Ireland is supposedly a Catholic country and I suppose it has managed to retain some of its “moral values”. Possibly more than other countries, although I doubt if all Irish people would subscribe as heartily to this ethos in the privacy of their own homes as they might like people to believe in public.
A couple of weeks ago a new TLD specifically for the adult industry was approved by ICANN – .xxx (hardly the most inventive of TLD denominations, but at least its intended audience is clearly defined).
Irish legislation is heavily influenced by Catholic and Christian values and anybody who denies that need only look to the Constitution to realise the error of their beliefs.
That this is the case is not surprising, nor is it an exception.
Other states have similar influences on their legislature. It is only countries, such as France, that have managed to truly separate Church and State (or more correctly Church from State).
For a number of reasons the topic of adult content in the Irish context has arisen a few times in the last few weeks, both in my conversations with industry colleagues and in more public fora.
Fergus Cassidy‘s most recent column makes reference to one of the IEDR’s more bizarre naming policies:
3.4: The proposed domain name must not be offensive or contrary to public policy or generally accepted principles of morality.
(see http://www.iedr.ie/NamingPolicy.php)
Irish law is based on common law principles, which means that the law is more than the statute books, but a combination of statutes, case law, precedent and interpretation.
It is not uncommon, therefore, to find tracts of “law” that leave a lot to be desired in terms of precision.
However, laws governing the state should not be confused with rules governing the registration of domain names.
Ambiguity and subjectivity are problematic and should be avoided.
Up until the late 90s it was not possible to buy a copy of Playboy magazine legally in Ireland.
In early 1992 there was a major scandal surrounding the distribution of contraceptives on Irish university campuses.
It is now 2005.
What has changed?
A lot.
Most newsagents stock Playboy and similar magazines in plain view, albeit on the top shelf.
Subscribers to Sky and other services can receive premium adult channels that leave little to the imagination.
Yet you cannot register porn.ie or hope to find an Irish hardcore website hosted in Ireland.
(Playboy.ie is registered by the way, though hustler.ie isn’t)
Why is that?
I know that we as a company would have problems if we were to host adult content on our network, but probably not from a legal point of view.
It would be more likely to cause issues with some of our other clients.
What exactly is the legislation covering this area?
It’s not too clear, and when I say that I am probably being generous.
This lack of clarity is problematic to say the least.
Although as a company I would not be in favour of us hosting hardcore porn or anything that could be interpreted as such, it would be preferable if the actual boundaries were defined clearly.
There have been discussions of this issue in the past, but they have all led nowhere, as the actual legislation itself is hard to follow.
For example, there are a couple of articles online that may act as starting points:
http://www.siliconweb.ie/webtalk/020899.shtml
http://www.ispai.ie/press.htm
However the articles are very old, and are not exactly comprehensive.
If anybody has any more recent legal references I would love to see them.
