Censoring Internet Content
https://archivesbb.nbclearn.com/portal/site/BbHigherEd/browse/?cuecard=46161
General Information
Source:
Creator:
Event Date:
Air/Publish Date:
NBC Today Show
Lester Holt/Peter
Alexander
01/06/2007
01/06/2007
Resource Type:
Copyright:
Copyright Date:
Clip Length
Video
NBCUniversal Media,
LLC.
2007
5:55
Description
Some videos appearing on the internet can be graphic and unsuitable. NBC explores the question about
whether internet videos should be screened by an authority before they are posted.
Keywords
Citizen, Journalism, Children, Editorial, Censorship, Parents, Educate, Youtube.com, Google.com,
myspace, Social Networking, Viral, World Wide Web, Internet, Standards, Saddam Hussein, Regulation,
Stunts, Citizen Journalism, User Generated, Cyber Moms
Citation
MLA
"Censoring Internet Content." Peter Alexander, correspondent. NBC Today Show. NBCUniversal Media.
6 Jan. 2007. NBC Learn. Web. 23 October 2015
APA
Alexander, P. (Reporter), & Holt, L. (Anchor). 2007, January 6. Censoring Internet Content. [Television
© 2008-2015 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Page 1 of 5
series episode]. NBC Today Show. Retrieved from
https://archivesbb.nbclearn.com/portal/site/BbHigherEd/browse/?cuecard=46161
CHICAGO MANUAL OF STYLE
"Censoring Internet Content" NBC Today Show, New York, NY: NBC Universal, 01/06/2007. Accessed
Fri Oct 23 2015 from NBC Learn:
https://archivesbb.nbclearn.com/portal/site/BbHigherEd/browse/?cuecard=46161
Transcript
Censoring Internet Content
LESTER HOLT, co-host:
In the days that followed the execution of Saddam Hussein, millions
headed to the Internet to watch a grainy cell phone recording of his
death. With no restrictions and little regulation, the Worldwide Web has
become the place to post and watch video, but is that always a good
thing? Here's NBC's Peter Alexander.
PETER ALEXANDER reporting:
Sergio Poliko was just 10 years old, too young to understand the dangers
of apparently trying to imitate the execution of Saddam Hussein. After
watching news reports on TV, the Texas fifth grader accidentally hanged
himself while on his bunk bed. This shaky cell phone video offers a
grainy and graphic glimpse of the death of a dictator. The major news
networks, including NBC News, stopped short of showing the actual
execution, but just a week after Saddam's death more than 10 million
people have gone online to watch the unedited version.
Mr. JEFFREY COLE (USC Center for the Digital Future): The only surprising
thing about the Saddam execution being a big hit is that anybody would
have been surprised.
ALEXANDER: So what's behind this morbid curiosity?
Mr. JACK LEVIN (Northeastern University): The more grotesque and
extraordinary an act of violence is, the more appealing it is to the
general public.
ALEXANDER: The gruesome fascination has spread worldwide. Consider this
example: Pakistani police say a nine-year-old boy hanged himself after
trying to imitate scenes he'd watched of Saddam's execution. While the
mainstream media sets limits and standards for what it'll show, the Web
is its own unregulated world, where once forbidden clips are now
available to anyone. From the barbaric death of 26-year-old Nick Berg to the racy clips of a celebrity sex
© 2008-2015 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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life.
Mr. COLE: this stuff is on the
Internet, it's going to be seen, and we're going to have to figure out
how to deal with it.
ALEXANDER: Many Iraqis and Americans wanted Saddam to be executed in
public. Thanks to a cell phone and the Internet, he was. For TODAY, Peter
Alexander, NBC News, Los Angeles.
HOLT: Here to talk more about the good and bad that can come with the
click of a mouse, Omar Wasow, an Internet analyst, and Art Wolinsky, the
educational technology director for Wired Safety.
And, gentlemen, good morning. Thanks for being here.
Mr. ART WOLINSKY (WiredSafety.org): Thanks for having me.
Mr. OMAR WASOW (Internet Analyst): Good morning.
HOLT: Omar, let me start with you just to set the table. A few weeks ago,
time magazine says Person of the Year is You, "you" meaning all of us,
because with a computer and a camera, we can become our own video
journalist. But are we seeing the down side of this now, this unfiltered,
unedited access?
Mr. WASOW: I don't think we're seeing the down side. I mean, I think
clearly with freedom comes responsibility, but there are enormous
benefits to this, whether you're talking about the documentation of Abu
Ghraib or even going back before the Internet to things like the
documentation of the beating of Rodney King, this kind of user-generated,
you know, citizen journalism really has, I think, important value. And
the fact that there's all this sort of silly stuff, you know, car chases
and people flipping over on their motorcycles, I think it's really just
kind of a distraction.
HOLT: But what about the protection of children? Obviously what goes on a
broadcast program like this has gone through an editorial filtering. We
mentioned the hanging and what was seen on TV vs what was seen on the
Web. Is there not some responsibility somewhere among--for someone to
police what kids can get to?
Mr. WASOW: Well, I'd like to make two points, right? So first is, you
know, the place most of us have seen the car chases and all sorts of
crazy stuff is on TV. You know, NBC maybe with its news expressing
editorial discretion, but you can turn on MTV, you can watch "Jackass,"
you can go to the movies and see lots of stuff far more egregious. But to
the other part of your question, clearly individuals need to take
responsibility and families need to take responsibility.
© 2008-2015 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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HOLT: And, Art, we've taken up the middle man is what's happening here.
Again, there's no editorial filter on the Web. I know you stop short of
out-and-out censorship...
Mr. WOLINSKY: Right.
HOLT: ...but what would you advocate?
Mr. WOLINSKY: Oh, I'd advocate the fact that we need to have certain
amount of guidance from parents. We have to educate the parents. We have
to help the industry to regulate itself. The big people like
YouTube--Google and YouTube are working with us right now to come up with
ways of handling abuse. They have taken a certain amount of editorial
discretion in what they're doing. They're not putting up everything. They
don't accept sex and things like that.
HOLT: Is part of the issue that we as grownups don't know as much about
the Internet as our kids? Social networking, MySpace, I hear about all
these things, I couldn't navigate that if you paid me a million dollars.
Mr. WOLINSKY: That is the huge part of it. We're in an unusual time in
history where the kids are living an in an entirely different world. The
only time this has happened before is at the turn-of-the-century when the
kids knew the language, the kids were doing all the things, so the
parents had no clue what was going on, they were depending upon the kids.
Now the kids today are living in a world that's unregulated, and they
need to be able to get that adult guidance to help them deal with that
world. One of the things we're doing next month is we're announcing
cybermoms, where we're looking to build an army of cybermoms online,
using social networks, getting moms using the social networks so that
they can understand what's going on, they can deal with it, they can
begin policing, they can begin talking to the kids.
HOLT: And let me ask Omar, to what extent is what we're seeing on the
Internet going to drive everything else? Now, will this drive what I do
for a living, what we see in movies, what we see on other television
outlets?
Mr. WASOW: Well, we saw it on the package before this, right? There's
footage that you wouldn't have seen on NBC News prior to this stuff being
shown on the Web. So, absolutely. You saw it with President Clinton,
that--when the Drudge Report posted about Monica Lewinsky, that became,
you know, publishable in the mainstream news. So it absolutely is
changing standards in mainstream media, but I also think mainstream media
has been pushing the boundaries for a long time, too.
HOLT: All right. Good discussion, gentleman. Thanks so much, Omar Wasow
© 2008-2015 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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and Art Wolinsky, appreciate you being here.
Mr. WOLINSKY: Thank you.
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© 2008-2015 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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