add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

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abma
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add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

in recent commits i've updated the "censor" filter in uberserver. now it handles also messages in battles and battle titles.

personally i think its better that it is transparent but its bad to have a list with a link list to maybe illegal sites.

best idea i had was to scrambled it with ROT13, but not sure.

is it a bad idea to add the bad-word list to github?
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PicassoCT
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by PicassoCT »

Fucking sure it is.

I shall make it my personal goal to add swearwords as units, just too make any censors live complicated.

Oh, this is not personal. This is about inter-player-hostility. Go on.
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Jools
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Jools »

Even if the censoring system (quotes unmerited because it is really a censoring system) is quite innocent—it is for instance cute that it changes 'damn' to 'darn'—it is still censorship and the question is, why is this needed?

We come from a different cultural background and what is profanity for one may be normal communication for another. Yes, it should be transparent how the censored words are decided, and it should also be transparent who manages this, and how the person that manages this is appointed. Everything less than this is corruption, of which we unfortunately already have quite a bit in the spring community.

No, links to illegal sites should not be published or the whole thing is counter-productive.

What if someone makes a program to change back fornicate to fuck? Is there a infinite loop check to make sure that the lobby server doesn't crash just because of something as trivial as a profanity check?

warned user for this post -- abma
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

Jools wrote:Even if the censoring system (quotes unmerited because it is really a censoring system) is quite innocent—it is for instance cute that it changes 'damn' to 'darn'—it is still censorship and the question is, why is this needed?
because it automates enforcement of server rules and removes workload from moderators.
Jools wrote: What if someone makes a program to change back fornicate to fuck? Is there a infinite loop check to make sure that the lobby server doesn't crash just because of something as trivial as a profanity check?
i'll ignore this. that deserves a warning.
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Jools
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Jools »

abma wrote: because it automates enforcement of server rules and removes workload from moderators.
What workload? Is it the mission of moderators now to check whether users say "damn" on a gaming forum? Maybe you need to re-evaluate your priorities. Not that I support the use of profanity, it's more the issue that it changes the text that user has written and it is bound to confuse people.

abma wrote:
Jools wrote: What if someone makes a program to change back fornicate to fuck? Is there a infinite loop check to make sure that the lobby server doesn't crash just because of something as trivial as a profanity check?
i'll ignore this. that deserves a warning.
You should not ignore this. It wrote it as I am in my opinion truly concerned that the stability of the site is considered secondary to some profanity check, that can't be right. Please don't take this personally, it was addressed as the way the profanity check is implemented and only secondary at the fact that it is, even though I don't support censorship in principle.
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

Jools wrote:
abma wrote: because it automates enforcement of server rules and removes workload from moderators.
What workload? Is it the mission of moderators now to check whether users say "damn" on a gaming forum? Maybe you need to re-evaluate your priorities. Not that I support the use of profanity, it's more the issue that it changes the text that user has written and it is bound to confuse people.
you didn't read the first post. its about the lobby server, not the forum.
gajop
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by gajop »

IMO:
1) List of censored stuff should not be available publicly
2) Profanity filtering should be implemented client side (but a list should be available publicly), or maybe even better, the client should be able to turn it off with a lobby command (feature req).
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Anarchid
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Anarchid »

is it a bad idea to add the already existing bad-word list to github?
I shall make it my personal goal to add swearwords as units, just too make any censors live complicated.
So i presume you are not doing this right now simply because you don't know what is in the bad words file?
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

i'll do whatever i want. why the heck do i ask when i get only such answers. (excluding gajop)

side note: already existing = the bad word list was created aeons ago.

edit: after calming down and giving jools a warning:

the bad_words.txt contains a table with dirty words (all of them insults) which are "translated" to similar meanings. i guess it was created by aegis. when the filter is activated for a channel it translates the words. atm its always on in battlerooms but not ingame. because of bugs this didn't work until now, but i fixed them. this is why i posted this topic. the same bad words are disallowed as usernames and checked on login.


bad_sites.txt is simple a file with a list of domains or urls which aren't allowed to send in channels/battlerooms where the filter is enabled.

for more details, read ubserver source code! its not hard to understand...
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

2) Profanity filtering should be implemented client side (but a list should be available publicly), or maybe even better, the client should be able to turn it off with a lobby command (feature req).
how to block bad usernames? what to do with messages which clearly offend lobby server rules:

https://github.com/spring/uberserver/bl ... ent.txt#L9

giving warnings is quiet annoying and time wasting. this applies to forum and lobby server.

maybe its weird that currently messages are replaced. would replacing bad words with **** be better?
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Silentwings
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Silentwings »

I'm personally ambivalent about whether or not there is a profanity filter; having one that is on/off-able client side sounds like a good idea. Replacement with random chars a la #@>$(£! seems better than **s or word-swapping to me; it conveys the sentiment well and without offence.

A filter that avoided bland impersonation of other usernames (l <-> I, O <-> 0, etc) and so on could be a good thing. Recently it seems not to bother people much but in the past it caused offence, and it harms no-one to prevent it. Idk if the database would handle it easily.
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

Silentwings wrote:I'm personally ambivalent about whether or not there is a profanity filter; having one that is on/off-able client side sounds like a good idea.
filtering on client side leads to the problem, that clients need the bad-words list, so it has to be somewhere public available.

Silentwings wrote:A filter that avoided bland impersonation of other usernames (l <-> I, O <-> 0, etc) and so on could be a good thing. Recently it seems not to bother people much but in the past it caused offence, and it harms no-one to prevent it. Idk if the database would handle it easily.
imo out of the scope of this thread. filtering similar looking user names is a different problem.
gajop
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by gajop »

abma wrote:
Silentwings wrote:I'm personally ambivalent about whether or not there is a profanity filter; having one that is on/off-able client side sounds like a good idea.
filtering on client side leads to the problem, that clients need the bad-words list, so it has to be somewhere public available.
The way I read it, it's closer to this:
gajop wrote:the client should be able to turn it off with a lobby command (feature req).
^ Client sends a lobby command and he no longer gets bad words filtered (censored stuff still gets filtered)
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

gajop wrote:^ Client sends a lobby command and he no longer gets bad words filtered (censored stuff still gets filtered)
oops, now i understand it: makes much more sense, agreed. what to send to the offender? imo he should be somehow notified that he did wrong, so act like bad words are filtered.
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PicassoCT
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by PicassoCT »

I for once welcome our new censorship and insult creativity enforcing overlords, and like to remind them, that as a trusted crazy person, i can help them to round up other trouble makers and raise the overall standard of insult-creativity.

http://pastebin.com/n4L2VjzY
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Silentwings
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Silentwings »

I think its better not to warn the source of the profanity. If the filter is going to optional then its not a major offence (which is generally the case irl), which makes me think of it as a milder alternative kind of ignorelist. So I also suggest that the filter is off by default, with a checkbox in SL options or first login. Of course if the profanities amounted to spam or sustained insults then they should be treated as such, but that requires human intervention anyway.
gajop
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by gajop »

I agree that there should be no warnings.
Whether or not the filter is off by default is irrelevant if there's a lobby command to set the state. Making it off by default would have it correspond to the current behavior.
Btw, I'm not sure if it should be applied everywhere. It shouldn't be applied to usernames, channel names and perhaps even battle titles (although in this case there's a battle ID unique identifier instead). Filtering in those cases might cause the clients to malfunction. Instead, bad words should be plainly disallowed in the case of usernames and battles, and no filtering done in the case of channels.
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Silentwings
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by Silentwings »

Not a big issue, but the default state matters in the same way as for any option, because it requires (a small amount of) someones time to figure out how to change it.
gajop
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by gajop »

True
abma
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Re: add "censorship" / profanity files to github?

Post by abma »

i'm no fan of filters/censoring: if it can be switched off imo it isn't needed.

is this conclusion correct?
1. store profanity list only on server, don't put it in the git repo
2. check only "static" stuff for profanity on the lobby server: channel name, channel topic, battle name, username
3. don't filter/change channel/battle/private messages at all

this would be performance/code wise also a good solution.
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