Pornographr
I went to log into Flickr at work today and was told by our automated net-police that I'd been blocked from visiting a restricted site.
A quick check of the back-end confirmed it. Our web filtering software, SurfControl receives a daily update to it's "internet threat database" of dodgy websites. Today it has decided that Flickr is categorised as "adult/sexually explicit".
For me, this is a worrying sign. Worrying because the Surfcontrol people are right, Flickr is an easy place to get pornographic pictures.
Perhaps because of the rather, er, "specialist" appeal of some of my photos, I get "befriended" by Flickr users whose photo streams are nothing but porn. A lot of it copyrighted material they've pinched off other sites. I've often thought "wow, if I wanted to surf porn at work, Flickr would be a great way to do it." If I've realised it, you can bet a lot of the quick-hand-shandy-in-my-cubicle brigade had realised it too, hence Surfcontrol's decision to stick Flickr on the Naughty list.
A lot of corporate sites use SurfControl, so a lot of innocent people are gonna find their Flickr access curtailed today.
I think Flickr might have some hard decisions to make. Much like Wikipedia, they're now starting to find that the free-and-easy attitudes they adopted when they were a little cult site no longer work now they're a hugely popular Yahoo-backed one. I don't want to see censorship on Flickr, and I really don't know where the lines should be drawn. I do think Flickr have dropped the ball when it comes to copyrighted and adult material.
Behind the cheery, family-friendly public facade of Flickr, a seedy culture of Adult picture-sharing is forming. I think something should be done about it, I'm just not sure what.
A quick check of the back-end confirmed it. Our web filtering software, SurfControl receives a daily update to it's "internet threat database" of dodgy websites. Today it has decided that Flickr is categorised as "adult/sexually explicit".
For me, this is a worrying sign. Worrying because the Surfcontrol people are right, Flickr is an easy place to get pornographic pictures.
Perhaps because of the rather, er, "specialist" appeal of some of my photos, I get "befriended" by Flickr users whose photo streams are nothing but porn. A lot of it copyrighted material they've pinched off other sites. I've often thought "wow, if I wanted to surf porn at work, Flickr would be a great way to do it." If I've realised it, you can bet a lot of the quick-hand-shandy-in-my-cubicle brigade had realised it too, hence Surfcontrol's decision to stick Flickr on the Naughty list.
A lot of corporate sites use SurfControl, so a lot of innocent people are gonna find their Flickr access curtailed today.
I think Flickr might have some hard decisions to make. Much like Wikipedia, they're now starting to find that the free-and-easy attitudes they adopted when they were a little cult site no longer work now they're a hugely popular Yahoo-backed one. I don't want to see censorship on Flickr, and I really don't know where the lines should be drawn. I do think Flickr have dropped the ball when it comes to copyrighted and adult material.
Behind the cheery, family-friendly public facade of Flickr, a seedy culture of Adult picture-sharing is forming. I think something should be done about it, I'm just not sure what.
Or for people to post pretty graphic images. There are some posted to one of the TG groups which are really awful from someone I had already blocked and reported.
There is a fine line between erotic and porn. I am as much of a fan of standard shots of models in their undies or swimwear as the next man.
Flickr have been far too slow in enforcing their rules on copyrighted images and pron. Add to that the flood of Yahoo members who have a willy fixation and its only a matter of time before things went downhill.
The problem comes when someone within flickr has to decide whether to become "family friendly" and if they do will they regard images of blokes dressed as girls as being something they want to allow?
It's a tricky nut to crack, I just think that Flickr (or Yahoo) could be handling it better than they are.
There are photos of nudes on flickr which are most definately not porn.
As for your photos being "specialist" they are not porn. That some of the trouser fumbling brigade might get arrosed by looking at them is somewhere actually I don't want to go, but your tranny pictures are not pornographic. That pornographers seem to think that anyone in a tranny group or just random strangers what to see their pictures is deeply offensive.
It is a worry though that Flickr may get very victorian in response especially as Yahoo consider groups such as the Angels as being "adult"
Ahh, that's actually my fault. I designated the Angels an adult gp when I set it up, and it won't let me change it.
That some of the trouser fumbling brigade might get aroused by looking at them is somewhere actually I don't want to go
Me neither.... (shudder)
We use surfcontrol at work as well will be interesting to see if I am ok or not ALSO as I have a flickr preview window on my blog I wonder if that gets "red handed"
There are ways round it though. Try searching free proxy browsing and selecting one to browse from work :-0
It's true. flickr has some very explicit terms of use as well as an easy to understand condensed version in the form of their recently published community guidelines.
These are absolutely enforceable in the cases that you mention (copyrighted images, porn appearing in public streams), BUT it would be absoutely impossible for the staff of flickr to moderate every single image in every single stream.
The amount of moderation staff they'd have to employ to achieve this would make it instantly a prohibitively expensive service to use (as well as a culturally stifling and police-state like place)
Therefore it's vital that the community actively help them moderate the site. If you see a photostream of user that violates the guidelines, don't just complain about it to your friends, use the Abuse Reporter to notify the admins.
In my experience, action is taken, and taken rapidly.
This kind of positive action by the community is the only way for sites like flickr to remain safe, friendly environments.
I borrowed your information to have a small write up a bit on this issue with surfcontrol with a few quote from yours, if you don't mind.
Interesting article I should say and nice blog, Becky.
Cheers.
K, thanks for the link, I went looking for something like that a few days ago and couldn't find it on the Flickr site, obviously wasn't looking hard enough! :-)
I still wonder if that even with the best efforts of the community, Flickr will still be inexorably swamped with pron, but we shall see.
The national lottery site is blocked as 'internet gambling' so you can't check your lottery numbers. But if you go on the unrestricted BBC news site you can check lottery numbers there. Some Yahoo games pages are blocked as gambling.
But the most crazy one concerns the word 'zip'. Zip files are not allowed to be downloaded. But if you go to a site to buy a jacket with a zip fastener, it's blocked due to the word 'zip'.
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