Flickr = Censorship, Part 2
[I am CEO of Zooomr]
Digital Download By David M. Ewalt Well I took a lot of heat the last time I titled a post Flickr = Censorship when Flickr censored one of their most popular photographers Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir.
Flickr later called the incident a "mistake" and apologized for it. Flickr also said that they would take steps to ensure that these kind of "mistakes" didn't happen in the future. The thread for this incident is now locked on Flickr.
The censorship thing with Flickr probably bugs me more than most because I was censored here myself and had dozens of comments deleted along with one of my images from my own photostream.
So it was with disappointment that I read today's headline over at Forbes.com about yet another case of Flickr censorship.
Flickr Censors Violet Blue
"Blogger, sex educator and web celeb Violet Blue has run afoul of the increasingly onerous content filtering system at photo-sharing site Flickr, having most of her photos removed from the site. Flickr (which is owned by Yahoo) recently started classifying user accounts depending on their content, ostensibly to make sure that any "dirty" pictures are behind walls where kids don't see them. Problem is, though, that none of Violet's photos displayed nudity; they were mostly things like vacation shots and pictures of her cat. A few non-nude pin-up photos may have tripped the automated system's prude sensors; as a result, her account was reclassified and most of her pictures were yanked."
You can read Violet's own side of the story here.
Update: Apparently Stewart has emailed Violet but she can't get her gmail account up. You can follow more of her story ongoing here: www.flickr.com/photos/violetblue/535335407/in/photostream/
Update #2: I'm not sure that Violet Blue's photostream could be characterized exactly as Forbes has published this report. Forbes reports that "none of Violet's photos displayed nudity," when at least one of her photos (pointed out to me by jakerome) would appear to be a public nipple shot that would not appear to have been self moderated. This case may be less a case of censorship and more a case of difference of opinion in what ought to be considered public and safe on Flickr.
Flickr = Censorship, Part 2
[I am CEO of Zooomr]
Digital Download By David M. Ewalt Well I took a lot of heat the last time I titled a post Flickr = Censorship when Flickr censored one of their most popular photographers Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir.
Flickr later called the incident a "mistake" and apologized for it. Flickr also said that they would take steps to ensure that these kind of "mistakes" didn't happen in the future. The thread for this incident is now locked on Flickr.
The censorship thing with Flickr probably bugs me more than most because I was censored here myself and had dozens of comments deleted along with one of my images from my own photostream.
So it was with disappointment that I read today's headline over at Forbes.com about yet another case of Flickr censorship.
Flickr Censors Violet Blue
"Blogger, sex educator and web celeb Violet Blue has run afoul of the increasingly onerous content filtering system at photo-sharing site Flickr, having most of her photos removed from the site. Flickr (which is owned by Yahoo) recently started classifying user accounts depending on their content, ostensibly to make sure that any "dirty" pictures are behind walls where kids don't see them. Problem is, though, that none of Violet's photos displayed nudity; they were mostly things like vacation shots and pictures of her cat. A few non-nude pin-up photos may have tripped the automated system's prude sensors; as a result, her account was reclassified and most of her pictures were yanked."
You can read Violet's own side of the story here.
Update: Apparently Stewart has emailed Violet but she can't get her gmail account up. You can follow more of her story ongoing here: www.flickr.com/photos/violetblue/535335407/in/photostream/
Update #2: I'm not sure that Violet Blue's photostream could be characterized exactly as Forbes has published this report. Forbes reports that "none of Violet's photos displayed nudity," when at least one of her photos (pointed out to me by jakerome) would appear to be a public nipple shot that would not appear to have been self moderated. This case may be less a case of censorship and more a case of difference of opinion in what ought to be considered public and safe on Flickr.