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* The original Subject was:  "VTW BillWatch #7" *
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Apparently-to: lsg@gryn.org
From: "Shabbir J. Safdar" 
Subject: VTW BillWatch #7

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     VTW BillWatch: A weekly newsletter tracking US Federal legislation
     affecting civil liberties.  BillWatch is published every
     Friday afternoon as long as Congress is in session.

         Issue #7, Date: Sat Jul  1 02:20:40 EDT 1995

      Please widely redistribute this document with this banner intact
    Redistribute no more than two weeks after above date
       Reproduce this alert only in relevant forums

      Distributed by the Voters Telecommunications Watch (vtw@vtw.org)

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CONTENTS
  Rumor Central (RC)
  1995 Communications Decency Act
    (passed Senate, fight in the House)
  1995 Protection of Children from Computer Pornography Act (S 892)
    (hearing scheduled in the Senate for July 14th)

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RUMOR CENTRAL (RC)

  We've got rumors of hearings for the Dole/Grassley Internet
  censorship bill in the Senate.  It's even *worse* than Exon's
  Communications Decency Act, believe it or not.  Details below.

  Well just about everyone read the Time article on "cyberporn".
  Time should know better.  The story was based upon a study
  whose methodology was to search porn-popular areas of the net
  and BBS' and provide statistics.  Time then treated the outcome
  of this study as if it was an examination of the net as a whole,
  often even forgetting to pay lip-service to the fact that it
  wasn't a survey of net content as a whole.

  Most telling is the cover caption, where online erotica is
  called "pervasive".  Later on it gives the figure that 83.5% of
  the traffic on pictures groups is "pornographic".  Note that
  this isn't of an entire newsfeed, but only of the pictures
  newsgroups.

  This detail is lost on the reader who is repeatedly berated by
  statements about how pornography is "ubiquitous".  It's obvious
  that there was strong pressure to produce a story that
  capitalized on the current hype about online erotica, but we
  should expect only the best from Time and Philip Elmer-Dewitt.
  The mainstreaming of the net has been good to writers on the
  cyberspace beat, and the net deserves the responsible
  journalism it so desperately needs to counter Congress' current
  hysteria.

Send your interesting rumors (anonymously or not) to vtw@vtw.org.
All mail headers will be destroyed.

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1995 COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT (CDA) (Passed Senate, HR 1004 in the
House)

Description:
  The CDA would criminalize electronic speech currently protected
  in print by the First Amendment.

House of Representatives, citizen action required:
  Call the League of Women Voters in your city and find out who
  your representative is.  The fight is going to become very
  heated in the next few weeks.

House CDA sponsors: Johnson (D-SD)

House status:
  Currently the CDA is unattached to any legislation, however
  it is expected that someone will introduce it as an amendment
  to the Telecomm bill in the next few weeks.  In addition,
  three Representatives (Gingrich, Cox, and Wyden) have all taken
  public positions against the Communications Decency Act.  Anti-
  censorship legislation is expected to come out of their objections
  to the CDA.

  The palatable Leahy alternative has been attached to the
  House Telecomm Reform bill by an amendment sponsored by
  Rep. Ron Klink (D-4-PA).

House actions anticipated:
  The House Telecomm Reform bill will go to a floor vote
  in mid to late July.  The Christian Coalition will find
  someone to try to amend the Communications Decency Act to
  the Telecomm Reform bill.

  Request the CDA FAQ and familiarize yourself with the issues
  surrounding the bill.  Directions below.

Senate, citizen action required:
  None.

Senate status:
  The Senate affirmed the Communications Decency Act (84-16)
  as amended to the Telecommunications Reform bill (S 652).

Where to get more info:
  WWW:   http://www.panix.com/vtw/exon
         http://www.eff.org/
         http://www.cdt.org/
         http://epic.org/free_speech
  Gopher: gopher -p 1/vtw/exon gopher.panix.com
    gopher gopher.eff.org
  Email:  vtw@vtw.org (with "send cdafaq" in the subject line)
    cda-status@cdt.org
    cda-info@cdt.org

----------------------------------------------------------------------


1995 Protection of Children from Computer Pornography Act (S 892)

Description:
  Would make Internet Service Providers liable for shielding
  people under 18 from all indecent content on the Internet.

Senate sponsors: Dole (R-KS), Coats (R-IN), Grassley (R-IA), McConnell
  (R-KY), Shelby (R-AL), Nickles (R-OK), Hatch (R-UT)

Senate status: Currently in the Judiciary committee, scheduled for a
  July 14th hearing.

Senate citizen action required:
  Request bill and analysis below and familiarize yourself with it.

House of Representatives status: No House version is known about.

Citizen action required:
  None.

Where to get more info:
  Email:   vtw@vtw.org (with "send s892" in the subject line)
  WWW:   URL:http://www.panix.com/exon
  Gopher: URL:gopher://gopher.panix.com:70/11/vtw/exon

--------------------------------------------------------------
End VTW BillWatch Issue #7, Date: Sat Jul  1 02:20:40 EDT 1995

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