Alec Helmys .XXX debutante ball was no party

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HOLLYWOOD, Calif. - Although XBiz Editor in Chief Tom Hymes instructed audience members to keep their questions "cordial and non-threatening," queries made to representatives and supporters of the proposed dot-xxx domain were anything but during the question-and-answer period at the Proposed .XXX TLD: A Dialogue with ICM Registry seminar.

The seminar got off to a quiet start, with Lawley taking on the myths and misunderstandings surrounding the much-opposed dot-xxx domain field. He defended the $60 registration fee ("It’s a matter of straight business and mathematics," he noted) by pointing out that other top-level domains regularly charge higher fees, and shot down the theory that any adult industry players stood to gain any profits from the TLD. "The company is 100 percent owned by the management team," Lawley claimed. "There are no outside investments and no secret deals."

Meanwhile, Balkam posited that dot-xxx will make it easier to keep porn out of households where adult content is not wanted by encouraging a "semantic Web" that would "make meta-data matter…We see it as an opportunity to hugely increase the amount of sites that are labeled [as being adult oriented], which will improve filtering systems," he offered, adding that the domain field would "reduce the fear and reduce the government from [interceding]."

These statements raised the ire of Piccionelli, who launched into a direct attack on dot-xxx, pointing out that "a lot of damage to free speech rights—including the 2257 regulations—has been under the guise of ‘protecting children.’

"At the heart is a political issue of keeping adult content away from children, but equally at heart are the freedom and rights of adults not to be sequestered into unfavorable speech [zones]," he continued. "You can take manure and put it in a gold frame, but all you’re left with is manure in a gold frame."

Piccionelli cited the Cyber Safety for Kids Act as proof that the government most likely would attempt to make dot-xxx mandatory for all adult webmasters and producers, and likened ICM’s pledges to keep registration voluntary to pledges made by men who say, "I promise I won’t come in your mouth."

"Adult content is unpopular speech," he went on to say, likening dot-xxx to the Motion Picture Association of America, which adversely affects the success of movies by bestowing upon them NC-17 or X ratings. He also proposed that "people not in the dot-xxx will be punished or singled out."

Perhaps the most powerful statement made during the Q&A period came from Free Speech Coalition Executive Director Diane Duke, who said she felt that—despite ICM’s claims that dot-xxx would be a tool for the adult industry—the TLD would become "a tool for the government."

"You’re asking us to sign on to something where the road is very hazy," she added. "As a businessman looking out for his own business interests, how can we be sure that you’re going to look out for the best interests of the adult industry?"

Sadly, that question was not answered during the seminar, and probably will not be resolved for some time.

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