Legislation proposed for blocking social software?

Yesterday I posted about a school in my region that has blocked the blogosphere from its district computers. Meanwhile, David Warlick wrote “You May Not Get to Read This Blog” in which he says “Because we still treat information as something that we can hide behind a wall, and we continue to teach that way to our children, they do not realize the dangers that their information represents to their personal safety and future well being.”

Also in this post he links to “Censored for Violence” in Wesley Fryer’s “Moving at the Speed of Creativity” in which he says “Simply put, because as educators we should strive to remain relevant to students and engaged in their development of literacy skills. Social networking websites are going to continue to grow FAST in the months and years to come. We need to help students make better decisions about the information they share about themselves online, in MySpace and elswhere. In some cases, it is hard to speak intelligently about something if you have little personal experience about it yourself.”

Tonight when I went back to the Warlick post to write about it, I find that David has added additional information from Andy Carvin (who writes "Learning Now" on PBS Teacher Source) that makes my blood run cold. “New Federal Legislation Would Ban Online Social Networks in Schools and Libraries.”

Carvin states that proposed legislation “would update the federal law that currently requires all schools and libraries receiving federal E-Rate money (the government program that subsidizes the cost of Internet access) to filter inappropriate websites. The amendment to the law would be even more specific, restricting access to interactive online communities.” He (and others who comment on his post) compare this development to COPA.

Will it never end?