Adult computer game

COMBINED GUIDELINES FINALLY RELEASED FOR FILMS AND COMPUTER GAMES

Over a year after the State and Territory Censorship Ministers agreed to combine the review of the Guidelines for the Classification of Films and Videotapes and the Guidelines for the Classification of Computer Games, the Federal Attorney-General, Daryl Williams, has announced that from 30 March this year the Office of Film and Literature Classification will be classifying films and computer games using new combined guidelines. As he said at the launch last month:

These new guidelines are the first in the world to meet the challenge of classifying converging media, such as computer games with film components and DVDs with game components. They are easier for the OFLC's Classification Board to use and simpler and clearer for the Australian community to understand. But there has been no change to classification standards. This reflects the results of community consultations, which show there has been no significant change in community standards.

The language of the new guidelines is certainly simpler, but it also appears that they could produce more liberal interpretations, giving classifiers more leeway to make less conservative rulings on specific films and computer games; although this depends very much on the appointments to, and the make-up of, the Classification and Review Boards. However, for a while in this drawn out process the end result looked as if it would be quite different. After calling for and receiving over three hundred submissions from individuals, media industry organizations, government agencies, community organizations, religious organizations, consumers of adult video content and computer game players, the OFLC released its first draft of the guidelines, outlining a number of areas that were under consideration for substantial change, including further restrictions on the use of nudity, violence and drugs. A new clause even argued that the 'inappropriate use of substances that might damage health or are legally restricted to adults must not be promoted or encouraged' (surely an issue for public health authorities rather than classification). The draft guidelines also allowed the classification board to consider the likelihood of certain actions or events within a film being imitated inappropriately, especially by young children, in real life, such as the detailed portrayal of criminal or violent techniques, or actions which may promote illegal or dangerous behaviour. The degree of interactivity could also be used to assess the impact of a film or game, and therefore its classification. Many of these changes came from what was a seemingly sensible suggestion--the adoption of a single set of classification standards that would cover films, videos, DVDs, computer games, Internet content and CD-ROM films, and could lead to the possibility of an R rating for computer games.

Co-director of the Centre for New Media Research at Bond University, Dr Jeff Brand, analysed the draft guidelines and the further submissions that were received. He made a number of suggestions regarding specific areas, but decided that overall the submissions showed no real change in community standards. His strongest and most important recommendation was that there was a need to make the guidelines simpler, clearer and easier to use. The founding Director of the Centre for Plain Legal Language, Professor Peter Butt, then examined the redrafted guidelines to confirm that the reformatting had not changed the standards of each classification category and that they were easier to understand.

Under the cooperative national classifications scheme, the new combined guidelines were then approved by all State and Territory Ministers, but Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers declined to introduce an R18+ rating for computer games. (It is understood that only one state minister was against this recommendation, but, needing a unanimous vote, the new classification could not be introduced.) Currently, games warranting a classification higher than MA15+ are refused classification. However, games that would have attracted an R18+ rating are apparently available over the Internet.

The Commonwealth intends to review the operation of the new combined guidelines after the first twelve months of operation, to ensure they continue to reflect community standards.

Copies of the new guidelines are available on the OFLC web site www.oflc.gov.au.

CONFERENCE ON CONVERGENCE

In line with many of the issues that have emerged during this review process, the OFLC is holding a conference in Sydney in September this year. Entitled Classification in a Convergent World the conference will feature a number of papers and panel discussions on the classification and regulation of computer and video games, on Internet filtering, and on the challenges of convergence. Speakers include Robin Duval, Director of the British Board of Film Classification, Bill Hastings, NZ's Chief Censor, several members of Scandinavian classification boards, Australian filmmaker Rolf de Heer, a number of specialists from the USA and UK, and others. The conference sounds very interesting.

NED KELLY

Meanwhile last month, in response to an application from United International Pictures, the distributor of Ned Kelly (Jordan, 2003), against the initial classification of the film as M15+, a five-member panel of the Classification Review Board met and unanimously confirmed that the film should retain that classification, which carries the consumer advice 'Medium Level Violence and Adult Themes'. In the Review Board's opinion, the film warrants an M15+ classification because it contains material considered to be potentially, but not likely to be, harmful or disturbing to those under fifteen years of age. The impact of both the violence and adult themes was not sufficient to require a higher classification that would be legally restrictive. The distributors had obviously hoped to receive a less restrictive classification; Mike Selwyn, head of UIP, argued that the film-makers had gone to great lengths to avoid gratuitous violence, with any scenes of killing having been cut as tightly as was possible, while producer Tim Bevan said that the classification was a surprise, given that the film-makers and distributors had negotiated with the OFLC during editing to get an M rating.

PORN ON THE NET STUDY CALLS FOR MANDATORY FILTERING

In March this year, social and ethical think-tank, The Australia Institute, commenced campaigning for mandatory filtering of all Internet access by Australian Internet Service Providers (ISPs), on the basis of a Newspoll telephone survey of 200 16-17 year olds, and through the Institute's subsequent report Youth and Pornography in Australia: Evidence on the extent of exposure and likely effects, which gained wide and rather extravagant media coverage through a number of press, radio and television stories on the terrible risks posed to children by the Internet. The survey had reported that eighty-four per cent of boys and sixty per cent of girls in that age group have happened upon Internet sex sites, with thirty-eight per cent of boys (and only two per cent of girls) deliberately searching them out. Critics of the report argue that, with 100 boys and 100 girls, it's too small a sample to be reliable. It's hardly surprising, however, that 16-year-old boys have come across porn on the Internet (is it not the twenty-first century version of a Playboy under the mattress?).

Clive Hamilton, Executive Director of The Australia Institute and an environmental economist, has commented that, 'for all of the hype, the information superhighway is principally a conduit for pornography'. Given that opinion, it's not surprising that the Australia Institute is proposing a system that, to be effective, 'would block innocuous and educational information, infringe the privacy of Internet users, and ultimately require the Australian government to hand over censorship decision-making responsibilities to artificial intelligence and commercial enterprise', as is claimed by anti-censorship group Electronic Frontiers Australia. Peter Coroneos, head of the Internet Industry Association, says the report either deliberately or inadvertently fails to mention the substantial options already available for Internet users, with the big ISPs, Telstra, Optus, and Ozemail, and many smaller companies, offering filters and advice.