🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <366sb1$6a9@uuneo.neosoft.com>,
Bruce Robertson <broberts@sam.neosoft.com> wrote:
> In article <tappd.11.00099EAF@sam.neosoft.com> Dan Tapp,
> tappd@sam.neosoft.com writes:
> >I mentioned to the folks at Neosoft that they should package a
> "parent-lock" 
> >account...just like their standard stuff, but the account owner could
> set the 
> >acceptable newsgroups at the server with a special password so that the
> client 
> >reader never saw them.  They expressed some minor interest
> 
> There's no simple way for a service provider to do this.  Nor anyone
> else, that I can see.
> 
> - Bruce Robertson, Senior Technical Editor
>    Network Computing Magazine, 713 546-6752

I'm surprised that a Senior TECHNICAL Editor at such a magazine
can't think of half a dozen ways to do this. Indeed it is
technically feasible to make a "safe space" on the Internet
for kids and in some ways it is almost a trivial thing to do.

As for justification, do we hold school classes on the streets
in a red light district or in a bar? No, we create a "safe space"
for youngsters and hold classes there, in the school.

The moderated newsgroup mechanism combined with controlled
feeds (somewhat like clari.*) could be easily adapted
to create newsgroups in which only registered people or
registered sites could post. This would merely involve
a bit of work with shell scripts or PERL scripts. 

Securing the Web or Gopherspace would be a little more challenging
but a start would be a modified Gopher or WWW client that
can only access authorised sites or sites registered with
a central authority.


cruisin' down the information highway, lookin' for a blast
breakin' all the speed limits as I come zoomin' past!
--
Michael Dillon                 Internet: mpdillon@halcyon.halcyon.com
C-4 Powerhouse                  Fidonet: 1:353/350
RR #2 Armstrong, BC  V0E 1B0      Voice: +1-604-546-8022
Canada                              BBS: +1-604-546-2705