topic Re: PlusNet shutdown of site in Plusnet Feedback

PlusNet shutdown of site

brianex121 — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 21:44:36 GMT

Noticed in today's Sunday Herald, that PlusNet and BT had moved quickly
(once the problem had been highlighted to them) to close down a Catholic Voice site,
said to have been critical of what the paper called 'extremist Jews' (See Page 6 of the News features).
The Sheffield web editor claims he has been 'smeared' but whatever the truth is,
how did it need a complaint ? Shouldn't the checker - CleanFeed - have noticed the type of matter
appearing? I'm not going to repeat what the MP instanced, but if this was accurately reported,
then there is no doubt the material ought never to have appeared.
What's PlusNet saying about all this... Surely we subscribers deserve a comment
on our community or Home pages please?

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

VileReynard — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 21:55:04 GMT

I see the Herald says

Quote
The website, www.catholicvoice.co.uk, takes an inflammatory stance over extreme sections of Judaism that reject non-Jewish races.

Is that why Israel killed all those Palestinians caged in the Gaza strip?
Shouldn't these Jews with the extremist views be shut down instead?

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Oldjim — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 21:59:13 GMT

jim:post
Gentlemen - this topic is heading in a direction I don't like. I am therefore locking it temporarily until a response is received from Plusnet tomorrow.
Can I ask that this discussion is held in abeyance until that time mod:end

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

petejackson — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 17:42:50 GMT

I can confirm that the website hosted at www.catholicvoice.co.uk was removed from the Plusnet hosting servers on 27th February following a complaint made to us relating to the nature of its content. The website was deemed to be in clear contravention of section 7.2.10 of our Acceptable Use Policy ( http://www.plus.net/info2/legal/aup.html ) specifically in relation to its containing 'material liable to offend'.
7.2.10 You may not post any adult material, material liable to offend, defamatory, confidential, secret or other proprietary material using your Web pages. You will be held responsible for and accept responsibility for any material of this nature available on your web pages. We accept no responsibility for material of this nature available on your web pages.
Plusnet does not proactively monitor the content of web pages and content hosted by our customers; however customers are bound by our Terms and Conditions of Use and Acceptable Use Policy. Where material is reported to us we will review and take action where appropriate.
It is not reasonable to infer that Plusnet, either directly or indirectly, should review the content of every web page we host, nor do we have the responsibility or the authority to do so. However I must stress that we take our responsibilities very seriously to act quickly on complaints made to us. The IWF content filter you refer to uses a list of known websites that we wish to protect our customers from inadvertently accessing. That the Catholic Voice website does not appear on this list is not the issue here, nor does it sit within Plusnet's influence.
The statement issued by our press office should serve to make our position clear on this issue: "We have a clear policy of refusing to work with people or businesses carrying out illegal activities or who make offensive statements. This is clearly the case with Catholic Voice and when we became aware of this site we terminated the hosting agreement."

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Oldjim — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:07:10 GMT

[Moderator's post by Jim (Oldjim) I have unlocked this topic for replies but in view of the potential for dubious comments, given the subject of the original post, I will be moderating this topic with a fairly heavy hand.
Any posts which I consider off topic or of an inflammatory nature will be removed with a PM to the poster.
If there are a significant number of posts which require moderation then I will lock the topic again.
I hope you will take this warning to heart and make my job a lot easier.
Thank you in advance ]

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Strat — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 19:53:02 GMT

Having just had a look at the site it's such heavy reading that if there was anything offensive on there I certainly couldn't be bothered to find it even if I wanted to.
Edit: The site is still available currently as I'm sure many people know.

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

jelv — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 20:01:53 GMT

I've just found a good review of the site: http://www.mediawatchwatch.org.uk/

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

itsme — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 20:17:49 GMT

What concerns me is that the site was closed down because of a complaint from an MP. If indeed the site carried 'material liable to offend' which is a criminal offence then the request should come from the police. Are the police charging the website owner?

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

MrC — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 21:12:47 GMT

PN seem to have shot themselves in the foot a bit here. Their AUP is so completely open to anyone at all claiming that something is offensive that PN have to act or leave themselves open to claims that they aren't following their own AUP.
What the AUP really needs is some definition of how content is determined to be offensive, eg by reference to an external adjudicator of some sort, or via some legal definition or decision making process.
I think the issue about whether the content is illegal or not is completely separate from PN following it's own AUP.
Just my 2 cents.
Mike

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

jelv — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 22:20:47 GMT

It seems that the Plusnet policy is that if there is a complaint from someone who is in a position to make life uncomfortable for Plusnet they will take the easy way out and take the site down.
Having said that, after looking at the site through a web archive, I don't think the sites removal is much of a loss to the internet (for example did you know that the 2012 Olympic logo was a not very well hidden emblem of the word ZION?).

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Strat — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 22:25:00 GMT

I'm shocked

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

jkerr82508 — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 22:42:24 GMT

Unfortunately, the only result of all this fuss is that a harmless eccentric, that no-one had ever heard of, is now a "celebrity" and his site, when it does re-appear (as it inevitably will, somewhere) will receive much more traffic than it ever did in the past. Anyone who wants to read this sort of stuff doesn't need to look very hard to find a lot more "offensive" material than this site is reported to have included.
Jim

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

VileReynard — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 23:25:54 GMT

Am I allowed to say (without fear of censorship) that these crank sites should be allowed to get on with whatever is that they do?
I was under the impression that if a UK web site needs to be shut down, then it is a police matter - not just a transfer of the
site to some other ISP.

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

jelv — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 09:33:07 GMT

Quote from: jkerr82508
Unfortunately, the only result of all this fuss is that a harmless eccentric, that no-one had ever heard of, is now a "celebrity" and his site, when it does re-appear (as it inevitably will, somewhere) will receive much more traffic than it ever did in the past. Anyone who wants to read this sort of stuff doesn't need to look very hard to find a lot more "offensive" material than this site is reported to have included.

I'm not sure I'd agree with "harmless" - essentially he's not a lot different to some of the Muslim extremists who have attracted a lot of media attention in the last few years.
As I've already said in a PM about this topic: What bothers me most is that what has happened has given a raving lunatic the oxygen of publicity.

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Strat — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:51:45 GMT

I hope, in say 10 years time sites such as that aren't quoted as one main reason why the Internet became a closely regulated and paid for service.

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

VileReynard — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 14:40:18 GMT

It is already.
adie:quote

Re: PlusNet shutdown of site

Strat — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 19:17:50 GMT

Quote from: Strat
I hope, in say 10 years time sites such as that aren't quoted as one main reason why the Internet became a closely regulated and paid for service.

Quote from: Axis
It is already.

Thank you Jeremy, you haven't let me down
Right.
By 'closely regulated' I am thinking in terms of no member of the public being allowed to place content on the Internet personally but would have to submit it to a regulatory body for scrutiny and subsequent inclusion on a site appropriate to the content if deemed fit for general consumption. I have a couple of sites neither of which I submitted for scrutiny so assume that such a state doesn't currently exist.
By 'paid for service' I am referring to a situation where most sites are subscription based and those that aren't are 100% advertising. The subscription would finance the regulatory infrastructure referred to earlier. Access to the Internet via broadband or the like as opposed to content viewing is a separate issue to the above and would continue to be paid for as now.
A bit of a nightmare scenario for the Internet and those who conceived and developed it.
Edit: Just a thought...hope I haven't given PN any ideas