FC: Free expression update: Victoria's Secret, libraries, Safeweb

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

---

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-111801inform.story

   By ERIC LICHTBLAU, Times Staff Writer
   WASHINGTON -- The document seemed innocuous enough: a survey of
   government data on reservoirs and dams on CD-ROM. But then came last
   month's federal directive to U.S. libraries: "Destroy the report."
   So a Syracuse University library clerk broke the disc into pieces,
   saving a single shard to prove that the deed was done.
   The unusual order from the Government Printing Office reflects one of
   the hidden casualties of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks: the public's
   shrinking access to information that many once took for granted.
   Want to find out whether there are any hazardous waste sites near the
   local day-care center? What safety controls are in place at nuclear
   power plants? Or how many people are incarcerated in terrorist-related
   probes?
   Since Sept. 11, it has become much harder to get such information from
   the federal government, a growing number of states and public
   libraries as heightened concern about national security has often
   trumped the public's "right to know:" [...]

---

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/bpihw/20011118/en/fcc_looks_into_abc_s_secret__1.html

   Sunday November 18 07:25 PM EST
   FCC looks into ABC's 'Secret'

   WASHINGTON (The Hollywood Reporter) --- ABC's airing of "The
   Victoria's Secret Fashion Show" is likely to cause the network more
   than a little discomfort as the federal government has received dozens
   of complaints that the G-string-laced show and its related promotions
   violate broadcast indecency rules.
   FCC (news - web sites) commissioner Michael Copps told reporters
   Friday that he has received 50 e-mails from different parts of the
   country complaining about the racy show and its promotions. One of the
   complaints was of a more personal nature -- Copps' 27-year-old
   daughter had a complaint about the show.
   "She saw it and was upset," Copps said. "She's a new mother, and when
   her child gets (to a) TV age, he should see wholesome programming."
   He said he was forwarding the complaints to the FCC's Enforcement
   Bureau and asking it to investigate whether it violated indecency
   regulations.
   [...]

---

http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/11/20/privacy.reut/index.html

   SafeWeb shuts free anonymous Web service
   SAN FRANCISCO, California (Reuters) -- An Internet privacy firm has
   closed an anonymous Web surfing service that had been partly funded by
   the CIA and intended to give Web users in countries such as China and
   Iran a way to circumvent censors, the company said Monday.
   Emeryville, California-based SafeWeb last week quietly shut down its
   service which allowed people to surf the Web anonymously for free, and
   is unlikely to restart it, spokeswoman Sandra Song said.
   [...]

---

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/ny-cards14.story
   By Graham Rayman
   STAFF WRITER
   November 15, 2001, 5:27 PM EST
   Requiring national identification cards and upgrading security at what
   they described as the "totally unsupervised" area of private aviation,
   were two recommendations offered Thursday by a panel of current and
   former law enforcement officials. [...]

---

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011119/tc/anthrax_internet_1.html

   U.S. Warns Bioterror Web Sites
   By DAVID HO, Associated Press Writer
   WASHINGTON (AP) - The government is warning dozens of Web site
   operators to stop touting unproven treatments for anthrax, smallpox
   and other infectious agents that could be used for bioterrorism.
   The treatments offered included dietary supplements such as oregano
   oil and zinc mineral water, the Federal Trade Commission said Monday. [...]

---

http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/172263.html

   By Ariana Eunjung Cha, Washington Post
   WASHINGTON, D.C., U.S.A.,
   19 Nov 2001, 5:43 AM CST

   Yahoo's message boards are erupting with the kind of
   free-flowing, impassioned discussions the Internet's creators always
   dreamed of, with postings about practically every aspect of the hunt
   for terrorists, the capture of Kabul and mysterious plane crashes.
   But what's also revealing is what is being deleted.
   Gone are some gloating messages that say America deserved the attacks.
   Gone are some links to extremist sites promoting a jihad, or holy war,
   against the Western world. Gone too is a sarcastic note posted by
   college student Usman Sheikh:
   "America succesfully [sic] attacks terrorists, pinpoint smart
   bombing," the note began, linking to pictures of bloody children who
   were hurt or killed as a result of the recent military raids.
   [...]

---

http://www.satirewire.com/news/0111/aclu.shtml

   ACLU TAKES OVER TERROR INVESTIGATION, WILL
   FOCUS ATTENTION ON NO ONE IN PARTICULAR
   "We Must Ask Nebraskans, Not Just Middle Easterners, What They Know"

   Washington, D.C. (SatireWire.com) -- Sensitive to accusations of
   profiling specific groups, the Justice Department today announced that
   the American Civil Liberties Union has taken over the lead role in the
   terrorism investigation, a shift in strategy that frees up the
   government to conduct a less prejudicial, more inclusive probe that
   should take, roughly, forever.

   "Instead of un-Constitutionally targeting specific groups, our
   investigation will expand the pool of interviews by more fairly
   including people of every ethnicity, every religion, every gender, and
   every sexual persuasion," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D.
   Romero. "Right now, we are interviewing Caucasian farmers in Iowa,
   legally blind Wal-Mart employees in California, and gay Latino package
   store customers in Florida to see if they had contact with, or were
   involved with, those from the Middle East who carried out these
   attacks."

   [...]

---

Hi Declan. If you choose to disseminate this information, please remove all
attribution to me and keep it anonymous. Under the onerous and archaic 
contempt
of court laws in Singapore, I have just committed contempt.

Thanks.

--- Forward Message ---

(Pardon the bad formatting...)

This is outrageous.

In yesterday's Sunday Times (18 November 2001), there was a story entitled 
"Man
allegedly 'encouraged law-breaking on Web'".
(http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/singapore/story/0,1870,84976-
1006120740,00.html?)

Robert Ho was accused of attempting to incite violence or disobedience to the
law which is likely to lead to a breach of peace, by posting an article
entitled "Break The Law And Get Away With It, Like PAP"
(http://groups.google.com/groups?
q=soc.culture.singapore+break+the+law&hl=en&rnum=2&selm=c443dfe.0110190220.221cc
721%40posting.google.com), which allegedly encouraged people to gatecrash
polling stations without authority on Polling Day, thereby breaking the law.

Read the articles and decide whether he did incite people to break the law.
Because if any judge finds that he did, then by definition 4 of Singapore's
political leaders have also broken the law.

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