Cyber cafe proprietors yesterday booed the draft bylaw regulating the city's Internet cafes as it passed its third reading at the Taipei City Council.
Proprietors have to register as information-recreation service providers within a year after the regulations take effect.
Jacky Wu (
"Internet cafes are not evil places to be in -- and we're totally different from video arcades such as those which provide gambling services," he said.
The city currently has about 800 recreation service providers.
The regulations allow Internet cafes to be set up only in commercial areas where roads are wider than 8m. They also prohibit them from being set up within 200m of schools.
Minors under the age of 15 will be barred from entering such facilities unless accompanied by a parent or legal guardian.
Those under the age of 18 will be prohibited from viewing pornography and playing violent computer games.
Internet cafe owners will face fines ranging between NT$50,000 and NT$100,000 if they allow those under the age of 18 to enter their facilities between 8am and 6pm as well as between 10pm and 8am during weekdays -- and between 10pm and 8am on weekends and holidays.
The regulations also bar information-recreation service providers from offering gambling services and access to pornography. Violators can face fines of up to NT$100,000 and a jail sentence of between one and six months.
Owners can face fines of up to NT$50,000 if they fail to keep records of the Web sites from which their their patrons browsed or downloaded data.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique