Time magazine’s cover story on cyberporn has become the=20 centrefold of a raging row over its ethics and=20 accuracy, reports Bruce Cohen
Accused of falling for a hoax of Hitler Diary =20 proportions, Time’s story is fuelling the growing=20 debate in the United States over censorship of on-line=20 services. Its Cyberporn issue is being waved across the=20 corridors of power by Congressmen and Senators who want=20 the Federal government to intervene.
Time’s story claimed to be based on an authoritative=20 Carnegie-Mellon University study of the Internet that=20 found that 87 percent of the imagery on the ‘Net was=20 pornographic; that this imagery was becoming=20 increasingly perverse; and that pornographers were=20 fine-tuning their output according to such detectable=20
What Time didn’t state was that this study was not=20 actually issued by the university. It was in fact an=20 undergraduate thesis written by electrical engineering=20 student Marty Rimm, who programmed a computer to scan=20 and count the number of files in the Internet alt.sex=20 newsgroups as well as non-Internet files on adult=20 Bulletin Boards (BBSes ) — which is like saying that=20 if pornographic magazines are sold in a corner=20 bookstore, they must therefore be on sale at every CNA.
This “authoritative” study was never peer-reviewed nor=20 given by Time to experts for comment prior to=20
The thesis has been roundly trashed by the academic=20 community. Professors Donna Hoffman and Tom Novak of =20 Vanderbilt University, acknowledged experts on the=20 Internet and statistical methodology, have called the=20 study “an outright fraud”. They have accused Time of=20 “irresponsible” and “reckless” handling of the report.
Time says, “There’s an awful lot of porn online,” but=20 Hoffman and Novak point out that Rimm’s own figures=20 suggest that the amount of pornography on the Internet=20 represents an extremely small percentage of the total=20 information available on the Internet. “Time further=20 neglects to clarify this by noting that the vast bulk=20 of Rimm’s study concerns files that reside exclusively=20 on adult BBSes. Very few of these BBSes are actually=20 connected to the Internet.
“Time supports the assertion by saying that “917 410=20 sexually explicit pictures, descriptions, short=20 stories, and film clips” were “surveyed”. However, the=20 professors retort that not one of these files came from=20 the Internet, but from the bulletin boards.
Time says that trading in sexually explicit imagery is=20 now “one of the largest (if not the largest)=20 recreational applications of users of computer=20 networks”. But the professors respond that there is=20 zero evidence for this statement – Rimm’s study doesn’t=20 even examine “trading behavior” on the Internet.
Time says that this material appears on a “public =20 network accessible to men, women, and children”=20 globally. But Hoffman and Novak point out that there is=20 no evidence that material from private, restricted- access adult BBSes ever makes its way to public=20 networks like the Internet.
Time notes that “1-million or 2–million people who=20 download pictures from the Internet represent a self- selected group with an interest in erotica”. The=20 professors say this figure is completely fictitious as=20 it is impossible to know how many people download=20 pictures from the Usenet news groups. Time provides no=20 reference for this figure, and the figure itself is not=20 mentioned in the Rimm report.
The story is creating huge ripples throughout the=20 Internet community. This week Wired — the cult=20 magazine of cyberspace — opened a special Internet=20 site — called Journoporn — devoted to criticism of=20 the Time story and inviting Internet users to=20 participate in the debate. (see Web Feet)=20
Wired also launched a scathing attack on Time and the=20 article’s author Philip Elmer-DeWitt.
‘In his lust for the cover, Elmer-DeWitt allowed=20 himself to be hoodwinked by an incompetent study that=20 he never shared with a single independent researcher,”=20 said Wired. Elmer-DeWitt’s piece was written with=20 typical mainstream puffery, presenting the=20 “significant” and “exhaustive” study, by “Carnegie=20 Melon” alongside a few skeptical remarks by critics who=20 never read it. But the problem is not with balance. The=20 problem is that none of Time’s main adjectives can be=20 truthfully applied to Rimm’s work, which is only=20 significant as an example of a major newsweekly=20 stepping in doo-doo and only exhaustive as a catalog of=20 statistical howlers.
Wired added: “Should we be dismayed that the nation’s=20 largest newsweekly could fall for a “scientific” study=20 so shoddy that it seems hardly distinguishable from a=20 hoax of the order of the Hitler Diaries and the=20 Piltdown Man? Or should we be filled with admiration=20 for a thirtysomething researcher whose first prankish=20 contribution to the annals of sociology made the whole=20 nation, including mother, blush?