer