h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So I wrote an entry. That was in February.

On Feb 26th, I put it in Peer Review. The response was almost universally positive. Read the thread: F116054?thread=251925

On March 17th, it was picked for the Edited Guide. I was ecstatic.

On April 14th, it hit the front page for a day. Cool!

The entry in question can be found here: A1000684

You will note, if you click that link, that it now says
"This Guide Entry has been deleted from the Guide by the author."

That's a lie. It hasn't. I haven't deleted it. I couldn't. It's an EDITED ENTRY. It was deleted today by the h2g2 Editors.

For the reason it's gone, you must look at the original, which was pulled at the same time: A979004. The original text is gone. In its place, I've put the email I got from the Editors.

Now, I'm not paranoid or anything. But what I wrote was a GREAT DEAL less directly sexually explicit than a number of other entries which remain visible:

A414451
A427204
A427204 (this one describes and condones an activity which is now illegal in the UK)

So I can only wonder why my entry, alone of those listed at C499, has been deemed to "break the guidelines for content".

It was not sexually explicit - indeed it went to some lengths to avoid direct discussion of the sexual act.

It did not describe or condone any activity which is illegal, dangerous, unethical, immoral or against any religious tenets which I know of (I don't know of any religions which have tenets about the use of camcorders...).

It used no unnacceptable language, was not defamatory, profane, or in any way offensive.

The Editors themselves admit it does not break the House Rules, and it was in Peer Review for nearly three weeks and was on the Front Page of the Edited Guide for heaven's sake!

And now - after sitting quietly in the EG for over two months - NOW, it is deemed unnacceptable and removed. You can't even tell what the title was.

Can anyone, anyone at all, suggest why the BBC is happy to publish a guide to masturbation, an explicit review of condoms, or a guide to sex in public, but doesn't want you reading common sense advice about the use in your own home of a camcorder on its site?

It strikes me as very, very odd. There's an entry, minding its own business, and then suddenly FOOP - it's gone.

I'm not paranoid, but you've got to wonder what I might have done to get this treatment.

FB

Curious

I read this entry a while ago, and you're correct

Over the last few days, a few entries have been removed. THe Hanging Gardens of Babylon and Cannibalism as I recall

But those were hidden

It's hard to judge without being able to see your entry or the edited version of it, but it sounds like some jobsworth at the BBC, or maybe one of the legal department has told the Italics to remove this one.

Maybe others will follow too

This is definitely not a hiddenworthy entry, unless it changed since I saw in PR

We'll have to wait over the weekend I suppose

> Over the last few days, a few entries have been removed. THe Hanging Gardens of Babylon and Cannibalism as I recall

'Cannibalism' was reinstated a few days later.

'The Hanging Gardens of Babylon' was hidden permanently, but, in my personal opinion, that was hidden because its content was similar to that published elsewhere. Certainly, the Google cache of its content didn't seem to break any other House Rule.

RhoMuNuQ

Oop, I forgot about Cannibalism being reinstated

Wasn't Hanging Gardens an update? So why don't they revert it back to unupdated version? Or can they do that

Jodan -- the Cannibalism entry is back - A530687. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon was removed because it was discovered, during the Update process, to break the House Rules. Neither of those are related to the current entry.

Further information: the entry didn't change much in PR, although the title ended up as "A gentleman's guide to home made adult entertainment", from the original "Home Made Pornography Do's and Don'ts". The main change was a sort of jokey tone addressing the thing to "gentlemen", on the grounds that "ladies" wouldn't be interested.

It was DEFINITELY all my own work, and appeared nowhere else.

FB

Jodan -- this has been discussed and concluded elsewhere -- go look for the threads. There was a reason an update was done, the prior version was considered to no longer meet the current EG standards.

Mikey, I read those threads

I just never understood which one and why, but I don't want to distract the thread

If you're really confused, you can always email me, and I will try and 'splain. You should be able to get my address from the scouts group.

My *Edited* Entry wasn't "moderated", but actually REMOVED, didn't break the House Rules, and didn't break the Terms and Conditions, but WAS, apparently, outside the "content guidelines" - so I went looking for these guidelines.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/policies/producer_guides/pdf/online_guides.pdf

I've read this document reasonably carefully, and can find nothing which was breached by the Entry that I wrote and that the Editors put on the Front Page in April.

In particular, I can find nothing in there which would suggest what I wrote was unsuitable, given that clearly everything else listed under C499 is suitable.

I'd love to hear anyone's ideas on what is going on here...

FB

Your article may have fallen foul of the " .... or otherwise objectionable material is not acceptable" clause of the house rules. Which is basically a catch all statement to say "if its causing a problem, it can be removed".

If someone somewhere objected to the article, all they had to do was hit the yikes button. If a couple of people have yikes'ed it then it may get hidden or removed even if it doesn't technically break any house rules.

The BBC must be publicly accountable for the content on h2g2, if the public have complained (within reason) then the BBC have to act.

Menza said "Your article may have fallen foul of the " .... or otherwise objectionable material is not acceptable" clause of the house rules."

And I'd agree with you, Menza, and understand - if the Editors hadn't taken care to tell me in their email that, and I quote:

"the entry doesn't break the h2g2 House Rules".

If it broke the House Rules, I'd have expected the page to say "This Entry has been hidden during moderation, blah blah". It doesn't.

If it broke the rules, I'd have expected a moderation email. I didn't get one.

Whatever has happened here, it's NOT what usually happens to entries which are yikesed.



I'm just surprised and puzzled that something that was able to get through PR and sit on the Front Page can sit quietly in the Edited Guide for two months and then suddenly, unaccountably (literally, I suspect), be removed. What happened?

And why only this entry, out of all the others that are a deal more explicit, and which condone sexual activities which are condemned by certain major religions (A414451), which are by most peoples standards to say the least perverse (A545159), which are immoral or unethical (A878204), or which are actually illegal (A507034)? Is advice on how to use a video camera in your own home actually LESS suitable in the BBC's eyes than advice on how to find porn on the internet (A523504), and if so, why?

FB

All of those (except how to be a perfect mistress) are informative, not instructive. You can get off writing about condoms and masturbation if it's simply informative. If an entry instructed how to go about doing things involving these... themes it might fare the same fate

rambling

I think it may have been pulled because of all the trouble that webcams have caused recently...or some sort of reason having to do with people using your information the wrong way.

Maybe you should have them spell out the problem for you.

"informative, not instructive"???

A375455 is very specifically instructive, as is A507034, which additionally contains the phrase "dying for a shag". Lovely.



Any suggestion webcams are relevant must surely be mistaken - the entry was very clearly about camcorders. Webcams are RUBBISH for making your own naughty vids - they have diabolical resolution, poor framerates, non-intuitive interfaces and CABLES. Plus, they weren't mentioned.

As for "people using your information the wrong way."

It's "Auntie BBC", isn't it? Not "Nanny"?

Take a look at A676352. It describes (although not in *too* much detail) how to murder ten million people at a time. I would suggest this is slightly more open to accusations of being able to be used in the wrong way.

More realistically, look at A420832 - which is a nice informative entry, which could easily be used as a poisoner's handbook.

I hope there isn't the suggestion that any information which might be misused by a minority must be hidden from the responsible majority. Are we not, in general, adult enough to deal with this stuff?

Perhaps not.

As for them spelling out why this has been done, all I'll say is that the staff, according to my observations, do not have a good record of explaining decisions like this. I can but hope.

FB

Yes...don't give up on getting an explanation....if you feel you have been wronged you should.

Editors should ....and often can...be able to justify the inclusion or exclusion of every piece.

I still think that the piece was pulled due to some concern of its ill use....I have no objections to a couple taping themselves because they love each other, by the way (not just for kinkiness...but that is my opinion)....I would think it is something to do with ill use.

Andrea (hope you get your answer)

Have you emailed them politely and asked?

I absolutely agree with your statement: "I'm just surprised and puzzled that something that was able to get through PR and sit on the Front Page can sit quietly in the Edited Guide for two months and then suddenly, unaccountably (literally, I suspect), be removed. What happened?" It surprises me too.

As a simple matter of courtesy I would expect a clear and simple explanation to be given to the author of any entry this happened to. It bugs me when the italics are opaque like this - it is rude to the researchers involved, and it causes unneccesary damage to their reputations as custodians of the site.

"The Perfect Mistress" "condones ... sexual practices which are immoral or unethical"? Well, I guess it does, at that. And there was me thinking it gave helpful hints on damage limitation.

Ben

Re posts # 1 and 14:
I'm not too familiar with UK criminal law, but why should the acts in A427204 and A507034 be illegal?
The first is on female masturbation and the other on outdoor sex. The first is not illegal to my best knowledge and the other states explicitly in the entry that it is not illegal to have sex outdoors. Could you clarify your arguemnts to these points?