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Shareware Overload Trio 2
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Shareware Overload Trio Volume 2 (Chestnut CD-ROM).ISO
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rating20.zip
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CUSTOMER.TXT
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1994-06-10
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4KB
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86 lines
Dear Customer,
##COMPANY_NAME## has devoted itself to developing and publishing a wide
array of software, including educational programs and family-oriented
games. We know that violent games and pornography are more profitable, but
prefer to make choices that reflect our personal values.
Like you, we are very concerned about the use of violent images in TV,
movies and software, and feel the most effective contribution we can make
is to create and promote gentle alternatives.
So you might think we'd be staunch supporters of Congressman Lantos's
recent crusade against computer games.
We're not. In fact, if Lantos gets his way, many small publishers and
developers of wholesome, family-oriented software will cease to exist.
Lantos has chosen to back the Interactive Digital Software Association
(IDSA), a consortium of a few foreign-owned cartridge game companies, in
their efforts to force an unwieldy and unworkable review process onto the
backs of American software producers and retailers. Ironically, billion-
dollar giants Nintendo and Sega, promoters of the IDSA scheme, publish
Mortal Kombat, the game Lantos cites most often as "filthy and disgusting".
Yet he has chosen to ally himself with them!
Lantos wants you to believe that only IDSA will rate games correctly.
That's not true. The trade associations which represent over 2100 smaller
publishers have a rating system that is objective and informative. But
Lantos is demanding that everyone use the proposed IDSA system with its
unnecessary technical requirements, publishing delays, intrusion into trade
secrets, and high review costs. If we don't go along with IDSA, Lantos says
he'll create an expensive government bureaucracy to review games --
requiring you, the taxpayer, to pay the bill for something software
publishers are willing to do for free.
No one has ever accused a PC or Mac software company of misleading anyone.
The most violent (and best-selling) PC game is already rated with a
parental warning on the box and the opening screen! PC software publishers
will put ratings on their games. They will do it quickly, accurately, and
without costing you a cent.
Ratings can provide information about content. That's good for parents who
might be confused about a product. But if the ratings systems is designed
to put the educational and alternative companies out of business, we'll all
lose.
Please write to your representatives, asking them to support the American
software industry's plan for self-ratings instead of the expensive and
unmanageable IDSA system that will put small educational software companies
out of business.
Thank you for your support.
Sincerely,
These are the gentlemen who are supporting the IDSA ratings plan:
Senator Joseph I. Lieberman
316 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
202-224-4041
Senator Herbert H. Kohl
330 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
202-224-5653
Representative Tom Lantos
2182 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
202-225-3531
Fax: 202-225-3127
You may also want to write to:
The Honorable Albert Gore, Jr.
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20501
Please also write to all the Senators and Congressional Representatives
from your home state, letting them know that you oppose the IDSA plan, and
prefer the plan supported by the four major trade associations: ASP
(Association of Shareware Professionals), STAR (Shareware Trade Association
& Resources), ESC (Educational Software Cooperative) and ASAD (Association
of Shareware Authors and Distributors).