Hoffman and Novak's Response to Rimm's "A Detailed Critique of A Detailed Critique of the TIME Article "On a Screen Near You: Cyberporn"

Rimm has prepared a response to the Hoffman and Novak critique of the Time "Cyberporn" cover article. Since posting the "Cyberporn Debate" page on the Project 2000 Web server, thousands of individuals have accessed the critiques. We urge all interested readers to now study Rimm's response. Below are our reactions.

• Mr. Rimm does not address the Hoffman and Novak critique of the Rimm study (only the critique of the Time cover article), nor the other posted expert critiques of his reseach.

• Mr. Rimm says "[i]t is peculiar that two business faculty from a well-known university would invest considerable effort in a non-reviewed, rushed manner attack [of] a study of computer pornography." Explaining the whys of bad research is important when one considers the statements being made by political officials who have read the Time cover story based upon Rimm's article. Our underlying goal is to promote electronic commerce on the many-to-many environment of the World Wide Web and its successors, and it is our fervent belief that a hysterical rush toward needless legislation of the Internet will hinder commercial investment and community and educational interests.

• Mr. Rimm continues to refer to his research as the "Carnegie Mellon study." Yet the study, and his response to the Hoffman and Novak Time critique, is single authored.

• Mr. Rimm attempts, throughout his remarks, to discredit Hoffman and Novak's credentials in an offensive and demeaning manner.

• Mr. Rimm attributes many of the statments made in the critique to Donna Hoffman alone, yet the critique is dual-authored by Hoffman and Novak.

• As of this writing (4:30 pm, CST, July 5, 1995) Rimm's study is not publicly available over the Internet.

note: Our reactions apply to the original version of Rimm's response, downloaded at 1pm, CST, July 5, 1995, and archived.