3 ms·

There is already lots of precedent that viewing a web page is making a copy. The law on child pornography is that it's only an offense to produce an image - sin

There is already lots of precedent that viewing a web page is making a copy. The law on child pornography is that it's only an offense to produce an image - since it's assumed that the person making the image is the one harming the child and banning reading/viewing something would have freedom of speech implications. There have been many convictions of people viewing images where the prosecution made the case that the browser had created an image (albeit a copy)

lotharbot 15y ago
> "The law on child pornography is that it's only an offense to produce an image" In the UK, "simple possession of indecent photographs of children" is a criminal offense [0]. US law is fairly similar [1]. [0] http://www.rogerdarlington.co.uk/sexonnet.html#UKlaw http://www.rogerdarlington.co.uk/sexonnet.html#UKlaw -- see Criminal Justice Act of 1988 [1] http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?LanguageCountry=en_US&PageId=1476 http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?L... -- part (b) of the first cited law
- SoftwareMaven 15y ago
  But the difference between possession and creation is very large.
sorbus 15y ago
The UK doesn't quite have a concept of freedom of speech, legally speaking. Freedom of expression is guaranteed by their Human Rights Act, but it has lots of limitations (incitement to racial/religious hatred, defamation), and there is illegal literature (mostly stuff relating to terrorism, but also "material that tend to deprave and corrupt those reading or viewing it")[1]. Therefor, I suspect that your mentions of legality may be specific to the USA; of course, if I'm wrong, I would love to be enlightened. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_by_country#United_Kingdom http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_by_country#Un...

3 ms·

There is already lots of precedent that viewing a web page is making a copy. The law on child pornography is that it's only an offense to produce an image - sin

by iuhyghjkl 15y ago

lotharbot 15y ago
> "The law on child pornography is that it's only an offense to produce an image" In the UK, "simple possession of indecent photographs of children" is a criminal offense [0]. US law is fairly similar [1]. [0] http://www.rogerdarlington.co.uk/sexonnet.html#UKlaw http://www.rogerdarlington.co.uk/sexonnet.html#UKlaw -- see Criminal Justice Act of 1988 [1] http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?LanguageCountry=en_US&PageId=1476 http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?L... -- part (b) of the first cited law
- SoftwareMaven 15y ago
  But the difference between possession and creation is very large.
sorbus 15y ago
The UK doesn't quite have a concept of freedom of speech, legally speaking. Freedom of expression is guaranteed by their Human Rights Act, but it has lots of limitations (incitement to racial/religious hatred, defamation), and there is illegal literature (mostly stuff relating to terrorism, but also "material that tend to deprave and corrupt those reading or viewing it")[1]. Therefor, I suspect that your mentions of legality may be specific to the USA; of course, if I'm wrong, I would love to be enlightened. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_by_country#United_Kingdom http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_by_country#Un...