In an environment of hyper-growth and hyper-competition, with content from around the world just a click away, it's unlikely the South Korean government-proposed Web ratings system can keep people locked out of sites any more than content providers can keep people locked into their own sites if competing content “rates” more highly.
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The attack is similar to the highly publicized "denial of service" attacks earlier this year that overwhelmed the U.S. sites of Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO), eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY), Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN), E*Trade (Nasdaq: EGRP), and others.
In Seoul, a local Internet rights group, Progressive Network, is suspected by the ministry of having coordinated the attack to protest a proposed Internet ratings system. "The group has been suggesting online protests against the system and has been providing mass click-in programs to Internet users through its Web sites," a ministry spokesman said.
Progressive Network denies any involvement. "But we support in full whomever it was. It was a legitimate demonstration," a spokeswoman for the group said. She also said the group called off plans to launch a Monday click-in attack of its own following the Saturday attack.
The proposed government ratings system calls for website operators to indicate if their content would be harmful to young people, which would allow parents to lock out access to a site based on its rating.
High-growth, high-speed, and content
The protest comes against the backdrop of explosive growth in online usage in South Korea, where intense competition is driving down consumer access fees. South Koreans are also connecting at faster speeds: The country is the world's fastest-growing market for high-speed Internet service, with three times as many broadband users as the rest of Asia combined.
Former South Korean phone monopoly Korea Telecom (NYSE: KTC) is the largest provider of broadband Internet access in the country, with over 670,000 subscribers. Following behind are aggressive upstarts Hanaro Telecom (Nasdaq: HANA) and Korea Thrunet (Nasdaq: KOREA), with over 550,000 and 470,000 subscribers, respectively.
While competition is keeping costs down for users, the cost of providing these services is daunting. As with their counterparts in the U.S. and elsewhere, the South Korean companies have turned to providing content as a way of augmenting their services and, they hope, their revenue streams.
This strategy, however, puts them in competition with independent content providers, such as the companies behind the phenomenally popular iloveschool site, where 4 million South Koreans have registered to search for long-lost classmates. Of course, there's also competition from international online media networks such as CNET (Nasdaq: CNET), Lycos (Nasdaq: LCOS), and Yahoo!
The Korean telcos now not only need to get people connected to their networks, they also need to keep them clicked in to their content. A juggling act under any circumstance, it may become even more so if the South Korean government adds a layer of regulation to the content game, as its proposed Internet ratings system will do.
The Information and Communications Ministry is painting the new bill as "designed to promote self-regulatory measures of Web sites." But Progressive Network sees a different picture, and calls the "so-called voluntary ratings" a threat to individual freedom of expression, and an attempt by the government to exert "coercive control over the Internet."
However, in an environment of hyper-growth and hyper-competition, where content from around the world is just a click away, it's unlikely that a content ratings system -- wherever on the spectrum between government coercion and self-regulation it should fall -- can effectively keep people locked out of sites they want to in get in to, any more than content providers can keep people locked in to their own sites if competing content "rates" more highly.
Your Turn:
Do you think Web ratings systems are a good idea? Is self-regulation enough, or do governments have a role? And how does the global reach of the Internet influence all of this? Share your thoughts on the boards linked below.
Related Links:
Internet Security, Rule Maker Portfolio, 2/10/00
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