Quote:
Originally Posted by TheDoc
Agreed... Problem I see though, is the average Webmaster - which is more exposed to hardcore porn - finds his content to be a bit to extreme.
The community would be at the tolerate point if the local porn stores also sell his movies or other similar hardcore related titles, and they are purchased. He sent these through mail - the Internet isn't in question.
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As I understand it, the Internet doesn't necessarily have to be involved in the way the indicted material was distributed for local community downloading and/or searching habits to be introduced as evidence of the pertinent community standard. Some judges allow such evidence under their interpretation of relevant case law, others do not. Unless I'm mistaken, in the case that I'm aware of that Jeffrey Douglas introduced search data as an exhibit, the material indicted was DVD content. (I'm pretty sure that's correct, because I don't believe that Jeffrey has been involved with any obscenity cases where the content was
strictly distributed via the Internet.)
Some judges will not even allow you to present evidence of what is for sale in local porn shops, btw -- the government typically argues that this is evidence merely of what is *available* in the community, and as such that information simply isn't probative with respect to what the community finds acceptable/tolerable, and some judges have concurred with that reasoning.
Personally, I think search/download data is more relevant than what is available in the local shops. Now, if lawyers could provide data on what material is actually being purchased and/or rented from those shops, that would be highly relevant, I should think. Naturally, my opinion on any of this means squat... somewhat less than squat, actually, since I'm no way qualified to assess the propriety of any judges' interpretation of the rules of evidence.