Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
#12
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
I don't like the California legislature banning any kind of hunting, the way those folks operate it'll become a habit. The State was a whole lot better off when they only met once every TWO years. While I don't much care for shooting game over the net, what do we do about those fellahs who've been made parapalegics after they became hunters? [X(]
#13
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: PA
Posts: 50
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
ORIGINAL: jones123
Is this correct? I understood he was planning to go from his present target shooting to real animal shooting, but had not yet done so. Texas is also trying to stop him through legislation.
Edit - I just went to his site and as best I could tell, there is no animal shooting yet. Guess I can take off my smelly camo & boots and get back into my polyester for some more internet dating.
Is this correct? I understood he was planning to go from his present target shooting to real animal shooting, but had not yet done so. Texas is also trying to stop him through legislation.
Edit - I just went to his site and as best I could tell, there is no animal shooting yet. Guess I can take off my smelly camo & boots and get back into my polyester for some more internet dating.
Which I'm glad about because I personally don't like this at all..
#14
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: PA
Posts: 50
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
Here is the article:
LIVE-SHOT IS THE TARGET OF CRITICAL FIRE - Boston Globe - Apr 18, 2005
For the first time, a computer game is on the verge of being outlawed.
The game is called Live-Shot, and it has generated such a storm of outrage that legislators in Congress and 17 states are scrambling to pass laws against it.
It's hard to imagine a ban on any computer game, no matter how shocking. After all, savagely violent games like Grand Theft Auto are nowadays considered mainstream fare. How could Live-Shot possibly be worse?
By using live victims, such as deer, sheep, and antelope. In Live- Shot, the players don't try to kill digital aliens or even digital police officers, but living, breathing wildlife. They haven't actually killed any yet; the first Live-Shot hunt, held this month, was a bust. But the mere idea of using the Internet for bouts of long-distance bloodletting has unleashed nationwide fury.
John Lockwood, the game's inventor, doesn't get it. To Lockwood, Live-Shot is a logical extension of the way he's hunted all his life. It's also a way to help disabled people discover the thrill of hunting. But to an unusual coalition of animal rights activists and hunters, Live-Shot is sacrilege, an appalling exercise in remote- control slaughter.
An employee of an auto body shop in San Antonio, Lockwood is an avid hunter who shot his first deer at age 9. He and a friend came up with the idea for Live-Shot after visiting the website of a landowner who put video cameras on his land. Visitors to the site could engage in "hunts" by waiting until an animal came within range of the camera, then saving the image and e-mailing it to the landowner. Each picture of an animal was credited as a successful hunt.
Lockwood recalled that "one of the guys here at work with me, an avid hunter, said, `I wonder if he's going to put a gun with that?' And it just clicked. So I did it."
Lockwood bought a computer and a motorized camera mount of the kind used for closed-circuit security cameras. He attached a hunting rifle, a gunsight-mounted video camera, and a device that trips the gun's trigger when it receives a digital command from the computer. He set up the rig on his friend's 300-acre spread near San Antonio, which is stocked with wildlife for hunting. Then he connected the computer-controlled rifle to the Internet, and Live-Shot was born.
Live-Shot isn't just for hunting animals. For $5.95, you can schedule a session of target shooting. Players get 10 shots at an inanimate target. "We have balloons that pop, paper targets that change color," Lockwood said. "Nobody seems to have a problem with shooting targets over the Internet."
But then Lockwood took his idea one step further. Why not let visitors pay $150 to take a shot at an animal? Lockwood does most of his hunting from a "deer stand," a fixed location where the hunter waits until an unsuspecting animal strolls into range. Why not apply the same principle to Internet hunting? Just set up the rifle in an area frequented by game animals and let the hunt begin.
And the controversy.
When Lockwood began to publicize his Live-Shot business, he expected bitter denunciations from animal-rights groups, and he was not disappointed.
"It amounts to a snuff film scenario, pay-per-view slaughter," said Michael Markarian, executive vice president of the Humane Society of the United States. "It makes it too easy for people to be able to engage in this behavior. It's like ordering a jacket from L.L. Bean."
What Lockwood didn't count on was the equally vehement opposition from hunting organizations.
It turns out that many traditional hunters think that picking off animals by remote control is a disgraceful parody of real hunting. "We think hunting was intended to be an outdoor activity," said Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs at the National Rifle Association. "We're really not in support of this concept."
John Monson, president of Safari Club International, an Arizona- based sporting group, went even further. Monson said his group would favor legislation to ban Internet-based hunting altogether. "This is not hunting," Monson said.
For years, efforts to ban violent video games have fizzled out. Not this time. Three states have already outlawed the Live-Shot concept Virginia, West Virginia, and Tennessee. Texas, Lockwood's own state, is working on a bill to put him out of business.
Hunters and animal rights activists fear that a similar company could be launched in another state without an online hunting ban.
Not if Republican Virginia congressman Tom Davis has his way. He's put forward a bill that would establish a nationwide ban on Internet hunting. "Why should someone be able to point, click, and kill?" Davis said. "It's not sporting, and it's certainly not `hunting' in the true sense of the word."
The furor has frustrated Lockwood, who sees nothing irrational or immoral about Live-Shot.
"I liken it to somebody's phobia of spiders," he said. "They don't understand what good it can do, so they have an irrational fear."
Lockwood thinks he's already done a little good. Live-Shot held its first live hunt this month. The hunter, Dale Hagberg of Ligonier, Ind., was an avid hunter until he was paralyzed in an accident 17 years ago. Live-Shot gave him a chance to bag one more animal. He didn't; no animals came within range of his gun.
Lockwood said that Live-Shot was created for people like Hagberg. He also wanted to reach out to active-duty US military personnel overseas. "They miss hunting and would like to take some time to do it."
Maybe so. But they'd better move fast, while Live-Shot is still legal.
For the first time, a computer game is on the verge of being outlawed.
The game is called Live-Shot, and it has generated such a storm of outrage that legislators in Congress and 17 states are scrambling to pass laws against it.
It's hard to imagine a ban on any computer game, no matter how shocking. After all, savagely violent games like Grand Theft Auto are nowadays considered mainstream fare. How could Live-Shot possibly be worse?
By using live victims, such as deer, sheep, and antelope. In Live- Shot, the players don't try to kill digital aliens or even digital police officers, but living, breathing wildlife. They haven't actually killed any yet; the first Live-Shot hunt, held this month, was a bust. But the mere idea of using the Internet for bouts of long-distance bloodletting has unleashed nationwide fury.
John Lockwood, the game's inventor, doesn't get it. To Lockwood, Live-Shot is a logical extension of the way he's hunted all his life. It's also a way to help disabled people discover the thrill of hunting. But to an unusual coalition of animal rights activists and hunters, Live-Shot is sacrilege, an appalling exercise in remote- control slaughter.
An employee of an auto body shop in San Antonio, Lockwood is an avid hunter who shot his first deer at age 9. He and a friend came up with the idea for Live-Shot after visiting the website of a landowner who put video cameras on his land. Visitors to the site could engage in "hunts" by waiting until an animal came within range of the camera, then saving the image and e-mailing it to the landowner. Each picture of an animal was credited as a successful hunt.
Lockwood recalled that "one of the guys here at work with me, an avid hunter, said, `I wonder if he's going to put a gun with that?' And it just clicked. So I did it."
Lockwood bought a computer and a motorized camera mount of the kind used for closed-circuit security cameras. He attached a hunting rifle, a gunsight-mounted video camera, and a device that trips the gun's trigger when it receives a digital command from the computer. He set up the rig on his friend's 300-acre spread near San Antonio, which is stocked with wildlife for hunting. Then he connected the computer-controlled rifle to the Internet, and Live-Shot was born.
Live-Shot isn't just for hunting animals. For $5.95, you can schedule a session of target shooting. Players get 10 shots at an inanimate target. "We have balloons that pop, paper targets that change color," Lockwood said. "Nobody seems to have a problem with shooting targets over the Internet."
But then Lockwood took his idea one step further. Why not let visitors pay $150 to take a shot at an animal? Lockwood does most of his hunting from a "deer stand," a fixed location where the hunter waits until an unsuspecting animal strolls into range. Why not apply the same principle to Internet hunting? Just set up the rifle in an area frequented by game animals and let the hunt begin.
And the controversy.
When Lockwood began to publicize his Live-Shot business, he expected bitter denunciations from animal-rights groups, and he was not disappointed.
"It amounts to a snuff film scenario, pay-per-view slaughter," said Michael Markarian, executive vice president of the Humane Society of the United States. "It makes it too easy for people to be able to engage in this behavior. It's like ordering a jacket from L.L. Bean."
What Lockwood didn't count on was the equally vehement opposition from hunting organizations.
It turns out that many traditional hunters think that picking off animals by remote control is a disgraceful parody of real hunting. "We think hunting was intended to be an outdoor activity," said Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs at the National Rifle Association. "We're really not in support of this concept."
John Monson, president of Safari Club International, an Arizona- based sporting group, went even further. Monson said his group would favor legislation to ban Internet-based hunting altogether. "This is not hunting," Monson said.
For years, efforts to ban violent video games have fizzled out. Not this time. Three states have already outlawed the Live-Shot concept Virginia, West Virginia, and Tennessee. Texas, Lockwood's own state, is working on a bill to put him out of business.
Hunters and animal rights activists fear that a similar company could be launched in another state without an online hunting ban.
Not if Republican Virginia congressman Tom Davis has his way. He's put forward a bill that would establish a nationwide ban on Internet hunting. "Why should someone be able to point, click, and kill?" Davis said. "It's not sporting, and it's certainly not `hunting' in the true sense of the word."
The furor has frustrated Lockwood, who sees nothing irrational or immoral about Live-Shot.
"I liken it to somebody's phobia of spiders," he said. "They don't understand what good it can do, so they have an irrational fear."
Lockwood thinks he's already done a little good. Live-Shot held its first live hunt this month. The hunter, Dale Hagberg of Ligonier, Ind., was an avid hunter until he was paralyzed in an accident 17 years ago. Live-Shot gave him a chance to bag one more animal. He didn't; no animals came within range of his gun.
Lockwood said that Live-Shot was created for people like Hagberg. He also wanted to reach out to active-duty US military personnel overseas. "They miss hunting and would like to take some time to do it."
Maybe so. But they'd better move fast, while Live-Shot is still legal.
#15
Giant Nontypical
Join Date: Dec 2004
Location: Ohio
Posts: 7,876
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
ORIGINAL: Slamfire
I don't like the California legislature banning any kind of hunting, the way those folks operate it'll become a habit. The State was a whole lot better off when they only met once every TWO years. While I don't much care for shooting game over the net, what do we do about those fellahs who've been made parapalegics after they became hunters? [X(]
I don't like the California legislature banning any kind of hunting, the way those folks operate it'll become a habit. The State was a whole lot better off when they only met once every TWO years. While I don't much care for shooting game over the net, what do we do about those fellahs who've been made parapalegics after they became hunters? [X(]
Let a man again put meat in his freezer for his family. Some people will never understand this.
#17
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Posts: 618
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
I certainly don't mean to offend any disabled hunters we may have on this site, but would you really get pleasure out of shooting an animal from your home.... over a computer?
I know people keep pushing the argument of, well, what are disabled hunters supposed to do or how are they supposed to hunt, but this isn't hunting. I for one enjoy being in the outdoors with my friends and family more than the process of shooting something, but I guess that's just me.
I know people keep pushing the argument of, well, what are disabled hunters supposed to do or how are they supposed to hunt, but this isn't hunting. I for one enjoy being in the outdoors with my friends and family more than the process of shooting something, but I guess that's just me.
#18
Nontypical Buck
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: collin county, TX
Posts: 2,320
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
Regulation of hunting has been necesarry for decades. As technology
advances so too will restrictions. This is how it has been in my lifetime. And I think that is a good thing. I agree it is unfortunate (to put it mildly)
some people may never be able to enjoy the thrill of the chase or even
just the great outdoors. But to sanction the remote killing of game animals is a step in the wrong direction.
PKnTX
advances so too will restrictions. This is how it has been in my lifetime. And I think that is a good thing. I agree it is unfortunate (to put it mildly)
some people may never be able to enjoy the thrill of the chase or even
just the great outdoors. But to sanction the remote killing of game animals is a step in the wrong direction.
PKnTX
#19
RE: Calif. lawmakers vote to ban Internet hunting
ORIGINAL: minnesotahunter
I certainly don't mean to offend any disabled hunters we may have on this site, but would you really get pleasure out of shooting an animal from your home.... over a computer?
I know people keep pushing the argument of, well, what are disabled hunters supposed to do or how are they supposed to hunt, but this isn't hunting. I for one enjoy being in the outdoors with my friends and family more than the process of shooting something, but I guess that's just me.
I certainly don't mean to offend any disabled hunters we may have on this site, but would you really get pleasure out of shooting an animal from your home.... over a computer?
I know people keep pushing the argument of, well, what are disabled hunters supposed to do or how are they supposed to hunt, but this isn't hunting. I for one enjoy being in the outdoors with my friends and family more than the process of shooting something, but I guess that's just me.