The case of the gay search engine

From: thenet1@thenet1.com
To: <rfi@netvision.net.il>
Subject: Your site has been rejected
Date sent: Tue, 20 Oct 1998 19:43:01 -04

The Net One, Corp. http://members.xoom.com/RedFish/index.html Rejected
Your submitted site has been rejected because of language. The following words were found which rejected this site:
(lesbian)
Remove the words that rejected the site and resubmit it. We spider all sites on a routine basis. If bad language is found, the site submission will be terminated and any webpage submitted From the base URL will be rejected from then on.

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From: Red Fish <rfi@netvision.net.il>
To: thenet1@thenet1.com
Subject: Dirty words, yuck!
Date sent: Wed, 21 Oct 1998 23:38:04

Dear sirs,

I have recently submitted a site for your internet index, "Net One", and my site was rejected because of language. However, as I understand from your mail, the site was not rejected on account of containing really dirty words such as f*** or s***, but because of containing the word (And I apologize if I offend anyone by including it here) 'Lesbian'.

I understand that you don't want any porn sites on your index, and so you have to screen websites before accepting them. But as the mentioned word appeared on the page I submitted, according to my last counting, once, I see no reason why this fact should label my site as "dirty". On the other hand, I very much doubt that your robots can read pictures; therefore, I could in theory submit a page full of hardcore pornographic material, and there would be no problem with it, as long as I don't mention any 'dirty words' such as 'lesbian'.

Now, like it or not, a great many people in the world are gays or lesbians, and some of them even know how to use computers. By refusing to include in your index sites that even mention that fact, you're denying those people's right to have web pages, or at least ones you want to know about. However I honestly believe that gay people will continue to exist even if you refuse to acknowledge their existence.

Frankly, you guys are just pathetic.

Have a happy life.

Red Fish

Oh no, I know a dirty word

Red Fish, I agree you should be abel to put in what ever you want in the Adult category in The Net One, and you can post anything you want in the Adult Category. Please try it and let me know if it worked for you. If you go to The Net One and click on Adult in the drop down box you should see many of the listings you spoke about. Thanks Jonathan Edelman

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From: Red Fish <rfi@netvision.net.il>
To: Jonathan Edelman <thenet1@thenet1.com>
Subject: Re: Dirty words, yuck!
Date sent: Thu, 22 Oct 1998 00:21:48

Hello Jonathan,

First, let me say I am pleasantly surprised that you even replied to my mail, and this fast. I expected it to disappear into oblivion. However I still think your (=net1's) approach is wildly discriminating.

In your letter, you wrote:
"If you go to The Net One and click on Adult in the drop down box you should see many of the listings you spoke about."

No, I didn't see any of them. I did see lots and lots of listings inviting me to "Hot Sex", "Live Nude Girls", "Adult Entertainment", etc. That's not what I'm interested in and that's not what my site is about. I suppose I can list my site there, but that would be entirely missing the point - nobody ever searches the "above 18" category for anything but sex.

You're not, as I thought earlier, ignoring the existence of gays altogether, just putting them into a ghetto. Anyone can list a site in the "Personal Pages" category saying "Hello, my name's John, I'm 26 years old and I like football", but if he says "Hello, my name's James, I'm 27 years old, I'm gay and I like baseball", he'll be thrown into pornland - even if his site doesn't mention sex in any way. That's as good as saying anyone can submit a site, unless he's jewish; then he'd have to be moved into the "hateful minorities" category.

I hope that clarified the problem and I hope Net1 would be changing it's policies soon. Until then, I have no intention of trying to submit any sites to it.

Thanks for your time

Red

Educational racism 2.1

Hi again, well we are trying to make it so that we let people search our site and not accidentally find a adult site if they where not trying to. This is why we do it this way. ( It also lets it be a safer site for kids) If you have a better suggestion then please let me know it and I will pass it to programing. Hoping to hear a better solution?

Jonathan Edelman

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From: Red Fish <rfi@netvision.net.il>
To: Jonathan Edelman <thenet1@thenet1.com>
Subject: Re: Dirty words, yuck!
Date sent: Thu, 22 Oct 1998 00:53:29

Hello again...

In your previous letter, you wrote:
"we are trying to make it so that we let people search our site and not accidentally find a adult site if they where not trying to."

That would be a very noble cause.

"If you have a better suggestion then please let me know it and I will pass it to programing. Hoping to hear a better solution?"

So, I appreciate your intentions, but I'm afraid you're way off.

And as for a better idea - I honestly not have one, except perhaps having a human being take a look at the submitted sites and decide whether they count as smut or not. I won't trust a robot to decide for me what's moral and what's not. How do most web indexes do it?

Good luck :^)

Red