Responses to Filter maintenance time question

[Darmae Brown]

This message has been posted to publib, web4lib and libnet (Colorado). 
Please excuse the duplication.

Thank you very much to everyone who responded to my question about the
staff time required to maintain internet filters.  More replies are
still welcome, but I wanted to summarize what I have gotten so far. 
These responses have been edited slightly, mostly to protect the
anonymity of the people who were kind enough to respond.  I'm sorry if I
inadvertently misquote someone in the process.

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You might want to look into a remote proxy, such as BESS, if you want a
turnkey, low maintenance solution.

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We use Cyber Patrol in our youth services area.  The filter has been in
place for 6 months now.  We have had no requests to add additional sites
to the filter.  Apparently the ones it blocks are sufficient for the
public here at least.  We have 3 terminals upstairs on the second floor
without any filters.  On those rare times when we get complaints about
the filter being consorship, we just tell everyone that they can always
go upstairs to any of the terminals without filters.  So in terms of
staff time to maintain the filter, it hasn't taken any other than the
initial time to install the filter.

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We are using CyberPatrol on most of the PCs in the children's room and
at three remote sites where we have "electronic libraries" in community
centers.  We do not even maintain the "not" list - just accept the
weekly updates to which we subscribe.  Even so, it takes diligence.  If
you ever forget to download the list each week, it blocks your access to
the internet completely.  It is quite a hassle, but is desired by the
remote sites and offered as an alternative in the library to those
parents who want to feel a tad safer about their children browsing.  We
have volunteers in the remote sites who have been trained to download
the not list and trouble shoot when access is blocked.

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We have CyberPatrol loaded on one of our computers.  We do download the
new "stop" sites on a regular basis; it takes about 15 minutes to
complete.  We occasionally have problems with the software requiring us
to go in and "tweak" it, but that only takes a few minutes each time. 
Staff time will also depend on how strictly you set the filters--too
strong, and you spend more time adding blocked sites to your "OK" list. 
We had initially blocked gambling and received a reference question on a
jockey at a nearby racetrack, only to discover that the home page for
the track was blocked.  Now, we only block four categories (the three
sex and 1 violence--we've asked our Library Board to drop the violence)
and that made a big difference.  Sorry I can't give you a concrete
answer, but the time--now the filter is installed and we've worked out
the bugs--seems to be minimal.

In selecting a filter: be sure you get one that allows total disabling
of keyword blocking and that also indicates the site address of all
hits, including ones that are blocked.  CyberSitter, for instance, will
not list sites that are blocked on your hits which means that you don't
have any information on sites you feel are legitimate and shouldn't be
blocked.  You might also want to check out Karen Schneider's web page on
filters (www.bluehighways.com/tifap) for more information about how
filters work.

Good luck!

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We use "Cybersitter" and the amount of staff time to update the filter
file is not worth counting.  The download is automated, and then I just
copy the file the patron machines.  The same is true with the url's we
add, they are kept in a separate file that I copy across the network to
the selected patron pc's.

I hope this helps.

Indeed it did--thank you all!

-- 
Darmae Brown, MA MCIS         darmaeb at netman.ci.aurora.co.us
Systems Coordinator           (303) 739-6622 phone
Aurora Public Library         (303) 739-6638 fax
14949 E Alameda Dr            All opinions are my own--
Aurora, CO 80012                 no one else would want them!