1st Edition

Community, Space and Online Censorship Regulating Pornotopia

By Scott Beattie Copyright 2009
    284 Pages
    by Routledge

    284 Pages
    by Routledge

    Internet censorship is a controversial topic - while the media periodically sounds alarms at the dangers of online life, the uncontrollable nature of the internet makes any kind of pervasive regulatory control impossible. This book compares the Australian solution, a set of laws which have been criticized as being both draconian and ineffectual, to major regulatory systems in the UK and US and understanding what drives them. The 'impossibility' of internet regulation opens deeper issues - what do we mean by regulation and how do we judge the certainty and effectiveness of law? These questions lead to an exploration of the theories of legal geography which provide tools to understand and evaluate regulatory practices. The book will be a valuable guide for academics, students and policy makers working in media and censorship law, those from a civil liberties interest and people interested in internet theory generally.

    Chapter 1 Introduction: Classification Refused; Chapter 2 ‘Protect me from what I want’: Censorship and Internet Classification; Chapter 3 Co-regulation and Symbolic Policy: The Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Act 1999; Chapter 4 ‘Taking the Red Pill’: Cyberspace, Jurispace and the Architecture of Regulation; Chapter 5 Sexx Laws: The Spatial Strategies of Censorship; Chapter 6 Censorship, Power and Regulatory Communities;

    Biography

    Scott Beattie is a lecturer at the Victoria University School of Law and Co-director of the Communications Law Centre, a media law public interest body. His background is in university education and public policy work and he has worked in law reform both as a researcher and as a consultant. He has published a number of books on Media and Communications law.

    '...a fresh approach to understanding the processes of moral regulation in secular, pluralist, states. This is no mean feat. Focussing on the censorship of internet-delivered "porn", Beattie identifies metasomic processes whereby regulatory regimes persist over time despite radically changing justifications. This work offers unique insights. A richly thoughtful study, it is grounded in careful attention to state practice and interpreted through the lenses of contemporary social theory, spatiality, regulatory fortressing, and critical human geography.' W. Wesley Pue, University of British Columbia, Canada