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FCC Calls for Free (Filtered) Internet; Berkman Fellows Respond

Berkman fellows blog about the FCC's proposal to auction a block of radio spectrum to a buyer that would provide free internet access, under the condition it would filter pornography and obscene content.

David Weinberger writes:

Scott Bradnerhas a terrific column on the FCC’s idea that it will make some spectrum available for free Net access, so long as it’s censored. If the naughty bits can’t be stopped by filters, then the FCC wants the carriers to block it using other means, e.g., perhaps by blocking encrypted data?

I don’t know why the FCC thinks that it has the mandate to censor the Internet. And if they do, why don’t they insist on a morally pure telephone network? Why do they think the Internet consists of content instead of people communicating? And why does the FCC care so much about boobies?

More info: The company behind this. The .doc file with the FCC text. Reuters. M2Z comment (type “m2z” in “filed on behalf of”). DailyWireless.

...also see David's note to BoingBoing.

Wendy Seltzer comments:

What could be bad about free wireless Internet access? How about censorship by federally mandated filters that make it no longer “Internet.” That’s the effect of the FCC’s proposed service rules for Advanced Wireless Service spectrum in the 2155-2180 MHz band, as set out in a July 20 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. [continued]

Persephone Miel of Media Re:public says:

The FCC says they want to make it easy for someone to deliver wireless broadband for free. But, as we say here at Berkman, there is free as in beer, and free as in speech. And the FCC’s new idea is UNFREE as in speech. Why? Because the license for the spectrum they want to auction requires a mechanism that “filters or blocks images and text that constitute obscenity or pornography and…any images or text that otherwise would be harmful to teens and adolescents. For purposes of this rule, teens and adolescents are children 5 through 17 years of age.” [continued]

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Comments on the proposition will be accepted by the FCC until July 9.