Gather's Daily Help Forum - July 9, 2009

Hey Donna, I released the post.

Thanks Chuck!

I hate to be a kill joy but wouldn't some people consider dumbass. . . profanity?   I know I would have gotten in trouble in school if i called people dumbasses (even if they deserved it ;)  )

So is ass (and all other ass related adjectives to go with it) not considered profanity on here?

Good thing we're not in the classroom :)

I think most variations of "ass" would be permissible.  Probably not assh***.

But why not?  If dumbass, smartass, assclown, asshat, asshead, and assface are all allowed shouldn't assh*** be allowed as well :0)

personally I prefer to call someone an assclown :0)

You're having far too much fun with this...

How did you guess :)

I just need to know for future reference when I should self flag heh

ass is biblical. donna's ass was dumb.

well most people's asses do have holes.

damn is also biblical but it's considered profanity.

And I don't live my live by that book so I don't subscribe to it's word approval either :)

I say damn all the time...  I guess the flaggers haven't found me out yet. ha!

See that's what I mean, profanity is all and all subjective.  Technically even blastphemous speech is profanity to some.   Which is why I asked why if one 'assword' is banned, why not the rest?

Language is a fun thing :)

common sense prevails in most cases ;-)

Damn, I forgot to tell you... "damn" is okay too.

So, are you saying I won't go to hell if I say damn? From what I understand, only the damned go to hell.

Okay, I'm going to chime back in. I ASSumed that "dumbass" would not be considered profanity., as it is a commonly used term, even on "family hour" programing on TV. I woiuld have flagged the post myself, if I had thought it was in any way profane. On that note, I guess I'm glad I didn't drop the "f" bomb.

Good morning!

Yesterday MaryAnne stated that there are no plans to modify the post Copyright and Flagging Concerns. However, that did not address whether additional information pertaining to 'unoriginal content' will be forthcoming (Chuck mentioned last week that some clarification was being readied for release).

Hence, will any new information pertaining to these subjects be communicated, and is there an estimate as to when it will be available?

Thank You!

Hi Kevin,

I have reviewed the Copyright and Flagging Concerns post and feel it is clear. I have added the following exception to unoriginal content as the only comment to the post:

Amber Alerts and Public Safety Announcements may be shared on Gather in their original form.  A member's point earning abilities will not be penalized by sharing this kind of unoriginal content.

Thank you for making that addition to your post MaryAnne.

Will the document/clarification that Chuck mentioned last week be published soon?

"Amber Alerts and Public Safety Announcements may be shared on Gather in their original form.  A member's point earning abilities will not be penalized by sharing this kind of unoriginal content."

I think this is a mistake.  This is information that's readily available from a large number of sources.  I don't think this sort of content is appropriate for Gather.

There is no additional documentation coming from Chuck, myself or Gather. Tom addressed the Updates to the Points Program and I addressed the Copyright and Flagging Concerns.

Thank you for the response MaryAnne.

I'm disappointed though that the information communicated to the community last week was incorrect. There is still a significant grey area surrounding content sharing and reporting in the community not covered under the umbrella of your recent post. Hopefully answers to my forthcoming questions will fill in the missing pieces.

Thanks again.

Good afternoon Chuck and MaryAnne.

Last week I explained a problem with embedding videos in my posts. One of the videos I had problems posting was YouTube. I've seen others complain that they also could not get the YouTube videos to embed. So... I'd like let everyone know that I discovered the reason, and that is you have to un-check the box for delayed cookies before you copy the code for embedding.

oh, btw. If I ask you the same question a hundred times will I get different results? lol. just wondering.

Debra, thank you for sharing what you found with everyone!

Good afternoon!

Today, a flag was released by Gather's Member Support team from an article that was flagged by the community for "profanity", presumably for the use the the word "dumbass".

A discussion of the allowable forms of "ass" in a post that has not been flagged by the author for Crude or Indecent Language followed the announcement of the release of the flagged content, and a member of the Gather Member Support team speculated that while "dumbass" would be allowed, "assh***" probably would not. Unfortunately, this discussion did not clarify exactly which words are allowed in a post that has not been flagged for Crude or Indecent Language.

Hence, will there be futher clarification from Gather Member Support on exactly which words are considered "profane" and can be used without the addition of a  Crude or Indecent Language designation and which are not? Will the Terms of Service be modified to provide clarification for the community?

Thank you!

lmao!

for a second I thought Janna changed her style of writing. I almost threw up a little.

Great idea! ...well, except for modifying the TOS to document language standards.

I'm a programmer.  I worked for a retailer that had a mail order catalogue.  Someone in the Marketing department noticed that people were requesting catalogues under double entendre names like "I. P. Freely."  One of my friends got to write a program to protect sensitive folks in the Marketing department from stuff like that.  What we decided to do was to maintain a list of dirty words in a file and make any catalogue request that contained any of the words subject to review by a human.  We giggled a lot over the huge amount of labor involved in  writing a program that could catch puns.  Fortunately management bought into the quick and dirty approach.

Wait, this program wasn't to protect customers... it was to protect marketing employees?

Nippy, i know someone who's name is Dick Dickies.  how would your company handle that if it came in as a request, seeing that it's his legal name.

Marketing employees can be very sensitive.

When I was working as a programmer in IT, our testing included developing test users.  We had a great time coming up with names like this for our test db.  "I.P. Freely" would have been considered quite amateur, though.

The only people who saw the catalogue mailing labels were either employees of the retail company, employees of the printer, or postal workers.  There was some concern, more valid, that we were spending money mailing catalogues addressed to jokes.  Our catalogue, no longer available due to the bankruptcy and dissolution of the company, cost over $3 each to mail.  When you mail several million of them a month, trimming the jokes is nothing to sneeze at.

Sheryl, most of the joke catalogue requests came from children, my guess is mostly boys in the 8 to 16 age group.

CC, the suspect catalogue requests got flagged for review by humans.  We had software for verifying addresses based on Post Office data.  Chances are Dick would have gotten his catalogue as long as the address was valid.  We had trouble with Eros, LA getting flagged.  It's a small oil drilling town.

"Sheryl, most of the joke catalogue requests came from children, my guess is mostly boys in the 8 to 16 age group."

That's actually a good description of my former IT department, Nippy. :-)

CC, I bet Dick Dickies would have enjoyed meeting my neighbor, Dick Eader. But they might have had to adopt Joe Smith and John Doe in order to get past Nippy.

It's interesting to me that people who profess to be religious are often the ones who are so "offended" by words. There is nothing bad about a word - the badness comes from the dirty thoughts some people choose to have when they read certain words.

Damn is God's word. For those who believe, isn't He the only one who has that power? It's especially baffling when people tell me I am not supposed to use God's name with that word (because it's only possible when he's involved, and because their god didn't choose a name so they think we have to forfeit the noun to him).

Now, explain to me why a man had to flag my sweet little lady story because it had the words 'blow' and 'job' sitting next to each other way down in the final paragraphs and he was afraid that his sixteen-year-old son might read my story and be tainted forever. Any kid who would read through that entire story would surely be mature enough to deal with that. Any who didn't read the story and just searched for those two words together would be a little punk who used the words together frequently (or dreamed about them), and an innocent child wouldn't know what putting them together meant.

What's the George Carlin quote? -- Something like "There are no bad words. Just bad ideas, bad intentions... and wooooords."

Sandy - best to use the term "BJ" in that context.  You can always say you were referring to the large box club.  It's quite effective.  Recently, I had my grown children in the car for some reason and we were discussing a stop at BJ's for something.  My son nonchalantly stated, "I like BJ's.  They're nice.", a comment nobody could really object to without seeming prudish and argumentative. 

Kris, I am ashamed to admit that I don’t remember the exact quote, considering the fact that I adored George enough to marry him (at least in my fantasies) and used another of his quotes as my signature line for years.

"Those who dance are considered insane by those who cannot hear the music."
— George Carlin

Sheryl, considering it was a bot that Kerry guy sent in to find my BJ comment, I'm not sure it recognized context. I do wonder if it searched for BJ as well as the words, though.

cracking up at sheryl's kid and glad i wasn't in the car cause i wouldn't have been able to stop laughing.

Yeah, he's a laugh-riot, CC.  A real 22-yr-old comedien.  At the time, we all kinda did one of those explosive-spit-laughs, thankful that we weren't drinking any liquids at that moment. 

"damn is also biblical but it's considered profanity."

What if some people consider the entire bible profanity? Does that mean we can't use any of the words that are in it? I sure hope we aren't all bound to individual considerations about words.

Just in case, I consider enunciate to be a perfect word.

Any considerations on the word sphinctor?

As long as you're not hurling sphinctor's and dumbass's at other members as personal attacks, knock yourself out.

I do believe the correct spelling is sphincter... so sphinctor couldn't be considered profanity since it isn't a word, right?  LOL

And, the word picture of someone actually hurling a sphincter at someone is cracking me up!

'knock yourself out' with a sphintor, says Chuck.

Now doesn't THAT conjure up some interesting images, Sandy?

Those images are enough to make me hurl, Sheryl. Well, if I had enough energy to hurl, maybe.

Sandy, (Gather Site Smartsphinctor) July 9, 2009

Any considerations on the word sphinctor?

Yeah--it's spincter. Dumbass.

Well, dumbass is really two words, smartass. (Do you believe I actually got out my Dorland's and still spelled it wrong when I came back to the computer? I am a dumbass.)

Oops, Janna left out the H! 

it's pronounced Dumas.

LOL at CC!  That's classic!

I guess I'm a smartass and a dumbass.

What did I say about hurling asses?!

Chuck - it is really hard to view your comments as coming from anyone with any kind  of authority with that icon of yours.

(of course, with my icon, I certainly don't garner any respect, either.)

would a hurling ass be considered a stink bomb?

"What did I say about hurling asses?!"

Oh, yeah.

Should Sandy and I report each other to Member Support for hurling asses at each other?

Additionally, should I also report myself to Member Support for calling myself a smartass and a dumbass?

Thank You!

I actually know a woman who's last name is Dumas.   She's also a dumbass but that's neither here nor there.

"Should Sandy and I report each other to Member Support for hurling asses at each other?"

Shoot, no. (That just feels weird.) We should flag this post!

Chuck, any word on the word flaggot?

Should Janna also report me for calling her "indecisive"?

"Chuck, any word on the word flaggot?"

I thought the correct spelling was flaggit?

Sunny beaches! I'm going back to my dadblamed critique article since I can't spell a freakin' word without somebody jumping my behind.

This whole thread is ASSenine, and I hope you all will refrain from ASSaulting each other, because I would hate for my  ASSertive question to Chuck to be ASSociated with anything ASSumingly profane/

Only a jackass would assume you were assaulting others for being assertive about such (asinine) questions associating you with Chuck, after all we know that Chuck isn't a wood chuck but we don't know how much wood Chuck could chuck or if he can chuck wood. Chuck?

How exactly does one "chuck" wood?  Is that like chewing it?

I think it depends on whether chucking is a verb or a noun, Chuck.

To chuck is to throw away, but some think chucking is throwing up. For example, Fred up-chucked his lunch at the family reunion yesterday. We chucked him out on his ass for doing that! What the hell was he thinking anyway? He should have never eaten the entire Chuck Steak!

Now now, "up-chuck" is a different verb altogether.

but it's still a verb. *grin

Ooops. I'm not a wizard afterall. Back to the drawing board with me.

would i be required to flag something for adult content, like one of my paintings, if it contained a penis mushroom (aka Phallus impudicus)?  after all, it can't help what it is, it just is.  is it my perversion for painting it?  "god's" perversion for making it?  or someone else's perversion for wanting to flag it as profane?

arguing perspective is never easy as no two people will ever see it the same.

Art should always be exempt, CC. 

(BTW -  what the hell is a penis mushroom?)

click the link and you will see.  it's exactly what you think it is.  a mushroom shaped like a penis.

Aw heck.  I can't define pornography but I know it when I see it.

Oh!  I'd like some kind of scale of measurement with that picture, please.

then there is the african species. Phallus drewesii

and lest we forget about the Muntinus Caninus also known as the dog penis mushroom.

sheryl, i'm sure they come in all different sizes depending on nature's stimulation.

CC's penis mushrooms are what first attracted me to her work. Now, I store them in the same fond memories compartment with the penis sausages my nephew asked for in the grocery.

i'm glad to hear that you are fond of my peni.

sheryl, examiner.com has a scale photo for you.

HOLY CRAP!!!!!!!!  (Oops, can I say that?)

and apparently that specific species of it will make you see god.

hahaha i didn't even catch that.  so true.

I'm sure Bob Drewes is real proud of that one, CC. :-)

"It's a wonderful honor and great fun to have this phallus-shaped fungus named after me," says Drewes. "I have been immortalized in the scientific record."

seems he's excited over it.

He's probably wishing they had turned the picture upside down before publishing it. :-)

AHA!

I followed all the bad words on my feed to find you all here!  :-)

If I use the orifice in conjunction with the word anus or anal orifice would I be asked to remove said article or such words?

Interesting party going on here!  Could someone please direct me to the chips and beer?  I hope there's lots of bean dip.  Beans = farts.  Oh, can I use that word?  ;op

LOL@ these comments.

Hiya I am new and not sure if this is the right place to post but I am getting error message after attempting to submit my content.  Can anyone advise?

P.S. These comments have given me a good chuckle!  Thanks for the laugh.