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30 Cap. U. L. Rev. 861 (2002)
United States v. Playboy Entertainment Group, Inc. - Sexually Explicit Signal Bleed and 505 of the CDA: Unable to Overcome Strict Scrutiny ... but Will Strict Scrutiny Be Abe to Overcome the Future

handle is hein.journals/capulr30 and id is 873 raw text is: UNITED STATES V. PLAYBOY ENTERTAINMENT GROUP, INC.-SEXUALLY EXPLICIT SIGNAL BLEED AND § 505 OF THE CDA: UNABLE TO OVERCOME STRICT SCRUTINY...BUT WILL STRICT SCRUTINY BE ABLE TO OVERCOME THE FUTURE? I. INTRODUCTION Sex. It seems to be everywhere. Sex is regularly featured in movies, daytime and primetime television programs, music, and advertisements. Many would argue that it is the sex and violence on television that is ruining the youth of America, desensitizing them and transforming them into deviants. Others would suggest that Americans are too uptight about human sexuality and greater exposure would cause Americans' attitudes toward sex to be more consistent with the attitudes of the rest of the world. Either way, the increased exposure of sex in American culture has everyone's attention, including members of Congress. Congress has been hard at work to limit or ban society's access to indecent, sexual speech in the name of protecting the youth of America.' It was in this vein that Congress enacted section 505 of the Communications Decency Act of .1996. Section 505 was designed to protect children from sexually explicit signal bleed; the partial reception of video images and/or audio sounds on a scrambled channel.3 Section 505 requires cable television providers that carry channels primarily dedicated to sexually-oriented or otherwise indecent programming to fully block the audio or video portions of the channel so that no cable subscriber receives it.4 Due to the overwhelming costs to cable providers to switch to consistently effective blocking technology,5 cable providers were forced to limit transmission of adult- oriented cable programming to the hours between 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. 6 Fortunately, the First Amendment poses a substantial barrier for overzealous legislators who seek to censor indecent speech based on the Copyright 0 2002, Craig L Leis I Sable Communications of Cal., Inc. v. FCC, 492 U.S. 115 (1989) (banning use of indecent speech in the dial-a-porn industry to protect children from exposure). 2 47 U.S.C. § 561 (Supp. III 1997). 3 Playboy Entm't. Group, Inc. v. United States, 30 F. Supp. 2d 702, 706 (D. Del. 1998). 4 47 U.S.C. § 561(a). 3 Playboy Entm't. Group, Inc., 30 F. Supp. 2d at 711. 6 ld. at 706; In re Implementation of Section 505 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, CS Dkt. No. 96-40, FCC 96-84, Order & Notice of Proposed Rulemaking amending 47 C.F.R. § 76 16.

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