Comments on: Playing at the park, getting banned from BoingBoing

By: Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › BoingBoing goes censorship crazy again!

Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › BoingBoing goes censorship crazy again! — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 22:30:49 +0000

[...] BoingBoing (you’ll recall I got banned ages ago), a site which regularly criticizes other sites, corporations, and entities for censorship and [...]

By: XeniDislikesFreedom

XeniDislikesFreedom — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 04:16:28 +0000

I agree that their initial moderator ban is the largest hurdle for any dissent to filter through and get posted (initially). Note though they apply several layers of comment censorship.
Layer 1: Group think Certification – If the post is BB-group think certified, it is posted with very little delay (~5 minutes).
Layer 2: Dissenting Comment with potential to Infect other readers. Here the post comment is deeeelayed. The comment appears perhaps 24 hours later (or more), long after most daily readers have read it, made their comment (if desired), and moved on.
Layer 3: Banned post. The post is never published. The comment in question is such an affront to their collective view, that it is quarantined and never seen the light of day. If confronted, BB censorship apologists attribute it to overworked moderators and or technical incompetence, not censorship!
Layer 4: Banned account. Here, the evidence of independent thought is too much to bear and the account is shadow-banned. They do not send you a notice, or give you an indication of banning when logging on to their site. In place of an explicit message that you’re no longer invited to the “No Homers” club, various error codes such as “Invalid Entry” are returned when you attempt to post comments. Again, if confronted the BB cowards maintain plausible deniability.

For your comment scrapping, you might want to start with something like this. Courtesy of Yahoo Pipes.

Here is the story on Digg.
https://digg.com/news/story/BoingBoing_sans_Doctorow

Direct link: https://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.info?_id=86565ec716af369600276f97725b46de

Good luck!

By: Shannon

Shannon — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 02:50:58 +0000

I have been thinking about writing a bot that watches their comment forums and keeps automatically tracks some of the censorship by watching their moderators delete and edit posts they disagree with. Of course it wouldn’t catch the massive pile that doesn’t make it through the initial censorship screen. Their moderators are sycophants and completely devoid of journalistic ethics.

By: XeniDislikesFreedom

XeniDislikesFreedom — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 02:11:58 +0000

Howdy! I was recently banned from BoingBoing. After years of occasional readership, I decided to create an account in the past year to participate with the community. Commenting is great for sure and it lead to the (somewhat obvious) outcome that I visited my often. From more frequent reading, I became increasingly uncomfortable with the posts of two contributors (Cory, but mostly those from Xeni Jardin). I found them encouraging Anti-Christian comments, treating Arab countries as “stupid”, and attempting to mold opinion with dirty tricks that would make Hearst proud.

They are bullies. Any dissent quickly leads to banning. And even community interaction is discouraged.

In essence, BoingBoing is “forced group think”. To participate, you must not indicate an opposition to our agenda. An Agenda you say? Yes, of course, they participate in an agenda. Their “public agenda” is for all to see, but their “secret agenda” can easily be inferred as well.

After being banned (like you, with no explanation, notice), it really ticked me off. This is a site that valued at over $100 million. Yet, when they are confronted with serious lack of journalistic or ethical integrity, they continue to claim to be “Just A Blog”,

Thank you Al for giving me a venue to air my dissent.

By: BBSucks

BBSucks — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 02:10:08 +0000

I’ve noticed a trend that BB responds to criticism of censorship and abusive moderation by claiming “technical problems with the comment system”, or “problems sorting out IP addresses”.

They also deflect any accountability to journalistic integrity and deflect justified criticism by claiming that WAJAB (We Are Just A Blog) defense.

As a site valued at over $100 million, I’m pretty sure they could afford a better commenting system, and allow real community interaction. So, yeah, your WAJAB defense is very weak sauce indeed fellas.

Boing Boing: An internet outpost of Group Think and Payola, dedicated to all its reader-serfs who have yet to learn anything from abusive media practices.

By: Stuart

Stuart — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 01:02:15 +0000

“Arguing on the internet is like competing in the special Olympics, even if you win, you’re still retarded.”

Saying that, though, I still agree with you and love you Shannon.

By: Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › Oh, moderators…

Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › Oh, moderators… — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 02:43:13 +0000

[...] you may remember, I have sort of a love/hate relationship with BoingBoing, that’s currently more on the [...]

By: Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › I agree completely, Amazon!

Shannon Larratt is Zentastic › I agree completely, Amazon! — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 22:23:42 +0000

[...] very much and very aggressively in the “God is NOT Great” camp — enough so as to get me banned from the surprisingly pro-superstition and Muslim-fearing BoingBoing, maybe the first time I’ve been dumped by an online girlblogfriend — so I totally [...]

By: Herbert

Herbert — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:03:00 +0000

@TOM

Ok, let me make myself a bit more clear. How often have you had a problem, and you then ask “god” for some answers and he either ignores you, or tells you what you already know. Thats what I mean when I say your “tiny” mind. There is no god, my superstitous friend.

By: Nurse Gracer

Nurse Gracer — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 07:23:07 +0000

My husband and I used to read BB with great regularity, but both of us have let it go due to the increasing frequency of fnords. It used to be a site of truly wonderful things but it now suffers from such reactivism that we can no longer stand it.

By the way, my husband (Formerly iam:Netzapper) says hi and wishes you well.

By: Tom

Tom — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:53:45 +0000

How funny that you actually have the gall to criticise someone else’s intolerance of your intolerance.

By: Lady G

Lady G — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:26:13 +0000

Your experiences at BoingBoing do not surprise me in the least. BB was founded by “hipsters” and like any hipster, they are completely intolerant of any beliefs that contradict their own world image.

Furthermore they are a huge bunch of hypocrites who make a big noise about censorship yet actively practice the harshest form of it to anyone who dares point out the hypocrisy. Then they come back with idiotic smug references cum in-jokes to cake and ice-cream that would make any Scientologist word smith proud.

BoingBoing is well past it’s prime and it’s time. There’s nothing sadder than a broken hipster.

By: Tom

Tom — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 14:35:27 +0000

@SHANNON

Setting aside the fact that I completely disagree with that sentiment, your position assumes that theism is the only factor in my decision making process. There are factors just as dangerous or delusional as, if not more so than, theism. Should they be discriminating factors as well?

I consider myself lucky that the majority of people, even atheists, don’t hold views as extreme as yours.

@HERBERT

Congratulations on being brave enough to hide behind your anonymity just long enough to make snide insults and uneducated generalisations.

By: Shannon

Shannon — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 14:11:11 +0000

Tom, if your argument in terms of why things should be the way they should be boils down to superstition and unverifiable fantasy, then yes, your argument can not be validly considered in matters of the real world.

By: Tom

Tom — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 14:08:59 +0000

So Shannon, let me get this straight. All theists, even the intelligent and compassionate ones, ‘lose their spot at the table’, but would-be champions of atheism like Herbert are still welcome?

By: Herbert

Herbert — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 12:55:49 +0000

You see, the problem with christians like yourself, TOM (aka Shitface), is that you won’t think for yourself. You throw all your problems to your imaginary friend that is in yoiur tiny mind.

By: starbadger

starbadger — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 13:57:40 +0000

@DEFEKTER
okay we’re all humans.

I have read that if we consider the creature that what we were (the animal, the primate) a quarter of million years ago that there have been 90,000,000 million of us with about 7 billion alive right now.

There have been times when I have had the thoughts you’ve had as no doubt have at least billions of the 90 illion at some time or another.

On reflection I take us (we humans) and myself less seriously than earlier.

Something I would encourage you or others to consider is whether or not a belief in god or at least a sense of something larger than ourselves is one of the things that makes us human.

A Shark lives in the moment. Its momment.

Is a Shark an atheist?

By: Defekter

Defekter — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:16:37 +0000

@ STARBADGER
Yes, I am a human being. I am constantly disgusted by that fact.
Secondly, you need to take everything in it’s context rather than blow a statement out of proportion, but just for you, dear, I will tell you that I meant that I agree with Shannon on his viewpoints relative to THIS blog post. We live in a very instantaneous culture here in North America, and that applies to everything, even responses to blog posts.
Thirdly, I am not alone in my cynical attitude toward humanity, and all that needs to be done is a quick glance around in public to know for sure in your own heart that humans are disgusting, and something needs to be done now.

By: Defekter

Defekter — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:14:02 +0000

@ STARBADGER
Yes, I am a human being. I am constantly disgusted by that fact.
Secondly, you need to take everything in it’s context rather than blow a statement out of proportion, but just for you, dear, I will tell you that I meant that I agree with Shannon on his viewpoints relative to THIS blog post.
Thirdly, I am not alone in my cynical attitude toward humanity, and all that needs to be done is a quick glance around in public to know for sure in your own heart that humans are disgusting, and something needs to be done now.

By: Shannon

Shannon — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 22:34:21 +0000

Tom, that’s only true if you take it to extremes. Like I said, Flying Spaghetti Monster. The logical conclusion to results is the logical conclusion, and you don’t say “2+2=4, but it could be 5 if [insert magical exception here]“