Forum Filter (Fit for purpose?!)

[Cleoriff]

@Martin-O2 @LukasB @TheresaV 

When I joined this forum in 2013 we had a forum filter which I understood was to stop swear words being posted. Such as the F word and the C word. Fair enough. Then we supposedly developed the filter so it removed email addresses, links and telephone numbers.

That has never worked. We still have to remind people to remove these to avoid being spammed.

However in terms of so called swear words, I think this forum should be moved into the 21st century.

On todays Word Hunt Diamond we had perfectly acceptable words removed by this filter. A few examples.

I wrote ****** (F L A N G E)  it was removed. This word means a piece of metal which holds on a tailpipe of a car or plane. . (It is also slang for the female VULVA)

****** F A G  or F A G E N D  I've had to space them so they won't be filtered out. Slang terms for a cigarette

If I say I'm going outside for a f a g it does NOT mean I'm off to engage in some sort of sexual activity male on male.

******IN F A G I N Also filtered out. Charles Dickins wrote about this man and I'm damn sure there was no-one there to filter that out!! It also means someone who pushes youngsters to steal.

I wrote about a MAINE ****** cat. C O O N. A breed of cat. Filtered out. I can't remember the last time I heard that word used in relation to a black person!

Then we come on to the breed of birds. Called ****** T I T S

Why on earth cant we write

Blue ******

Coal ******

Marsh ******

Great ******

Willow ******

Instead of

Willowtits

Bluetits

Coaltits

Marshtits

Greattits

The forum filter stops us writing the correct name.

I don't think it allows **** C R A P  or BULL****** (B U L L ****** ) 

However, in the emoji box we have a pile of **** (so we can show a picture of it but we can't say it?

I'm not the only one who feels like this and others can feel free to add comments as they like but personally I'm sick to death of it and think the filter needs updating.

I'm NOT asking the forum filter to allow a swear fest. What I'm asking is some common sense.

That's all!

[Cleoriff]

Now I've seen all those genuine words filtered out, it just shows how absolutely STUPID this forum filter is. FGS!! 

[jonsie]

It's all in the spelling which can be ridiculous and incredulous

I posted about the last penalty shootout between Germany and England

One of the players was called Kuntz which I also used to describe them. Allowed

****** not allowed but ass-hole is allowed

[Mi-Amigo]

Excellent thread and post @Cleoriff 

As the originator of the Word Hunt Diamond and White Room Quiz, I am heartily sick of the filter kicking in and posting **** for correct and acceptable word.

No-one wants to see swearing, racist or homophobic words or comments on a public forum but there is a real need to distinguish between posts which deliberately contain offensive words and those which are using words in their literary, historical, and non-offensive content.

For example

The filter will not allow the first name of the highwayman Turpin nor the first name of the robin who is killed in the well-known poem.

The only way round this is to use / between letters of the filtered word or paces between the letters

e.g. D/I/C/K Turpin; and C O C K Robin as in the poem "Who killed c o c k robin?"

Surely, this issue can be addressed quickly and simply by using a bit of common sense.   

[pgn]

Well said, @Cleoriff.

Also, by overriding the naughty word logic, the Forum rules somewhere indicate this is a 'no no' - so what is its purpose?

I could go off on a rant with ****** or ***** and, rightly, be reprimanded, or worse.

However, if I paste a URL in from (typically, the ITV) news site, the URL gets monstrously mangled by this same filter, and I have to go find a URL-shortener (again breaking the 'do not attempt to overrule the bad-word filter'!) or give up and paste a URL in from another website, if at all.

Today's Word Hunt Diamond is not the first to have been partially nobbled by the bad boy (or girl) beater. Perhaps an update to its dictionary and how it identifies personal or coarse language is in order.

Still, some sites prevent the naming of that North Lincolnshire town, Scunthorpe, the Borders town of Penistone, and other such genuine names - ******-fitters and gold-****** notwithstanding (taps ******end into ashtray!).

[Cleoriff]

Add to that the F word is banned and quite rightly so. However the filter doesn't understand the word 'fekin' which passes the forums beady eye.

Last week on the WHD @Anonymous posted C R A P which is in the dictionary. He was horrified when he saw it had been bleeped out.

We have moved on from the 19th century and c r a p is a word used every day by most people.

i.e ' How are you today Den? I feel c r a p actually'.

[Martin-O2]

Thanks for bringing this issue to our attention @Cleoriff and to everyone else who has shared their thoughts on the matter. 

I'll start by addressing the question asked in the title of this thread, "is the forum filter fit for purpose?" I would say yes it is. The filter mostly works as intended and blocks out swear words and other offensive terms. This stops those words being seen by members or anyone browsing the community. This can include children so the filter is doing it's job. A secondary benefit is it saves the community management team time editing out profanity from posts. 

That said some words do have dual meaning and this can cause legitimate use of a particular word in the proper context to be filtered out. The filter is a list of words that has to be manually updated and over the years lots of words have been added. It's clear from this discussion that some of the words do have legitimate use on the community so I'm more then happy to review the list and look at removing some of the words that are not really considered to be that offensive anymore or have dual meaning. 

To help us out on this please drop me a private message with a list of words that you've had issues posting, or that are currently filtered but you don't think they should be. We pull everyone's words together, review them and remove them from the filter if it's appropriate. Remember to put spaces in between characters or they will be filtered out! 

A final word on @pgn's point about bypassing the filter. We would only enforce this rule if someone is intentionally trying to post a banned word by changing certain characters or adding spaces. If you are shortening an URL this is fine and we would not take any action. For example if "dog" was a filtered word and someone posted "d0g" or "d o g" to get around the filter we would not allow this. 

[Cleoriff]

Thanks for your response Martin and I'll certainly send you my list of words which should be allowed to bypass the filter.

However to get back to my first paragraph when I mention the filter was updated ostensibly to remove posters personal details, including phone number, addresses, order numbers and dangerous links.

This is a complete failure.

The times all of us report to the mods asking them to remove personal details and links pretty much happens on a daily basis.

Yet whenever I update this Guide: How to Pay Your Bill (Airtime & Device Plans) it ALWAYS removes the bank sort code which is ridiculous in this day and age.

I'm offline now for a while, so will see any response you make when I log back on.

Thanks x

[Martin-O2]

Please do send your list @Cleoriff. We've not had a proper review of the list for some time so it's a great opportunity to get the filter words up to date. 

Regarding the filters on personal details I agree this didn't work as intended. We've obviously removed the filter on phone numbers now as that was causing more grief then it was worth given this is a mobile provider's community! We can take a look at the other filter lists when we review the profanity words. 

[liggerz87]

Ah ye like I posted that bee video and didn't realise it got filtered as no one else could get to the link so I shared it on my own profile to then share it