Who killed CockRobin?

[VirtualMetal]

I guessed there would be. =) Even though this is annoying I don't think TNT would be that mean. Although I wouldn't be terribly surprised if they did receive warning for something similar. I've heard of people getting warned for words within words and even though probably a mistake, TNT don't seem to retract warnings.

[yvonne_l_d]

Well, you probably will not get in trouble for saying that you have a spouse or a partner. It was probably 'maternity leave' that got me the warning, rather than husband or wife.

This is what my warning looked like.

You have received an official warning from the Neopets Team for violating the Neopets Terms and Conditions. Do not discuss adult real world topics or situations on this site. This is an all-ages site where some topics are not appropriate. This includes issues such as pregnancy, drugs, suicide, sexual orientation, health issues, abuse, etc. We want to make Neopets a comfortable atmosphere for all of our users - so we will warn/freeze accounts for discussions of this nature. If you continue to break the rules, your account will be permanently frozen. To see a list of Neo Rules, please visit http://www.neopets.com/chatrules.phtml. Please do not reply to this NeoMessage.

I guess they don't like people talking about pregnancy.. but I didn't actually use the word pregnant. What I had said was that a guild member of mind was a stay at hom mom until her maternity leave ended. Her child was already born. It was probably the word 'maternity' that caught their attention. I would guess that in general, you could say that you are expecting a child without getting in trouble.

I should also mention that I had a petpage with an 'about us' section about our guild and I posted the same kind of information that people post on their user lookups. I didn't post anything about peoples real full names, etc., so that's why I had to guess, from the warning, what was offensive in that page. At first I thought it was the fact that two people were married to each other, but then it occured to me that 'maternity leave' might be the problem.

[Lee]

Well, you probably will not get in trouble for saying that you have a spouse or a partner. It was probably 'maternity leave' that got me the warning, rather than husband or wife.

This is what my warning looked like.

You have received an official warning from the Neopets Team for violating the Neopets Terms and Conditions. Do not discuss adult real world topics or situations on this site. This is an all-ages site where some topics are not appropriate. This includes issues such as pregnancy, drugs, suicide, sexual orientation, health issues, abuse, etc. We want to make Neopets a comfortable atmosphere for all of our users - so we will warn/freeze accounts for discussions of this nature. If you continue to break the rules, your account will be permanently frozen. To see a list of Neo Rules, please visit http://www.neopets.com/chatrules.phtml. Please do not reply to this NeoMessage.

I guess they don't like people talking about pregnancy.. but I didn't actually use the word pregnant. What I had said was that a guild member of mind was a stay at hom mom until her maternity leave ended. Her child was already born. It was probably the word 'maternity' that caught their attention. I would guess that in general, you could say that you are expecting a child without getting in trouble.

I should also mention that I had a petpage with an 'about us' section about our guild and I posted the same kind of information that people post on their user lookups. I didn't post anything about peoples real full names, etc., so that's why I had to guess, from the warning, what was offensive in that page. At first I thought it was the fact that two people were married to each other, but then it occured to me that 'maternity leave' might be the problem.

It was most likely the maternity. Because it usually directly refences pregnancey. You can never me to careful.

[Alex]

The censoring can get quite ridiculous. I'm constantly getting told off by the filters when someone asks for help with a Faerie Quest, and I'll reply with "Sure, two secs."

Apparently the phrase isn't as common over in the US, where I'm basically saying "Sure, I'll help you out, just give me a couple of seconds to search for you." Apparently the filters think I'm saying something else though :eyeroll:

[Daze]

"Sure, two secs."

I use to get caught out with secs all the time, but once you get use to the filters it becomes 2nd nature to modify what you are going to type.

Apparently the phrase isn't as common over in the US

It isn't the phrase, but the word secs could be seen as someon trying to use the word sex.

*As bad as* is another saying, that I must stop myself using. (can be seen as "bad smurf").

We may complain about how sensitive, weird or stupid the filters are but as I said before, it does make Neo a better place.

Certainly some nasty posts do get through, whether of a political, rasist or sexual nature, it sometimes takes awile for these boards to disappear and we wonder why it takes so long. But I am sure we can see that while TNT try and make it a better site, some filters are just going to be the price to pay.

The system isn't perfect, but it is better than having people swear and use nasty words whenever they feel like it, and it is usually only those who want to cause trouble on Neo that post such things.

Innocent words or sayings that are filtered is such a small price to pay.

EDIT:
lol even PPT sensors the word!!!
As you can see, it isn't just Neo that has silly filters!

EDIT 2:
In even a more ridiculous filter by PPT, even A in LM.O is censored. (which TNT does not censor)

Last edited by Daze on Mon Sep 03, 2007 2:20 pm, edited 4 times in total.

[Fiddelysquat]

Sorry, but I really do see where TNT was coming from when they banned your pet. I nearly spit out my soda and thought I was going to have to deal with another porn troll when I saw your topic title out of the corner of my eye.

I do agree that the filter can be irritating but is a necessary evil. Although there are times where a post of mine won't go through and I can't for the life of me figure out why.

[ahoteinrun]

Funny as it may seem to yourself I was not trying be clever at all, the idea was purely innocent as I'm currently working on an art piece of the poem with illustrations. Not really sure what you're insinuating about me either. I personally don't see why it wouldn't be harmless to those who've not read the poem, maybe I'm naive?

What scares me the most about this, is that i'm actually working on a heavily illustrated book of the poem along with of course the illustrations as well. Funny how that works.

And with reguards to PPT's filters, yeah, they exist and they exist for a reason. If the words been banned it's because someone has gone, abused the word, perhaps on more then one occasion, used it to snark at someone else and left the staff with little choice but to nix it's use. Sorry if it's inconvenienced you, but frankly if we had a member with the name "CockRobin" I think we'd have enough sense not to ban them.

[Daze]

Sorry if it's inconvenienced you,

Nope, not inconvienced me at all. But certainly did demonstrate a point.

Funny thing is, I have never thought of the A word as a bad enough word to censor, but to each their own.

[ahoteinrun]

Sorry if it's inconvenienced you,

Nope, not inconvienced me at all. But certainly did demonstrate a point.

Funny thing is, I have never thought of the A word as a bad enough word to censor, but to each their own.

Perhaps i'm viewing this too much like a moderator, but the point I think it illustrates for you and the point it illustrates for me are most likely vastly different. As I said, people have abused it, and they will again and thats why it's been filtered. An unfortunate situation by any means that people go so far with language.

[Daze]

Perhaps i'm viewing this too much like a moderator, but the point I think it illustrates for you and the point it illustrates for me are most likely vastly different. As I said, people have abused it, and they will again and thats why it's been filtered. An unfortunate situation by any means that people go so far with language.

I didn't mean it as an offense of PPT, I meant that filtering takes place for a reason. A lot of people whinge about Neo's filtering on PPT, but PPT has it's own filtering for the same reason Neo does - people abuse the system when filters/mods are not in place. And in this one little instance, PPT are actually stricter than Neo.

I appreciate the difficulties that a site like PPT would have to deal with, just like Neo does. It was ironic that my point was made in such a fashion.

I PPT. Please don't think I am putting you as a mod or any mod down.

[gabriellaeve]

Yeah, one of the thing that frustrates me about these word filters is that I'm somehow supposed to know that a harmless word in English is a disgusting word in some other language. I got in trouble a while back for posting a diminutive of my pets name. I won't post it here, because (after much research) it turns out it is a really bad slang word in one version of spanish - but seriously, how on earth was I supposed to know that? All the filter did was teach me a new dirty word...and it didn't even tell me what was the bad word.

[Daze]

Yeah, one of the thing that frustrates me about these word filters is that I'm somehow supposed to know that a harmless word in English is a disgusting word in some other language. I got in trouble a while back for posting a diminutive of my pets name. I won't post it here, because (after much research) it turns out it is a really bad slang word in one version of spanish - but seriously, how on earth was I supposed to know that? All the filter did was teach me a new dirty word...and it didn't even tell me what was the bad word.

I have never heard of the filter's picking out foreign words - are you sure of the word? Sometimes 2 words in a row can form another word (as my posts above mention).

No-one can be expected to know what will set off the filter, but filters are better than your account getting frozen straight away, like mine did, due to a misunderstanding about what I had typed on my guild board. (I got the account back).

[buttwig]

Been there - done that. Had neomail blocked for no reason that I could figure. I've also been suspended for a day for neomailing the definition of jaunty (I posted a poll on my guild and one answer was 'I'd buy a jaunty hat for each of my neopets'). Now I figured that the context would have some bearing on it and the neomail DID go through...why wasn't it blocked as most are? If I had typed the F-word, sure, BLOCK - but why let things go through in the first place? I guess that's my beef with the censor. I haven't run into it on the boards as I don't post there much but I see all sorts of objectionable things there that should never have made it past the "censor". It leaves me wondering...is TNT sick and lets some things go through so they can get their jollies reading it? lol Just kidding but I have wondered about the mechanics of all that. I do know that most discussions of health matters are frowned upon by the censor, so that's likely why the maternity word got someone in trouble. However, a guild member's daughter had kidney stones recently and it was rather freely discussed on our adult guild board. I expected warnings to come any second but no one got one. Why? Good question. What is the difference between health particulars? I reckon TNT could do a better job on this quite necessary censor thing though. Since I don't have a clue how it works, I'm at a loss to suggest anything though.

Oh and a synonym for jaunty is 'gay' in case anyone is scratching their head over it. IMHO, they should also ban rainbow items if they're going to be that picky lol.

[VirtualMetal]

After all that rubbish I'm now suspended. What for? Politely asking a lass on the boards not to bring religon into the conversation. We were talking about ghosts! x___x

Sick of it, seriously...

[pink_coconut]

Ugh Neopets has gone downhill ever since they redid the pets and made the new layout. I'm getting sick of them. *wishes I hadn't bought the neopets magazine*