Right-Wing Christian Group Ethur Raises Issue with Nintendo's Wii

Quick scenario: it is 3 o'clock in the afternoon, and the kids beat you home. Do you know what they are doing online... after they turned on the videogame console?

Probably not... but perhaps you should.

Therefore, it should not be surprising that you just might find a little - or should I say wiitle - new report circulating online that just might clue you in on some creative solutions to making sure it does not happen to your kids, coming from the most unlikely of organizations. According to videogame industry blog Kotaku, the Corona, Calif.-based right-wing Christian group Ethur has issued a public service announcement of sorts, hoping to increase awareness of the need to protect all points of online access that children use to go online and browse the Web.

In particular, the organization is calling specific attention to the Nintendo (Pink Sheets: NTDOY) Wii, advising parents across the nation of the popular motion-controlled videogame console's Web browser software and advising them to limit their kids' access to inappropriate websites using the console's built-in parental controls. Ethur member and owner of the online pornography awareness website ThePornTalk.com Mike Foster compares such unprotected access points to his personal concept of a network of what CrunchGear.com describes as "gateways to sex, debauchery, AIDS, and, worst of all, becoming a liberal." He likens this to the invention of the zipper - as well as other things, which he personally refers to as "devilish creations."

Foster notes from research conducted through his website that regardless of the safeguards available on the Wii and similar system, parents do not appear to be taking advantage of the precautionary features. The result is that kids are left unprotected from graphic sexual content that can is easily filtered out by parental control software such as that embedded in the Wii itself, as well as other software platforms such as Sony's (NYSE: SNE) PlayStation 3, and also in Microsoft's (NASDAQ: MSFT) Windows Vista operating system on personal computers. (Note: as of this writing, Microsoft does not provide web-browsing software on its Xbox 360 console as far as I am aware).

The Wii has become the best-selling video game console in the United States, outselling both the Xbox 360 PS3 for the month of January 2007. Due to this success, many websites have taken advantage of its online capability with several companies having changed the look and functionality of their web sites to accommodate the Wii. Unfortunately, the porn industry is also implementing these changes to their sites -- even going as far as taking the look of the Wii's home page and menus and modeling their own sites after them. Worse still, these porn sites are even converting their video clips so that they can run on the Wii. And this is all according to research conducted by Foster.

Foster recommends that parents need to get their facts straight, and then talk to their children about expectations for online activity. This includes using such tools as parental control utilities, privacy maintenance tools and other software designed to protect kids online while providing them with access to age-appropriate websites and software programs on both personal computers and videogame consoles.

"Whether it is the home computer or these new gaming consoles, porn is easily accessible," Foster says. "The Wii is an amazing console and tons of fun but parents need good info on how to keep kids safe."

DISCLAIMER: At the time of writing, the author of this article did not own any shares in the companies mentioned above.