Outfilter the filterers

[Perrin, Thomas W.]

That's an incredibly mature suggestion.  I'm not too sure about the 
mechanics, but I love the idea of selecting rather than censorship.  One
of the things that continues to trouble me is that the censors would, by
definition, constrain scholarship in a multiplicity of fields. Another
thing, I see no reason to continue giving the porn sites unlimited free
publicity.

Thomas W. Perrin
Tom's Quick Guide to the Internet &
The World Wide Web
http://members.aol.com/tomsquickg/index.html



Millard Johnson wrote:
> 
> Why can't we turn this argument around.  Instead of contributing our
> effort to censor sites, we could contribute to selection.
> We establish some criteria for what constitutes valid library
> resources.  Things like objectivity, reliability, usefulness,
> presentation quality, etc. -- all of the things that we would consider
> in selecting a print resource for the library.  We might also rank
> things as juvenile, research, etc.  And we would qualify professional
> librarians to grant this distinction.  The distinguishing mark of these
> sites would be the library symbol - a figure with an open book.
> We would invite all web sites to apply for this distinction by
> sending Email with a URL to a qualified librarian.  Our effort is
> then positive - we are selecting rather than censoring.  Any library
> could then use or ignore the library quality subset or ignore it.
>   Millard Johnson    INCOLSA