The Internet Filtering in Australia and the Asia Pacific workshop was held at the University of Wollongong on the 30th November and 1st December 2009. The event was organized by Mark Mclelland, and funded by Innovations in Cultural Research, Capstrans, and the Cultural Research Network. The discussions, from international scholars, focused on the impending Australian [...]
Monthly Archives: December 2009
ICR at Creative Arts
Members of ICR from the Faculty of Arts and Creative Arts met in the Creative Arts building to admire the installations and art work of the media arts and graphic design students final exhibition for the year. Links were forged between the two faculties and plans discussed for the upcoming 2010 year. Thanks for your [...]
David Vaile University of New South Wales Internet Filtering in Australia and the Asia Pacific
Prohibited Packets and the Great Firewall of Canberra: Inspecting the Despicable, Assessing the Unacceptable
Exploring the chain of public speaking that invested public funds into a proposal to introduce ubiquitious ISP based monitoring and selective blocking of all internet requests originating in Australia, against one secret, fixed blacklist of unknown but tiny extent, against one or two others that it makes up as it goes along. Implications for participatory and open governance on the Internet. Potential liability for unintended technical and other consequences when the objectives, requirements and risk tolerance are not articulated. Challenges to the practicality of accurate classification of the trillion things on the web, or even the 10-60 billion a month that change. And what are the real needs of young people from dot to 18 year old, ‘digital natives’ on the scary new frontier when their parents are not? Does filtering meet these needs? If not, what could?
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David Turner
Software Consultant, speaking at the Internet Filtering in Australia and the Asia Pacific Workshop at the University of Wollongong on the 1st December 2009
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Kwang Suk Lee Internet Filtering in Australia and the Asia Pacific
Dr Kwang Suk Lee
Sung Kon Hoe University Korea
Internet Regulation in Korea 1993-2009
Kwang Suk Lee explores the recent asymmetric relationship between the citizens and the state, especially as they are revealed in the online regulation practices of the Korean government.
Peter Chen University of Sydney
This paper places current arguments about online content regulation in perspective: historical and policy. The paper begins by identifying the established tradition of censorship in Australia and its attempted depoliticization in the 1970s. From this perspective online content regulation fits within a pattern of recurring challenges to this political settlement. These challenges are motivated by technological developments which motivate real or imagined moral risks and undermine established regulatory institutions. The current filtering debate is compared with the similar conflict under the Howard government (circa 1997-2000). This comparison will identify the universally unsatisfactory policy response embedded in the Broadcasting Services Act (Online services) 1999, and will draw out key similarities and differences in the nature of the political debate.
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Peter Chen Internet Filtering workshop
Peter Chen University of Sydney
This paper places current arguments about online content regulation in perspective: historical and policy. The paper begins by identifying the established tradition of censorship in Australia and its attempted depoliticization in the 1970s. From this perspective online content regulation fits within a pattern of recurring challenges to this political settlement. These challenges are motivated by technological developments which motivate real or imagined moral risks and undermine established regulatory institutions. The current filtering debate is compared with the similar conflict under the Howard government (circa 1997-2000). This comparison will identify the universally unsatisfactory policy response embedded in the Broadcasting Services Act (Online services) 1999, and will draw out key similarities and differences in the nature of the political debate.
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Gail Hawkes and Kath Albury Internet Filtering Workshop uow
Dr Gail Hawkes drawing on work done with Dr Danielle Egan, who could not make the workshop at the University of Wollongong on the 30th November and 1st of December. The paper addressed anxieties about the child that are often expressed in contradictory notions of ‘vulnerability’ and ‘rights’ which is underpinned by assumptions about the child and moral panics about children.
Dr Kath Albury, University of New South Wales, Sexting and Citizenship: Regulation and Representation of 16 and 17 year olds.
This paper looks at the ways that current classification laws and media regulations render consenual sexual images produced by/of 16 and 17 year olds as unrepresentable. Popular and legal discourses around adolescent ’sexual citizenship’ are contrasted to recent debates regarding the lowering of the voting age to 16.
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Mark McLelland Internet Filtering Workshop University of Wollongong 30th November and 1st December
At the instigation of the Australian Labor government various ISPs in Australia are trialling a filtering system that will block access to a ‘blacklist’ of websites. Various stakeholders have raised questions concerning by whom and for whom such sites are deemed unsuitable. A wide range of sites can potentially be filtered out including animation, manga and gaming sites, ‘pro-ana’ (anorexia) sites, sites discussing euthanasia and sites connected with ‘terror’ groups. It has been pointed out that content-based filtering systems do not adequately address questions of purpose, practice and use and may unreasonably limit access for legitimate purposes. Furthermore, because of differing State and Federal laws the process of gaining exemption to allow academics and other parties access to such sites is extremely time consuming and cumbersome.
This workshop brings together academics whose research may lead them to filtered sites (such as those studying online sexuality, transnational crime or mental health issues) and other stakeholders including civil-liberties advocates and those charged with developing regulations policy and administering surveillance systems to discuss the issues and problems involved. In addition international speakers will offer comparative perspectives on how Internet regulation and filtering is being addressed by societies across the Asia-Pacific region.
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Michael Flood Internet Filtering Workshop
Dr Michael Flood
50 ways to leave your lover: Social and Educational Strategies Addressing the Harms of Pornography Consumption among Young Men
Pornography plays an increasingly significant role in boys’ and young men’s peer cultures and sociosexual relations. There is consistent and reliable evidence that consumption of pornography is associated with shifts in young men’s sexual understandings, practices and relations. In addition, young men’s use of pornography is in flux. Overall rates of exposure (both deliberate and accidental) are increasing, the means of consumption are changing, and the kinds of sexually explicit materials being used themselves are shifting.
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Dr Chris Moore Internet Filtering Workshop
The Double Bind: Australian Games Classification and ISP Filtering
The missing restricted (R18) ratings category for video and computer games has produced a tricky double bind for the Minister of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Stephen Conroy and Australian gamers. The proposed Internet filter has conflated the already problematic ratings and classifications system for games in Australia, with unsubstantiated and vague claims made by the Senator’s office in response to questions of ‘unregulated’ adult content in online multiplayer games. As it stands, the proposed filter will prevent access to online (multiplayer) games downloaded games and even websites that allow games not ‘suitable’ for a 15 year old audience (yes even Facebook). Due t the lack of the R18 classification for games and the inability to opt out of the proposed Internet filter, the effect on games like Second Life and World of Warcraft are largely unknown and widely feared among gamers, and the current access and content of games, and will speak to the potential future of games as social spaces in national, regional and globalised contexts.
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