Thursday, May 31, 2001

Dutch government to act against virtual child pornography The Dutch Minister of Justice, Korthals, has announced measures that will make it illegal to produce or possess child pornography created by means of electronic image manipulation. The proposed legislation appears to be aimed at preventing the production and possession of artificially rendered images that could be interpreted as representations of children involved in sexual acts. Current Dutch law states that the production or possession of pornography is a criminal offence if it involves the physical (ab)use of (real) persons under a certain age. [Based on a report in an e-mail message from Radio Nederland Wereldomroep.] Leaving aside for the moment the moral issues involved, as well as the practical aspects of enforcement, or even the difficulty of ascertaining the age of a virtual person, the legal ramifications could prove interesting, since the proposal appears to be based on the assumption that the virtual representation of an activity can somehow be put on a par with its physical counterpart. Few, if any, people will be prepared to argue in favour of sexual acts involving children, which is why it is an illegal activity. In the same vein, few would argue in favour of the wholesale slaughter of people for the purpose of entertainment. We find the idea repugnant, which is why such activities have also been made illegal, at least in most modern countries. On the basis of these premises, I wonder how the widespread legal availability of virtual reality shoot-'em-up computer games will affect, or be affected by, the proposed legislation. I somehow doubt that Mr. Korthals will be prepared to do battle with such economic forces as represented by Messrs. Sony, Nintendo, and soon, Xbox producers, Microsoft. The RISKS? Assuming that seeing is believing, or that What You See Is What You Get. Marcus de Geus http://www.degeus.com ["Marcus de Geus" via risks-digest Volume 21, Issue 45] 0:00 # G!

WSJ/Word change tracking/"MS Tool Lifts Veil on Spin" If you send a Word .doc file directly to someone else, without going to "track changes" and accepting all changes, your recipient can see all the edits you have made to the document, with results that can be humorous, embarrassing, or worse. This is old news to RISKS readers--how long ago did the first mention of the problem appear in RISKS? But perhaps the recent appearance of an article about it in The Wall Street Journal (May 14th, page C1) is worthy of mention. The article is entitled "How to Read Between the Corporate Lines." It gives the procedure for viewing Microsoft Word edits, and (with somewhat less clarity) the procedure you must go through to prevent someone else from viewing YOUR edits. The way the Journal puts it: "Just a couple of clicks provides a revealing peek into how some companies massage their public messages to Wall Street." In a news release from Ameritrade Holding Corp, "in one draft, Ameritrade billed the March hiring of Mr. Moglia as one of the 'right decisions' the company made during a difficult second quarter. But his name ended up on the cutting-room floor, a thin blue line erasing him from the final version." It mentions that "Analysts and investors looking at an earlier draft would have found a per-share, quarterly loss of 31 cents. But that, too, was crossed out and change to a loss of 30 cents." An Ameritrade spokeswoman brushed off the changes, saying "it is too bad--but on the other side of it, it is too bad that someone would think to turn the edits on." The article goes on to cite minor gaffes from Visa USA, Allied Capital, Web Street, and Acxiom, leaving little doubt that the problem is widespread. There are no real howlers or scandals here. But you'd think the RISKS would be obvious, wouldn't you? Daniel P. B. Smith "Lifetime forwarding" address: dpbsmith@alum.mit.edu ["Daniel P. B. Smith" via risks-digest Volume 21, Issue 45] 0:00 # G!