Article reprinted in its entirety due to brevity, and, you know, general stupidity. (Of the policy, not the article.)
The Internet's primary oversight body approved a plan Wednesday to create a virtual red-light district, setting the stage for pornographic Web sites to use new addresses ending in "xxx". The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers said it would begin negotiations with ICM Registry Inc., run by British businessman Stuart Lawley, to iron out technical issues and prices for the new Web addresses. Adult-oriented sites, a $12 billion industry, probably could begin buying "xxx" addresses as early as fall or winter depending on ICM's plans, ICANN spokesman Kieran Baker said.
The new pornography suffix was among 10 under consideration by the regulatory group, which also recently approved addresses ending in "jobs" and "travel." ICM contends the "xxx" Web addresses, which it plans to sell for $60 a year, will protect children from online smut if adult sites voluntarily adopt the suffix so filtering software used by families can more effectively block access to those sites.
The $60 price is roughly ten times higher than prices other companies charge for dot-com names.
"It will further help to protect kids," said John Morris, staff counsel at the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology. Morris predicted some adult sites will choose to buy "xxx" Web addresses but others will continue to use dot-com.
Now, let's just think about all that, shall we? Let's shall.
1) Registration costs ten times normal .com registration. Not massive cost increases, to be sure, but still, why would you bother?
2) Domain specifically designed to segregate your business and make it harder to access. ("You know, for kids.")
3) Purely a business consideration: a certain amout of websurfing of naughty sites takes place at work. (I know! Whoda thunk it?) It's going to be terribly easy to block off the .xxx domain. (Which, to be sure, is part of the point.) One suspects -- just suspects -- that the drop in business for sites switching to the new domain would be, shall we say, noticeable. (The increase in subscriptions to high-speed cable and DSL would also be, shall we say, noticeable.)
To be sure, this isn't an administration policy, although I can't imagine that they're at all unhappy about it. But one does wonder how long it will be before the administration tries to make it mandatory for all US-based adult businesses -- or at least, all such adult businesses wanting to register new sites -- to move to that domain.
Ah, well. Here, have some entertainment.
Back in the not too distant past
When I would need a quick repast
Or a temporary break from my agenda
Up to the bedroom I would head
Pull out the Playboy from 'neath the bed
And sneak a peak at all the portraits of pudenda
My alternatives were slim
If I tried to find another source for sin
I'd have to hang out with the weirdos in the backroom of my local video store
But last month I finally made the call
I got a brand new cable modem installed
And it opened up the floodgates of a whole new universe of
INTERNET PORN
Internet porn... Roman orgy scenes
Internet porn... Dominatrix queens
Internet porn... Girl on girl on girl on girl on girl on guy on sheep
Internet porn... Gross anatomy
Internet porn... Pam and Tommy Lee
Internet porn... When you're given so much to choose from
who has time to sleep?
After my girlfriend goes to sleep
And I get out of bed and down the hall I creep
So I can hunker down and wallow in depravity until 3 or 4
You'll always find me in that same tableau
Silhouetted by my monitor's warm glow
And absorbing all the bounty from the cornocopia of
INTERNET PORN
Internet porn... Barely legal teens
Internet porn... Naughty figurines
Internet porn... Geriatric German grandmas spanking Spanish men
Internet porn... Erotic Asian art
Internet porn... Guys with extra parts
Internet porn... I don't think I'm ever going to see the sun again!
Internet porn... Melonlove.com
Internet porn... There's my neighbor's mom
Internet porn... Bikers wearing diapers chasing nurses dressed like smurfs
Internet porn... maison lec navage
Internet porn... Un, deux, trois, menage!
Internet porn... Every kind of smut from every corner of the earth!
(and now the search strings on this site will just get relentlessly entertaining, won't they?)
Posted by iain at June 02, 2005 03:16 PM
