[ICANN-EU] Answers to questions by Ralf Moebius

["Constantine S. Chassapis" <cschassapis@acm.org>]

From: Ralf Möbius <ralfmoebius@freenet.de>
To: <icann-candidates@egroups.com>; <icann-europe@fitug.de>
Sent: Friday, August 25, 2000 11:44 AM
Subject: [ICANN-EU] Date: Fri, 25 Aug 2000 10:48:56 +0200


> Good morning,

Good morning to you too,

> after a long discussion about democracy and the dangers of political and
> industrial domination of the net, I would like to ask you a few qestions
> about internet and censorship.

> 1. Do you think there should be a general censorship in the www, filtering
> certain contents ?

no!

>
> 2. If so, isn`t the danger of censorship higher than any influence of
> extremist contents?

Yes, the danger of censorship is the highest. The essense of democracy, is
not the "vote" as someone put it, but fair play (and that induces the "vote"
story). Fair play means, you allow anyone to play, to speak that is,
including the ones whom you disagree with!

>
> 3. Isn`t it sufficient, that the criminal law and terms of resposibility
for
> web-contents of each country ensure that contents in the net follow a
> minimum standard of what we call civilization?

Yes. Even if somethings are allowed in some countries and simultaneously
not allowed in others. The Internet will transform society! You must not
apply old tools to the new medium. If there is something globally bad, like
child pornography, then I am certain that all "civilized" countries will
rightfuly attack it, through local laws, which will become global if applied
by all countries. You must not apply censorship to the medium Internet.

> Best regards, Ralf Möbius.

Best Regards,
Constantine Chassapis