Child pornography is despicable and illegal. But do you or don't you host a site which defends, through words only, the concept of child pornography?

You've already made up your mind? What if it is a respected psycho-something sex therapist who defends child pornography as a way for pedophiles to deal with their inclination and therefore prevent abuse? (Half-baked perhaps, but only a fer instance).

Osama bin Laden? A site which defends his actions? How about a site which lays out factually the circumstances which may have led to his actions? It's a very fine line, depending on how one interprets the circumstances.

Is it up to a host to decide what speech should be free, what not? How can anyone be an arbitor of ideas? Are there guidelines? Do you get a second opinion from some authority? Is it totally at a host's descretion, or if you take a site down are you liable to be sued? Has it been court tested?

Just curious how it works.

the basic question is does the host have the right to limit speach on his site.

Yes, as long as it is defined in the TOS / AUP.

but again there are even rules to that.

you got to define the tos real good otherwise the legal system will not protect you ( i forgot what it's call but it's a test to see how vuage your terms are ) the clasic catchalls don't really work.

Examples:
Porn is more or less defined within our industry as sexual content visual image.

but does the rules apply to a person that writes love stories that get very graphic in detail. ( mental image )

Hate speach, I think it's well defined in the legal system. But what do you do with a site that states I love osama bin laden. that's a line I hope never to have to cross because then I am forcing my view on a client ( under contract ) to remove his text.

the advantage is that if you are a monthly biller of your clients, you can advise your clients with a simple e-mail that you will not renue there hosting. anybody that offers yearly will have to stick with it.


AS a host I have certain rights, what the prudent host does is define those rights and enforces them. We can be the sole judge of what goes on our servers but we must tell the world of those conditions.

Our TOS prohibits any porn at all. 'Art' nudity comes under the heading of 'our discretion'. The statue of David for example shows full frontal nudity of a male figure, but is hardly porn. Kids in the same pose however would have us coming down like armegeddon on the customer. (account suspended, and sent to the FBI, along with any access log files they requested)

I'm not closed minded at all, and have no objection to 'legal' porn. It just won't be on our boxes for the trouble it causes.

Hate material, now it's been brought up may be a weakness in our TOS, as being overly broad. To date it's never come up so hasn't been an issue, but we'd probably look pretty closely at any site we host that's promoting hatred of any kind. While it comes under 'our descretion' they may be a legal hole in it.

As a personal choice? I'd probably authorize canning any site that hates for the sake of hating. There's enough trouble in the world without being one of the conduits for spreading more.

We run a loose ship as many customers would no doubt agree. We don't come down hard on anyone unless they stray from the bounds of the TOS, and cut many of them a break when needed. It's all about customer satisfaction rather than screwing them for a few bucks here and there. But there are limits... and the TOS outlines them. It's written with the average user in mind and respects that they may do this and that, that other people might crack down on, but at the end of the day, our box, our rules.

In difference to other thread on this forum, regarding suspension of accounts, unless we have a good reason, that we have proof of, suspension is unlikely, even through an ongoing investigation. But, if our staff sees something that's clearly in violation of what we state as acceptable material, then prepare for the full force of the suspend button to come into effect - you'll be 404'd before your head stops spinning.

What a lot of people may forget is, hosting companies have to rely a lot on judgement calls. We're as human as you are (for the most part), and decisions can sometimes be emotive. A good hosting company will try to look at it without personal bias, and think of legal ramifications for their actions, but that grey muck in our heads is going to make the decision one way or the other. Most of the time it's pretty clear cut:

"Hmm, naked children.. *hits suspend - e-mails FBI*"

"Hmm, spammer.. *deleted account*"

For those grey areas though you have to accept that the guy with the power to suspend may not see thing quite the same way as you do. Think of it as a landlord in an apartment block. Sometimes what's good for you, isn't good for the rest of the tenants.

Greg Moore