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Old 15-March-2008, 10:47 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RalofTyr View Post
What's the problem?
It's been explained several times.

Quote:
It's censorship because the reason for the decline was to prohibit certain speech.
No. It would be something similar to censorship if it were to restrict certain points of view, or certain speakers. If, say, Intersteller Traveller had been permitted to have that publicly viewable, but otherwise restricted debate with Jay where no one else was permitted to post in that thread, that would have been censorship. If Swift was allowed to post about tensors but not you, it would be censorship.

Not being permitted to (falsely) shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater is not censorship. Moderation is not censorship. Regulating topics in a general sense on a private forum you aren't paying for isn't censorship, or if it is, it's the very mildest form and entirely within the admin's rights as the folks who pay for this board.

Quote:
The fact that one can go off and create their own forum doesn't make it not censorship. That's like saying, well, if you don't like it here, you are free to go to the mountains and speak your will there.
Your free speech rights in no way obligates anybody to provide you a soapbox. Your free speech rights in no way obligates anybody to listen. You are indeed free to go to the mountains to speak your will there. Or any space paid for through public taxation. You are also free to provide yourself a private forum in which to speak to your heart's content.

While we're here mooching off of Phil and Fraser's bandwidth, however, we're obligated to follow the board's rules on acceptable content.

Quote:
In the US, I believe the internet falls under Federal laws. How can one police a website that's in Taiwan?
Nope, unless the laws were pre-existing and/or written to regulate other media (DMCA, for example). A couple of states do have anti-spam laws (mostly targetting the headers), and the feds fail to come up with similar legislation from time to time, but for the most part, the net is not explicitly regulated.

The problem you raise is precisely what has been causing so much trouble for the politicians. I can't say I'm especially choked up about that.
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Last edited by Moose : 15-March-2008 at 06:31 PM. Reason: payed = bad. paid = good.
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