Sorry to do this: Comments Are Now Filtered of Some Words.
April 23rd, 2008
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I apologize for this, but unfortunately there have been a few too many comments on here which made very heavy use of vulgarity. In general, we’re adults here and it’s no big deal if someone uses a four letter word from time to time, especially when responding to something of equal offense. However, my concern is simply that having too much of that kind of thing could trigger this site being blocked by filtering software, such as in schools, libraries or overly-protective homes. This could also hurt the ranking on some search engines. Additionally, simply having a lot of four letter words on the page, even in the comments tends to present a less professional image and may turn some off or prevent other sites from wanting to link to posts on this site.
Therefore, after having seen some comments which just went way over the top, such as this one, the decision was made to activate a simple filter to remove some of the more strong words. This will not in any way censor comments for their basic message or block those who are disagreed with. It will not even block comments containing vulgarity. Rather, it will replace words with something like s**t or f***, which should make the content of the message clear and not obscure the basic intent, but will help avoid any kind of blocking of the page and maintain a semi-family-friendly image. This filter is only being applied to a few words. You can still say “damn” and “crap” and “ass.” It’s also not a very strict filter, so if you *really* want to, I’m sure you can get around it.
We will see how this goes. I may also change the color of the filtered words to illustrate that they have been changed and assure that nobody’s comment appears in a deceptive manner.
This is a compromise which is intended not to infringe on the freedom of expression of opinions which is valued here.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008 at 11:18 am and is filed under Announcements, Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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April 23rd, 2008 at 11:52 am
Okay I’ve disabled the profanity filter for now because it seems to be having some problems with being case sensitive and it also changes some things I don’t want it to. I’ll experiment with it on a mirror of this site and then turn it on when I have it working properly
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April 23rd, 2008 at 12:50 pm
It is sad that this has become necessary but I agree with you. While profanity may occasionally be found in intelligent debate, too much of it being used pointlessly or to insult others just tends to bring the overall quality of the debate down. Those example you linked to from the kinoki foot pads were pretty bad. I felt my IQ drop 50 points just from reading them
In general, I am against censorship but I also don’t think this type language has an important place in debate. I just wish that people could be adult on their own without having to be forced. There’s a time and place for that type of language but some people don’t realize it.
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April 23rd, 2008 at 1:36 pm
It is sad that this has become necessary, but alas, sometimes the noble citizens of S****horpe must sacrifice themselves for the greater good. Wait, damn, the filter’s off now.
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April 23rd, 2008 at 3:08 pm
I was just sitting with my little ****zu and reading some E. E. Cummings when this was brought to my attention. I hope that the filtering works.
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April 23rd, 2008 at 3:09 pm
What the heck just happened? I was telling you about my dog and a book and it gets censored?
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