She should know better, then - one of the things they taught us in my library school is that you can quote legal findings to someone, but that you should always ALWAYS let people know that you're not a lawyer and that they should refer to a lawyer for a definitive answer on legal questions. (Something the idiots over at LJ obviously haven't been doing, or else the lawyer that they've got found his license in a cereal box made by the MPAA and RIAA.)
The only thing that might excuse her presumption is if she was trained in law librarianship, or if she was a lawyer/paralegal before getting into librarianship. (Not as unusual as you'd think, but she looks a bit young for that to be her second career.)
LJ's take on this seems to be that they're worried about becoming accessories after the fact, due to the simple knowledge that there's something of *ahem* dubious legality going on over their servers. This despite the fact that their own policy basically says, "If you are caught doing/showing/etc anything illegal we will leave you twisting in the wind 'cause it ain't our fault." Now, if people were showing photos of little kids being molested, they'd be justified in calling the cops on the people in question. If there was a comm, even a locked one, that was reported as being the center of a pedophile ring, I'd have no objections to them giving the cops access to said comm and providing the information to shut the bastards down. But a drawing of a fictional character fucking another fictional character who appears to be of age (and from what I hear, was describes as such in the artist's comments, although I didn't see that part myself) is a very fuzzy grey area which the company shouldn't have any problems covering their asses legally on. I've seen the pic that got Ponderosa banned, and while it was extremely graphic even by my standards, I know it was posted as being such in an adults-only comm, and HP didn't look a day under 18 to this gal.
Add to that the fact that they can't seem to figure out what they banned Pond for (was it because it was "lacking artistic merit" or not? were they covering their asses legally, and if so what did they think they were going to get charged with?) and the company image that they're projecting right now is one of indecisiveness, incoherency, incompetence and possibly even bigotry.
no subject
Date: 9 Aug 2007 05:27 pm (UTC)The only thing that might excuse her presumption is if she was trained in law librarianship, or if she was a lawyer/paralegal before getting into librarianship. (Not as unusual as you'd think, but she looks a bit young for that to be her second career.)
LJ's take on this seems to be that they're worried about becoming accessories after the fact, due to the simple knowledge that there's something of *ahem* dubious legality going on over their servers. This despite the fact that their own policy basically says, "If you are caught doing/showing/etc anything illegal we will leave you twisting in the wind 'cause it ain't our fault." Now, if people were showing photos of little kids being molested, they'd be justified in calling the cops on the people in question. If there was a comm, even a locked one, that was reported as being the center of a pedophile ring, I'd have no objections to them giving the cops access to said comm and providing the information to shut the bastards down. But a drawing of a fictional character fucking another fictional character who appears to be of age (and from what I hear, was describes as such in the artist's comments, although I didn't see that part myself) is a very fuzzy grey area which the company shouldn't have any problems covering their asses legally on. I've seen the pic that got Ponderosa banned, and while it was extremely graphic even by my standards, I know it was posted as being such in an adults-only comm, and HP didn't look a day under 18 to this gal.
Add to that the fact that they can't seem to figure out what they banned Pond for (was it because it was "lacking artistic merit" or not? were they covering their asses legally, and if so what did they think they were going to get charged with?) and the company image that they're projecting right now is one of indecisiveness, incoherency, incompetence and possibly even bigotry.