In its three-page mission statement, ICRA officials identified the need for an organization such as FOSI based on what they call a “web 2.0 world,” which has dramatically changed Internet safety concerns.
“Should governments censor certain types of content or mandate the use of an adult label?” Reads the FOSI mission statement. “Or, can the international Internet industry rally around a comprehensive and cohesive set of policies, technologies and public education messages and demonstrate beyond and doubt, that it is capable of rising to the challenge of family protection?”
According to its mission statement, FOSI’s goal is to answer the latter question in the affirmative while working closely with content producers to protect rights of free expression around the globe.
In the meantime, the atmosphere for online labeling may be changing apart from FOSI’s planned efforts with the resurrection of a .XXX sTLD registry nearly eight months after the ICANN board shelved ICM Registry’s plan.
A Jan. 6 Associated Press report on the return of .XXX speculated that content labeling organizations such as ICRA and the soon-to-be-born FOSI, would play a key role in the administration and functionality of a proposed TLD for adult entertainment.
“Porn sites would have to participate in a self-descriptive labeling system, likely one from ICRA,” the report said.
In a Jan. 5 letter to ICANN Chairman Vinton Cerf, ICM President Stuart Lawley said that he would like to explore ways in which FOSI could work in conjunction with the International Foundation for Online Responsibility (IFFOR), which was originally established to handle policy issues for .XXX.
Lawley included the possibility that FOSI might manage IFFOR’s policy initiatives.
Adult entertainment attorney J.D. Obenberger told XBIZ this latest effort to resurrect .XXX is a step toward the creation of an online ghetto for adult entertainment at the expense of industry professionals who pioneered the infrastructure of the Internet.
“The ghettoization of the adult Internet brings us one step closer to the kind of governmental control over the Internet practiced by the People Republic of China and many steps away from the kind of liberty that we and our ancestors have always considered our birth right in a free country,” Obenberger said.
Obenberger added that attempts from outside of the adult industry to label websites are well meaning, but ill-conceived attempts that do nothing to protect children and families.
“Make no mistake, .XXX is a step toward censorship and thought control by government,” Obenberger said, adding that ICM’s actions “seek to line the registry’s pockets with money taken from the hard working members of adult entertainment.”
Brandon Shalton, who is working with the ASACP on a self-labeling project for adult entertainment — known as Restricted To Adults — told XBIZ that ICM’s move to try and align itself with FOSI is an attempt to buttress its case for .XXX this time around.
“ICRA [now FOSI] has a lot of big name clout behind it in terms of major companies and organizations,” Shalton said. “Bringing in that kind of support will likely help ICM address some of the complaints made by the international community when .XXX was shelved.”
The founding members of ICRA include AOL, Microsoft, AT&T, Cisco, Verizon and British Telecom.