They've struck in the night . . .
And that's the end of my attention to Tumblr.
Showing posts with label censorship. Show all posts
Showing posts with label censorship. Show all posts
Monday, December 17, 2018
Thursday, December 13, 2018
The Coming Demise of Tumblr
You Won't Be Able to Find NSFW Content on Tumblr Anymore
The recent ban on NSFW content could spell the end for the blogging platform.
https://www.unreservedmedia.com/nsfw-content-ban-tumblr/
Many a tear will be shed (not all by Tumblr, we’re sure) after the popular blogging platform recently announced that starting 17 December, it will censor any “adult content [that] primarily includes photos, videos, or GIFs that show real-life human genitals or female-presenting nipples, and any content — including photos, videos, GIFs and illustrations—that depicts sex acts.”
The censorship rule follows the temporary removal of the Tumblr app from the iOS Apple Store over an incident involving child pornography found on the site. Tumblr CEO Jeff D’Onofrio released a statement shortly after the incident on a blog post stating, “Let’s first be unequivocal about something that should not be confused with today’s policy change: posting anything that is harmful to minors, including child pornography, is abhorrent and has no place in our community.”
Tumblr, a blogging tool which was launched in 2007 is favored for its ability to allow users to share quick multimedia posts as opposed to traditional lengthy blog posts. Over the years, it became a hotbed for erotic content and became especially known for their relaxed attitude towards NSFW content on a platform that’s considered a safer environment compared to other more ominous, ‘adult’ platforms that can be found online.
Inevitably, certain Tumblr users did not take the news well and the backlash faced by the Verizon-owned platform has been immense. Users have opted to abandon Tumblr by heading to other online social communities that they hope will be more lenient with erotic content.
Can the platform survive this migration of users? Time will tell. For now, Tumblr is trying to make a stand despite their obvious teething problems. D’Onofrio added that “It is our continued, humble aspiration that Tumblr be a safe place for creative expression, self-discovery, and a deep sense of community.”
Source:Washington Post
Thursday, December 6, 2018
What the freak is going on?
Have right-wing religious fanatics gotten together and bought a controlling interest in Facebook AND Tumblr?
Facebook bans users from saying if they're a 'top' or 'bottom'
https://www.queerty.com/facebook-bans-users-saying-theyre-top-bottom-20181206
Facebook certainly doesn’t mind if you’re gay, but a new rule forces users to keep what they do in the bedroom to themselves. Or at least move the conversation to Messenger.
The new content policy makes things like saying you’re a ‘top’ or a ‘bottom’ off-limits, in a move the social media behemoth says will combat content that “facilitates, encourages or coordinates sexual encounters between adults” and bars “sexually explicit language that may lead to solicitation.”
“Sex positions,” “sexual preference” and any number of other sexy umbrellas pertaining to “sexual hints” are all means for moderator intervention now.
Another common phrase you see a lot — “send nudes” — is a no-no, whether its meant as a joke or an actual request. The new rules ban “offering or asking for nude images.”
Via FB’s community standards:
“Do not post content that engages in implicit sexual solicitation, which can be identified by… using sexual hints such as mentioning sexual roles, sex positions, fetish scenarios, sexual preference/sexual partner preference, state of arousal, act of sexual intercourse or activity (sexual penetration or self-pleasuring), commonly sexualized areas of the body such as the breasts, groin, or buttocks, state of hygiene of genitalia or buttocks.”
Jennifer Scheurle
@Gaohmee Facebook’s updated community standards are fucking WILD! Stating your sexual orientation is now literally against the rules and is seen as solicitation.
Also butts are not ok anymore either.
Fuck this so much. Everything about it.
5:15 PM - Dec 5, 2018
CynthiaTazer.com@Tazertazertazer
Facebook has changed community standards. My strip club community watch the ads you post. Nothing can suggest “erotic dance” or even slang like “a good time”
Read the whole thing. I don’t want any one banned. https://www.facebook.com/communitystandards/sexual_solicitation … pic.twitter.com/t1xPFiCntF
8:18 AM - Dec 5, 2018·Wisconsin, USA
Even a Fox News reporter realized something might be amiss here:
Christopher Carbone
@christocarbone Have #LGBT folks noticed that #Facebook updated its community standards to ban a wider range of language around "sexual solicitation"? If so, what do they think? Email or DM me. https://www.facebook.com/communitystandards/sexual_solicitation …
8:13 AM - Dec 6, 2018
And one user pointed out the timing of the change, so close to Tumblr banning all adult content:
Jesse DM's maniacs@GiveMeAnAxe
with #tumblr banning adult content and now #Facebook banning all sexual innuendo in their "community standards" with #instagram likely to soon follow, what else is out there?
google plus?
12:00 PM - Dec 6, 2018
A Facebook spokesperson defended the changes, which were implemented in October, to PC Mag: “This change was prompted, in large part, by conversations with our content reviewers, who told us that the sexual exploitation policy did not adequately distinguish between exploitation (e.g. ‘My ex was a slut. Look at the photos she sent me.’) and solicitation (e.g. ‘Looking for swingers. Friday at 8 PM, [name of bar]. Wear pink.’).”
The spokesperson continued: “We’ll be putting out the minutes from our policy development meeting at which these changes are discussed and adopted, and we’ll also publish updates to our Community Standards so that people can track changes over time.”
# # #
In the category of WTF?
No more "adult" content on Tumblr . . . followed by an explanation of sorts . . . and a potential alternative . . .
https://tumblr.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/231885248-Sensitive-content
Starting Dec 17, adult content will not be allowed on Tumblr, regardless of how old you are. You can read more about what kinds of content are not allowed on Tumblr in our Community Guidelines. If you spot a post that you don’t think belongs on Tumblr, period, you can report it: From the dashboard or in search results, tap or click the share menu (paper airplane) at the bottom of the post, and hit "Report."
What is "adult content?"
Adult content primarily includes photos, videos, or GIFs that show real-life human genitals or female-presenting nipples, and any content—including photos, videos, GIFs and illustrations—that depicts sex acts.
What is still permitted?
Examples of exceptions that are still permitted are exposed female-presenting nipples in connection with breastfeeding, birth or after-birth moments, and health-related situations, such as post-mastectomy or gender confirmation surgery. Written content such as erotica, nudity related to political or newsworthy speech, and nudity found in art, such as sculptures and illustrations, are also stuff that can be freely posted on Tumblr.
What will happen to my adult content already on Tumblr?
We will send out email notices to members of the Tumblr community whose content has been flagged as adult. If your post has been flagged as adult, it will be reverted to a private setting viewable only by you. If you want to learn more about how to see those posts, see this help article.
As always, please make sure the email associated with your Tumblr account is one you use regularly. It’s how we get in touch when we need you!
My content was flagged as adult, but I don't think it should be. What should I do?
If you feel that we have categorized your post incorrectly, you can appeal this decision using the button on the post in question. Please note that this process is only possible to complete on the web or the Tumblr Android app version 12.2 or later to review your flagged content. If you are on iOS, please use the web to appeal for now.
Read more about how to review your content and appeal here.
What if my blog (not to be confused with posts) was marked as “explicit” before December 17, 2018?
Blogs that have been either self-flagged or flagged by us as “explicit” per our old policy and before December 17, 2018 will still be overlaid with a content filter when viewing these blogs directly. While some of the content on these blogs may now be in violation of our policies and will be actioned accordingly, the blog owners may choose to post content that is within our policies in the future, so we’d like to provide that option. Users under 18 will still not be allowed to click through to see the content of these blogs. The avatars and headers for these blogs will also be reverted to the default settings. Additionally, posts from these blogs are kept out of search results.
# # #
https://www.out.com/news-opinion/2018/12/03/rip-tumblr-banning-all-porn-app
https://justfor.fans/welcome.php
Thursday, February 26, 2015
2008: Net Censorship Law Struck Down Again
This article from 2008 bears re-reading...
http://www.wired.com/2008/07/net-censorship/
Net Censorship Law Struck Down Again
BY RYAN SINGEL
07.22.08 | 11:06 AM
A federal appeals court struck down as unconstitutional a Clinton-era law that would have forced websites with adult material to verify visitors’ ages, dealing another blow to the government in a 10-year court battle over net censorship.
The 3rd U.S. Circurt Court of Appeals upheld on Tuesday a 2007 lower-court decision that the Child Online Protection Act violated the First Amendment since it was not the most effective way to keep children from visiting adult websites.
Both courts also found that the standards for material that had to be hidden from open browsing were so loosely defined that any content not suitable for a four-year-old would have been hidden behind a age-verification firewall.
"Unlike COPA, filters permit adults to determine if and when they want to use them and do not subject speakers to criminal or civil penalties," the court wrote.
The Justice Department has been defending COPA since its passage in 1998, when the ACLU and others filed suit against the censorship law and won an immediate injunction. Since then, the court battle has made its way twice to the Supreme Court, though the government has never won any clear battles in the dispute.
COPA makes it a crime to knowingly post material that is "harmful to minors" on the web for "commercial purposes" without having some method — such as a credit card — to verify a visitor’s age.
Critics assailed the law for infantilizing the internet and requiring website operators — including news sites — to live in fear of prosecution if even a small part of their website contained adult material.
COPA was intended to be a narrower version of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which would have catastrophically extended the rules of television ‘decency’ to the internet had the Supreme Court not emphatically rejected it in 1997.
In its ruling (.pdf), however, the appeals court did not see much of a difference between the two laws.
"It is apparent that COPA, like the Communications Decency Act before it, ‘effectively suppresses a large amount of speech that adults have a constitutional right to receive and to address to one another,’ Reno, 521 U.S. at 874, 117 S.Ct. at 2346, and thus is overbroad. For this reason, COPA violates the First Amendment," the judges wrote. "These burdens would chill protected speech."
The ACLU’s Chris Hansen, a First Amendment lawyer for the rights group, applauded the decision.
"For years the government has been trying to thwart freedom of speech on the Internet, and for years the courts have been finding the attempts unconstitutional," Hansen wrote in a statement. "The government has no more right to censor the internet than it does books and magazines."
The Justice Department is not pleased with the decision and is reviewing its options, according to spokesman Charles Miller.
"We are disappointed that the Third Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a Congressional statute designed to protect our children from exposure to sexually explicit material on the internet," Miller said.
The ACLU, suing on behalf of Salon magazine sexualhealth.com and the owner of the Urban Dictionary website, successfully argued that the law criminalizes constitutionally protected speech, would drive pornography sites to non-U.S. servers, and prevent the spread of health information due to people’s unwillingness to register to read sensitive information.
They also argued the law would apply to anyone who wrote about mature subjects who also happened to have Google or Yahoo ads on their personal blog.
For its part, the government says the law was intended to apply to pornographic websites, not news sites. It also argues COPA’s age restrictions would work with content filters.
The government is likely to appeal Tuesday’s decision for a full hearing at the appeals court or to the Supreme Court.
# # #
Blogger porn ban
Zoe Margolis
Wednesday 25 February 2015 08.39 EST
Wednesday 25 February 2015 08.39 EST
Google’s decision to force blogs hosting adult content into becoming invitation-only services is a deliberate and ill-considered sabotage on free speech and connectivity, writes Zoe Margolis, of sex blog Girl With A One-Track Mind
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/25/blogger-porn-ban-google-zoe-margolis
Google has steadily been cutting down on adult-oriented material hosted on Blogger, its blogging platform, over the last few years. Previously, bloggers could freely post “images or videos that contain nudity or sexual activity,” albeit behind an warning screen that Blogger implemented in 2013.
Then, Blogger said “censoring this content is contrary to a service that bases itself on freedom of expression”, so bloggers rightly assumed that they would be free to continue to post adult content.
But in a huge U-turn, Google has changed its position and decided that as of 23 March, there will be no explicit material allowed on Blogger unless it offers “public benefit, for example in artistic, educational, documentary, or scientific contexts” – all which will be determined by Google. Quite how they will do that has not been made clear.
Anything else that does not fall into this category will be restricted to private-only viewing, where only people who have been invited by the blog’s creator will be able to see them; it won’t appear in search results.
This is like having a public library where all the shelves are empty and all the books imperceptible to readers, and authors are required to stand there in person, handing out copies of their work to those hoping to read it. What Google is doing, in reality, is making these blogs invisible. It effectively kills them off.
Some people might read this and think: “Well, Google just doesn’t want to host porn for free any more, that’s why it’s bringing in these restrictions, what’s wrong with that?” To some extent, they’d have a point, because other blog platforms are available and if a users’ sole intent is to make money, then they’re a business and should pay for hosting, not expect to get it for free.
But this new policy has more far-reaching and long-term implications than just censorship and a loss of profit for those posting explicit content, and here’s an example of why: it breaks the internet.
My own personal blog (no explicit images, but graphic descriptions of sex) has had more than 8m readers over 11 years of being hosted on Blogger. If I was forced to make it private and invitation-only, there is no conceivable way that I could contact every single one of those readers and send them a password link to access it.
When I joined Blogger in 2004, I did more than just sign up to publishing a sex blog, I joined a community of people: other erotic writers, non-erotic writers, sex educators, feminist porn-makers, memoirists, political activists, journalists, photographers, news-sharers, comedians, artists, comic creators and more. A disparate bunch of people joined together by one thing in common: we all posted stuff on the internet and then shared it.
This network – indeed the Internet itself – is made up of links. You find a link, click through, and expect to arrive at a page containing some form of content, whether that be text, images, video, or audio files. From its inception, blogging has been about people sharing links; indeed, one of the UK’s first well-known blogs back in 1999 was the link-sharing LinkMachineGo.
By forcing blogs – any blogs, regardless of their content – to become private, it means the link to that blog will no longer work: people clicking through without a password would arrive on a non-existent page. Thousands of other bloggers and websites may have shared that blog’s link over some years, and as a result of this policy change, that link would effectively be dead. In essence, what this means is that a long-standing, interactive, supportive community will be killed off overnight.
There is no justification for this. The fact that these blogs feature nudity (so?) is irrelevant. What Google are doing here goes against the very ethics of the web and their own motto, Don’t Be Evil.
Google itself has previously said: “Blogger increases the availability of information, encourages healthy debate, and makes possible new connections between people”, but this new policy completely undermines that and rather than forge connections, it is cutting them off.
Forcing millions of blogs to become private is not just a free-speech issue, or one about making adult content harder to find (Google’s own search tool makes that argument redundant), but boils down to Google sabotaging the integrity of the web – and how it functions – and it is for this reason that we need to oppose this narrow-minded and short-sighted policy.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/feb/25/blogger-porn-ban-google-zoe-margolis
Google has steadily been cutting down on adult-oriented material hosted on Blogger, its blogging platform, over the last few years. Previously, bloggers could freely post “images or videos that contain nudity or sexual activity,” albeit behind an warning screen that Blogger implemented in 2013.
Then, Blogger said “censoring this content is contrary to a service that bases itself on freedom of expression”, so bloggers rightly assumed that they would be free to continue to post adult content.
But in a huge U-turn, Google has changed its position and decided that as of 23 March, there will be no explicit material allowed on Blogger unless it offers “public benefit, for example in artistic, educational, documentary, or scientific contexts” – all which will be determined by Google. Quite how they will do that has not been made clear.
Anything else that does not fall into this category will be restricted to private-only viewing, where only people who have been invited by the blog’s creator will be able to see them; it won’t appear in search results.
This is like having a public library where all the shelves are empty and all the books imperceptible to readers, and authors are required to stand there in person, handing out copies of their work to those hoping to read it. What Google is doing, in reality, is making these blogs invisible. It effectively kills them off.
Some people might read this and think: “Well, Google just doesn’t want to host porn for free any more, that’s why it’s bringing in these restrictions, what’s wrong with that?” To some extent, they’d have a point, because other blog platforms are available and if a users’ sole intent is to make money, then they’re a business and should pay for hosting, not expect to get it for free.
But this new policy has more far-reaching and long-term implications than just censorship and a loss of profit for those posting explicit content, and here’s an example of why: it breaks the internet.
My own personal blog (no explicit images, but graphic descriptions of sex) has had more than 8m readers over 11 years of being hosted on Blogger. If I was forced to make it private and invitation-only, there is no conceivable way that I could contact every single one of those readers and send them a password link to access it.
When I joined Blogger in 2004, I did more than just sign up to publishing a sex blog, I joined a community of people: other erotic writers, non-erotic writers, sex educators, feminist porn-makers, memoirists, political activists, journalists, photographers, news-sharers, comedians, artists, comic creators and more. A disparate bunch of people joined together by one thing in common: we all posted stuff on the internet and then shared it.
This network – indeed the Internet itself – is made up of links. You find a link, click through, and expect to arrive at a page containing some form of content, whether that be text, images, video, or audio files. From its inception, blogging has been about people sharing links; indeed, one of the UK’s first well-known blogs back in 1999 was the link-sharing LinkMachineGo.
By forcing blogs – any blogs, regardless of their content – to become private, it means the link to that blog will no longer work: people clicking through without a password would arrive on a non-existent page. Thousands of other bloggers and websites may have shared that blog’s link over some years, and as a result of this policy change, that link would effectively be dead. In essence, what this means is that a long-standing, interactive, supportive community will be killed off overnight.
There is no justification for this. The fact that these blogs feature nudity (so?) is irrelevant. What Google are doing here goes against the very ethics of the web and their own motto, Don’t Be Evil.
Google itself has previously said: “Blogger increases the availability of information, encourages healthy debate, and makes possible new connections between people”, but this new policy completely undermines that and rather than forge connections, it is cutting them off.
Forcing millions of blogs to become private is not just a free-speech issue, or one about making adult content harder to find (Google’s own search tool makes that argument redundant), but boils down to Google sabotaging the integrity of the web – and how it functions – and it is for this reason that we need to oppose this narrow-minded and short-sighted policy.
# # #
P.S. Let's see what effect changing the blog description has: "A blog for the public benefit of expanding awareness, tolerance, and camaraderie in artistic, educational, documentary, and scientific contexts.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
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