Nanny Filter

[Birdzeye]

I'm not a big fan of profanity, but sometimes I believe the nanny filter is a bit overzealous. I was quite surprised recently when I posted a comment about the late Lee At.water, and because the second through fifth letters of the name make up a word that's on the no-no list, that part of the name got replaced with (*)(*)(*)(*).

I thought that was overkill.

[ABoyNamedSue]

Can't help you there. The Owner sets the profanity filter. Mods have no control over it.

[Birdzeye]

Understood. It was just such a shock to get bleeped when I wasn't saying anything bleepable (IMO).

I don't use profanity much IRL. I work in an office where it's frowned upon, and I have three parrots at home who are learning to talk, and I don't want them learning certain words! My first parrot (who is now in Rainbow Bridge, i.e., he passed away a few years ago) learned the "s" word when he was hospitalized at the animal hospital for one day!

[White Fox]

I really hate it when the filter blocks something in a url so that it doesn't work anymore.

It's especially bad when you can't figure out what the word was.

[Birdzeye]

The first online forum I participated in, Time Online (now defunct for many years), activated its nanny filter without notice one day. Its solution to profanities was to delete the post altogether. It just never appeared.

Then some smartalec poster who was Internet savvy figured out how to outsmart the filter, shared the solution with all of us, and people started posting posts with profanities. People who had rarely or never posted any bad words were now posting posts with just one (bad) word.

By the end of the day, the powers that be disabled the nanny filter, and the posters went back to their occasional use of profanity.

[redphish]

Originally Posted by White Fox

I really hate it when the filter blocks something in a url so that it doesn't work anymore.

It's especially bad when you can't figure out what the word was.

I had the same happen to me, but looking back at the address it was obvious what the problem was.

[heikstheo]

Originally Posted by Birdzeye

I'm not a big fan of profanity, but sometimes I believe the nanny filter is a bit overzealous. I was quite surprised recently when I posted a comment about the late Lee At.water, and because the second through fifth letters of the name make up a word that's on the no-no list, that part of the name got replaced with (*)(*)(*)(*).

I thought that was overkill.

I was once on a history forum where the nanny filter filtered out the first four letters of a Japanese admiral's name as (*)(*)(*)(*) because those first four letters spelled out a slang term for, um, "smelly brown used food." It's just that some nanny filters are too sensitive.

[catzmeow]

Just go with "smurf" in the future.

[CB4]

Originally Posted by Birdzeye

I'm not a big fan of profanity, but sometimes I believe the nanny filter is a bit overzealous. I was quite surprised recently when I posted a comment about the late Lee At.water, and because the second through fifth letters of the name make up a word that's on the no-no list, that part of the name got replaced with (*)(*)(*)(*).

I thought that was overkill.

lol i agree, i try not to cuss really, but im just so dam angry

[heikstheo]

I was once on a forum with a nanny filter that censored the word crackers (a type of food Americans put in their soup) because it is also a less than complimentary reference to poor Southern whites. Nanny filters are incapable of discerning context.