Annual Reminder: You Can Probably Just Call The Super Bowl The Super Bowl
Furnished content.
It's that special time of year again where we here at Techdirt need to remind you that, no, the NFL cannot keep you from referring to The Super Bowl as The Super Bowl, full stop. While the NFL stomps around the entire country every year, slapping down bars and churches for hosting Super Bowl parties, all while an extremely unhelpful media plays along, the truth is that most of the bullying the NFL does isn't over actual trademark infringement. Sure, if some business advertises some association or endorsement by the NFL, that would be trademark infringement. Or if they claimed endorsement of the game or the NFL, that too would be infringing use. But a church simply hosting a Super Bowl party is not trademark infringement.And, of course, the silliest output of this confusion is people and companies using half-baked euphemisms to refer to the Super Bowl instead. Everyone knows what they're talking about and, yet, this somehow isn't infringing. So, were there any confusion, it would still exist, and yet the NFL relents. The most common of these has been "The Big Game", of course, and its use continues to this day.Restaurants have taken to calling it the Big Game because the NFL trademarked the name "Super Bowl" and jealously defends its use. But whatever you call it, Dallas restaurants are offering a superabundance of specials and takeout options for Sunday's game. We'll just call them Super Bowl specials because we can. And so can everyone else. Really. Go ahead. This "the Big Game" nonsense is modernity's "fire in a crowded theater." But, because trademark bullying works, and everyone is so terrified of the NFL, instead you get this...Not to be tripped up by trademark hassles, GAPCo got creative in naming their game-day deal. The Superb Owl Sampler includes 12 garlic knots, 12 toasted ravioli (six cheese, six beef), 12 pizza poppers with large ranch and sauces for dipping. The sampler ($55) feeds up to 10 people. How the hell do you even parody something like that?But if you really want to get yourself irritated, actual United States government agencies are getting in on this euphemistic bullshit. And the US Consumer Product Safety Commission actually made this all sillier with its own messaging on Twitter.Why in the name of Tom Brady's sweaty jock strap would you put out a tweet that names the Super Bowl and then put out an image that uses a euphemism for it? And, related: "the Large Football Game"? I'm frankly tempted to see that graphic as an attempt to poke fun at the NFL for its protectionist nonsense, but somehow I don't think the USPSC has that much of a sense of humor.Stop. STOP. Stop giving the NFL a power it doesn't actually have. Stop acting like the league can somehow gatekeep reality. It can't. Just call the Super Bowl by its damned name. It's not Voldemort, after all.
Read more here
posted at: 12:00am on 04-Feb-2021
path: /Policy | permalink | edit (requires password)
Content Moderation Case Study: GitHub Attempts To Moderate Banned Words Contained In Hosted Repositories (2015)
Furnished content.
Summary: GitHub solidified its position as the world's foremost host of open source software not long after its formation in 2008. Twelve years after its founding, GitHub is host to 190 million repositories and 40 million users.Even though its third-party content is software code, GitHub still polices this content for violations of its terms of service. Some violations are more overt, like possible copyright infringement. But much of it is a bit tougher to track down.A GitHub user found themself targeted by a GitHub demand to remove certain comments from their code. The user's code contained the word "retard" -- a term that, while offensive in certain contexts, isn't offensive when used as a verb to describe an intentional delay in progress or development. But rather than inform the user of this violation, GitHub chose to remove the entire repository, resulting in users who had forked this code to lose access to their repositories as well.It wasn't until the user demanded an explanation that GitHub finally provided one. In an email sent to the user, GitHub said the code contained content the site viewed as "unlawful, offensive, threatening, libelous, defamatory, pornographic, obscene, or otherwise objectionable." More specifically, GitHub told the user to remove the words "retard" and "retarded," restoring the repository for 24 hours to allow this change to be made.Decisions for GitHub:- Is the blanket banning of certain words a wise decision, considering the idiosyncratic language of coding (and coders)?
- Should GitHub account for downstream repositories that may be negatively affected by removal of the original code when making content moderation decisions, and how?
- Could banned words inside code comments be moderated by only removing the comments, which would avoid impacting the functionality of the code?
Questions and policy implications to consider:- Is context considered when moderating possible terms of service violations?
- Is it possible to police speech effectively when the content hosted isn't what's normally considered speech?
- Does proactive moderation of certain terms deter users from deploying code designed to offend?
Resolution: The user's repository was ultimately restored after the offending terms were removed. So were the repositories that relied on the original code GitHub decided was too offensive to allow to remain unaltered.Unfortunately for GitHub, this drew attention to its less-than-consistent approach to terms of service violations. Searches for words considered "offensive" by GitHub turned up dozens of other potential violations -- none of which appeared to have been targeted for removal despite the inclusion of far more offensive terms/code/notes.And the original offending code was modified with a tweak that substituted the word "retard" with the word "git" -- terms that are pretty much interchangeable in other parts of the world. The not-so-subtle dig at GitHub and its inability to detect nuance may have pushed the platform towards reinstating content it had perhaps pulled too hastily.Originally posted on the Trust & Safety Foundation website.
Read more here
posted at: 12:00am on 04-Feb-2021
path: /Policy | permalink | edit (requires password)
|
|
