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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, January 30, 1993                   TAG: 9301300109
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                LENGTH: Short

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PRODIGY TO DROP SEX BULLETIN BOARD

Prodigy, the computerized information and home-shopping service, has decided that its "Frank Discussion" electronic bulletin board was becoming too frank.

Complaints from subscribers about sexually explicit messages prompted Prodigy to terminate the bulletin board of social issues on Wednesday.

"A publisher has a responsibility to its readers to exercise editorial discretion," Geoffrey Moore, Prodigy Services Co.'s director of market programs and communication, said Friday.

In October 1991, Prodigy was criticized by the B'nai Brith Anti-Defamation League for what the group called a proliferation of anti-Semitic messages in its bulletin boards. Then it was criticized for censoring the messages.

Before that, Prodigy prompted accusations of censorship after it eliminated one electronic bulletin board that had become a forum for bitter debate between homosexuals and Christian fundamentalists.

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