The Elephant In The Library: Collection Development Or Censorship?

There is an elephant in the room and his name is Ian Wishart. I have watched the furore over Ian Wishart’s latest book Breaking Silence with a small amount of trepidation. I don’t think it is the death of free speech, seeing as no one is actually banning Wishart from publishing the book. As a free speech [...]

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Nethui. You should have been there. No really, you should have.

Webstock used to be my no-miss conference until this week. It’s like a combined rock festival and party for geeks – the learning and fun are intense and amazing. If Webstock was a keyword it would be “awesome”. Nethui was not a rock festival, and less of a party in terms of headiness. Yes, there were [...]

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Banned Book Week 2010

It is the American Library Association’s Banned Book Week, highlighting their continued fight against censorship. There are some familiar titles in the list and some new ones that surprised me. It would be interesting to see what books gather the most complaints in New Zealand libraries. Stephenie Meyer joins ranks of ‘most challenged’ authors by [...]

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Internet Filter Debate Merry-Go-Round

The announcement that two ISP’s have signed up to run their service through the new government filter service has led to some debate on the list serve about censorship. Previously myself, Sean and others have had a vigorous debate about the pro’s and con’s of censorship and filtering, in particular with regards to the act [...]

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Campaign for Censorship Reform

Today I just thought I’d bring your attention to Andrew Armitage’s appeal for changes to the Films, Videos and Publications Classification Act. Andrew is proprietor of the excellent Aro Video in Wellington. The stiff fees for classification of foreign movies in New Zealand impacts severely on the availability and supply of movies and documentaries.  The [...]

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