And , to agree with you... as I said elsewhere, if you want to operate illegally, why are those of you with the 'they'll never enforce it' viewpoint even bothering to contribute to this discussion?

The sheer ridiculousness of legislation has no bearing on its legality or your compliance.

That's not necessarily correct.
If you republish content that was produced before 1995 then that new publication is subject to the new rules and regulations surrounding 2257.

Now here's where it gets tricky. When is a web page published? Is it the date you uploaded it to the server? Or is it whenever someone downloads the page?

When someone accesses your webpage, your webserver sends them a copy of the page, basically republishing it, and your computer makes a new copy of the page on your hard drive.
So it can be argued that any web page(s) that are receiving any traffic are republished every day and hence will be subject to the new 2257 regulations.

I'm not making this up, the person at Justice in charge of this stuff (Osterban....not sure if I'm spelling his name right) holds this view of web publications.

:2 cents:

ok, you legal scholars, which of these two images need 2257?

which of the images are "lascivious"?

or are neither?

That's another one I think we need an actual legal opinion or 20 on, because you're correct, it's a gray definition as far as I can see, as well. Drawing inferentially on the comments they make about lenth of record-keeping after the cessation of production, I'd say you're right, but the actual wording of the exemption clause and the instructions for notation of exemption due to grandfathering lean the other way.

Heres one that I have never gotten clarity on.

If you host a non-explicit thumbnail or preview of a picture that links to an explicit version of the same picture hosted by someone else (for ex an affiliates site/hosted gallery) are 2257 docs required for YOUR thumbnail.

Some seem to think yes other no....

No matter how it goes, I know they are busy building prisons in Texas. As soon as they are ready, I'm sure they will fill them.......They always do.

Thanks Oberon :thumbsup

Technically they both would require 2257 due to TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 110 > § 2256 (1 e.)
Although they do not any form of intercourse, masturbation, or S&M (though I do personally believe viewing the 57 is a form of masochistic abuse) they do however depict lascivious exhibition of the pubic region. Using the legal deffinition of the word at least.

ok, take the girls off the couch, wipe those smiles off their faces, take the jewelry and makeup off them, and put them in a doctor's office background.

change the page title to "female images by age, external reproductive organs".

now do they need 2257?

you see how silly this is going to get?

So, to this point, areas of greyness I've identified that really need a legal opinion, or many legal opinions, from actual lawyers.

1. Content produced before 1995.... grandfathered as excluded...BUT... if you put it on a new web page, are you in effect publishing it anew, and then have to comply?

2. it says 'you can't be the record holder in the us and shoot a model with non-us id'..Now, being as elsewhere they've said secondary producers have no obligation to check the validity of primary producer info... Anyone located outside us can shoot anyone anywhere, and need gov't id to be legit...gov't id for the model from one presumes her country of residence...Since the primary record holder is then outside the US, no issue. Now, sell that content to a US company, and as a secondary producer they have no obligation to challenge the validity of the documentation, as far as I read. So.. can so any US company then use that content, they just cant be the primary producer? Or by being the 'record holder', are they barred from using it?


3. The definition of production date as applied to a webpage, which probably has legal precedent in copyright case law, if nothing else.

4. The definition of 'not able to control content' , which is an exclusion for things like google, but probably not BBS owners, and this one probably already has legal precedent..

5. The question of what, exactly, happens if as a non-compliant company based outside the US you make direct sales to US based consumers.

6. To what extent must a primary producer make the effort to track usage of the content by secondary producers and have records for that usage?

Affiliates
 

I have the addresses, so all I need to do now is get the records from all my sponsors. :helpme

Interesting thread on Sanitizing (removing info from) Id's

Neither does! That is the point I was trying to make with you the other night.

2257 says Now go read 2256

E is not included in the definition for purposes of 2257!

bump so we can see it all.

WOW, apparently you are correct. THANK YOU!!!!!!!

what a bunch of doubletalk: :Oh crap

it starts with this:

(2) ?sexually explicit conduct? means actual or simulated?
(A) sexual intercourse, including genital-genital, oral-genital, anal-genital, or oral-anal, whether between persons of the same or opposite sex;
(B) bestiality;
(C) masturbation;
(D) sadistic or masochistic abuse; or
(E) lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of any person;


and you dig deeper, and it clarifies with what you said:

(h) As used in this section?
(1) the term ?actual sexually explicit conduct? means actual but not simulated conduct as defined in subparagraphs (A) through (D) of paragraph (2) of section 2256 of this title;

no, wait.

from my reading it means "E" is inclusive of sexually explicit content. :(


same guys who wrote 2257 also write US tax code.

Explain because that is not how I read it. 2257 specifically says (A) through (D) if they wanted to include lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of any person they would have said (A) through (E)

Keep in mind 2256 is primarily used for definitions in child porn crimes, and that is why there is an E it doesn?t apply to adult porn IMO

my reading of it is that they specifically left (E) out because they know the word "lascivious" is usually an adjective, and subjective.

and because they left it out of the clarification i conclude that it is still inclusive in the category of "sexually explicit conduct".

maybe we can get 6 different attorneys to opine with 6 different opinions.

i'm not smart enough, i only have 6 years of college :Oh crap

ok, i see your point, i will go back to 2257 now. thanks.

Here glance at the chapter 110 index

http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/h..._I_20_110.html

That will give you an idea of how the definitions in 2256 apply to other things, and that is why it doesn?t seem to make sense if you assume the definitions found in 2256 are only there for 2257.

Ok how can I put this. We have spoken with three different attornies in regards to 2256, one had your opinion the other two had a different one. We decided to go with the different one since if we are wrong we are still right in the eyes of the law.
Now let me try to explain what they said.

You have the following:
(2) ?sexually explicit conduct? means actual or simulated?
(A) sexual intercourse, including genital-genital, oral-genital, anal-genital, or oral-anal, whether between persons of the same or opposite sex;
(B) bestiality;
(C) masturbation;
(D) sadistic or masochistic abuse; or
(E) lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area of any person;

Then further down you find this:

(h) As used in this section?
(1) the term ?actual sexually explicit conduct? means actual but not simulated conduct as defined in subparagraphs (A) through (D) of paragraph (2) of section 2256 of this title;

In 2257 is says "actual sexually explicit conduct" which is A-D if it is not simulated, since simulated is exempt. Which one attorney called this the Hollywood exemption clause since they are very prone to using this in movies without using (E). So we know that (A) through (D) are covered if its real. Now on to that pesky (E) which seems like it should not even belong here. (E) would not be simulated so it is always actual. The new regs do not use (A) through (D) like they did before and just say actual sexually explicit conduct.

We are just playing it safe though and more likely than not actual could have the same meaning as before and (E) would not be included, unless of course it needs an exemption statement.

Shit I think I even confused myself. Laws do that to you.

haha. thanks for clearing that up :Oh crap

BTW love you sig.

I think you are confusing the regulations which are found in the Code of Federal Regulations with the actual law itself 2257&2256 which is part of the United States Code. You are right the regulations don?t say A-D, but you have to understand what the regulations are. The regulations are supposed to be a clarification of the code. The regulations cannot change the definition of 2257 and 2257 states clearly A-D As I stated earlier those definitions in 2256 don?t just apply to 2257 they apply to child porn offenses, and that is where E comes from. If you are taking nude pictures of children and those pictures depict a lascivious exhibition of the genitals or pubic area it is considered child porn. The only way I could read 2257 as two of your attorney?s did would be to assume the 2256 definitions only applied to 2257, and then that E had to mean something.

While some of you may be correct in your assumptions that just using a thumbnail of the model's face or only using "softcore" material may put you outside the scope of the 2257 regulations, the counsel I have been given is "why take the chance?"

It's a gray area that isn't worth risking your freedom over. If you don't have the ID's then don't post the content....if you have old pages with content that you don't have the ID's for then take it down, because the definition of "publish" when referring to a web page is also another gray area.

If you publish a page today that has porn movies from 1982 on it, is it exempt? Depends on whether or not the DOJ is looking at the day the movie was made or the day your page was published.
If you uploaded the page a year ago and haven't changed it....is that when the page was published? Or was it published today when I downloaded it from your server and a "copy" was made of the page?

The safest bet is to take down anything you don't have ID's for, period, the end.
It's not worth risking 5 years of your freedom and afterwards living the life of a convicted felon.....don't try to get "cute" with the law.

I fully get what your saying. I also understand that 2256 applies to many other cases besides any that would originate from 2257. Our lawyer made it simple though since it was very grey. He said to apply 2257 to anything that is showing pink. This of course is beyond what is required but we would rather have to much than not enough.

I agree you can never go wrong with less risk, but I just wanted to clarify that what you were saying is not required by the code, I don?t even think I would call it a gray area as there is no case law on the matter, and the code (exempting e) has been that way for some time. Let me give you a couple of examples of what I think a gray area would be in regards to the definition of sexually explicit.

1. Say you publish a picture of a girl groping her own tits and she has her o face on. Could it be argued she was masturbating?
2. Say you publish a picture of a fully clothed girl or guy rubbing their crotch are they masturbating?

Problem was, there is no past case law on 2257 at all. It was never enforced.

Lenny, this is valid for those who in addition to non-2257 content, have extensive 'explicit content', like small paysite owners and such. But for affiliates running free sites -who simply cannot comply with this record-keeping law because of the size of their networks- it is much simpler to just replace the content. This is ALL the content these affiliates will have (and publish). If no 2257 content can be found anywhere, then they should be safe. Yes, this will require examining every single folder in each server and killing what is even borderline.

very valid questions.

this is the media age, and we need some practical, decisive answers on this sort of stuff simply because the stakes are high.

i will ask the hypothetical question again:

there are 10,000 public nudity sites on the net, colorado river, mardi gras, fantasy fest, nudes-a-poppin, sf gay freedom parade, etc etc.

no way in the world you can get 2257 docs on this stuff.

but it is public, thousands of people in the crowds, and hundreds, if not thousands of photographers.

and a girl on bourbon street up on the balcony turns around and pull her panties down and spreads her cheeks for a thousand adoring fans, and they've been doing this since the 1960's.

DO YOU NEED 2257?

and, IF you DO need 2257, what happened to the concept free speech in the USA?

Say you publish a picture of a girl groping her own tits and she has her o face on. Could it be argued she was masturbating?

If it can be argued, then, that masturbation only exists in your head as a projection of your own thoughts. She could as well be calling her cat.

An act of masturbation must be also explicit, according to the defintions used by the new regulations. If you don't see a pussy or you don't see a hand reaching a pussy, or dildo or anything that can unequivocally demonstrate an act of 'masturbation', then it may well not exist.

But I am not a lawyer.

They were hypothetical scenarios, but I don?t read anywhere in 2257, 2256 or the regulations where it says masturbation while clothed or masturbation by sensitive nipples is excluded from 2257 record keeping requirements. The definitions say merely a depiction of actual masturbation. I offer this merely as food for thought and to point out that essentially the AG can stretch the definition to include things most people wouldn?t think about.

How is everyone planning to keep these records? Anyone know of a script out there to help with this? I am sooooo glad that I have a Lot more non-explicit content then explict content on my servers, but I still have about 80 domains I have to go looking at to see what is what?

I am also curious on censored banners. It says actual or simulated, but if a banner has a big star over the private bits, does it fall under 2257?

That's why the lawyers get paid, because most politicians don't care about free speech or the constitution. Those in charge of the U.S. right now don't just dislike free speech, they hate it.

This law has never been tested at the Supreme Court. Who wants to be the first to take it there? :)

We're developing a software product to help manage the record keeping requirements. I have some screen shots up at http://www.manicproductions.com/komply/ and it should be going into beta before the end of the weekend.

It's something we started developing for in-house use and quickly decided to market to the masses since I think a lot of people are in the same boat as us (a lot of domains, even more sites and a shitload of content).

As for an opinion on the banner thing... I'm no lawyer, but we're going to go to just "non explicit" banners - rather be safe than sorry :)

http://www.manicproductions.com/komp...view_model.jpg

- CGI

My banners though are almost as bad as my content as far as all over the place. My later sites I have the banners on rotators, which I can easily change them out to non-explicit, but i've been building sites since 99 so some have the banners just embedded in the pages. :helpme

Thanks for the link on the script, I knew someone had to be coming out with something to make life easier on this one!

looks good. does it have a server scan feature?

Finally, one feature I didn't think to add (if you're referring to scanning the server for the content - the system will already spider the URLs where the content is published to archive a copy per the regs).

Because of the way the new regs read - the filenames for all of the content are already stored in the system so it will be trivial to add the ability to have it search servers for the content.

The software should be run on a machine at your business address in order to comply with the 2257 requirements (needs to be at your business address) so it will be done either with a script that runs on the server and is accessed remotely, or it will connect via ssh and scan the server that way (I'm leaning towards ssh due to the more secure nature).

The software will run on either UNIX or Windows and can run under an existing webserver install or, in the case of Windows, it provides it's own (using Apache+PHP+MySQL) as well as the few support files it needs (ImageMagick, wget, tar, gz).

Since this will makes our lives a lot easier, it's definatly high on the list of things to add.

- CGI

Silly question, but does this software also include printing options?

Of course.. you can print right from the record you're viewing, or tag records and export them to a PDF which you can download and print at will.

- CGI