But SAT's News Alerts carry a "signature" advising people in Pakistan on how to use anonymizers to read full articles, as general Musharraf's government ordered its blocking.
A few months ago, SAT forums felt like a pleasant university staff common room, with articulate, well-informed conversation about issues presented in articles, some inside-joking between friends: a meeting place for an intellighentzia opposing both an undemocratic government and religious fanaticism.
But the notice below is the second all-caps one about grave forum misbehavior in less than 7 hours. And shouting in all-caps is definitely not the style of SAT.
Sure, readers' forums are at risk; they can and do go haywire for different reasons (1). But considering what SAT stands for and its being censored in Pakistan, forum trouble as described in the e-mail below begs worrying questions as to the identity and agenda of the trouble-makers, or of whoever organized them.
Moderation is a possible solution, sure: but it hampers conviviality. Besides, in the former e-mail about forum trouble, SAT announced they would check that forum users actually are located where they declared they were when they signed up, and remove those who gave a false location. This is tantamount to removing from the forums all readers who live in Pakistan and have to use an anonymizer (if my understanding of anonymizers is correct).
Have a good day
Claude
Claude Almansi www.adisi.ch
(1) Another, recent Swiss exemple: TicinOnline www.tio.ch is a Ticino news agency. Its readers' comments are moderated - in theory. But having to deal with a big surge of virulent antisemitic comments to articles about the March 13 arsons at the Lugano synagogue and at a Jew-owned shop, the moderators accepted things like "Gli ebrei... fanno solo un gran casino per ottenere dei lauti indennizzi e non mollano mai pur di ottenere soldi, soldi e ancora soldi (vedi olocausto)" i.e. "Jews... they only raise hell in order to get huge compensation and they never let go till they get money, money, and more money (see holocaust)". When people pointed out that such expressions were *not* acceptable, the editorial board deleted these comments and decided do disable the comment featue for articles "about similar issues" on March 29.
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: ALL SAT DISCUSSION FORUMS LOCKED FOR 24-48 HOURS FOR CLEAN UP Date: Thu, 31 Mar 2005 15:16:14 -0500 (EST) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
ATTENTION USERS:
ALL FORUMS HAVE BEEN LOCKED FOR 24 TO 48 HOURS TO CLEAN UP THE MESS CREATED BY A FEW USERS WHO DIGRESS FROM THE SUBJECT, WHO USE ABUSIVE LANGUAGE, WHO INSULT RELIGIONS AND MAKE PERSONAL ATTACKS UNDER FAKE NAMES AND IDS.
THE FORUMS WILL BE REOPENED FOR SERIOUS AND INTELLECTUAL DISCUSSION AND NOT FOR CHILDISH CHATS BETWEEN FIGHTING KIDS. ALL THOSE WHO HAVE MISUSED THE FORUMS WILL NOT BE ALLOWED TO TAKE PART. IF THE PROBLEM STILL CONTINUES, ALL FORUMS WILL BE MODERATED AND MESSAGES WILL BE CLEARED BEFORE THEY ARE POSTED.
FOR THE SERIOUS USERS WHO HAVE NEVER INDULGED IN SUCH PRACTICES, SAT OFFERS ITS APOLOGIES FOR THE INCONVENIENCE CAUSED AND HOPES THAT THEY WILL UNDERSTAND.
ADMIN
-- Claude Almansi www.adisi.ch
NB La mia messaggeria di posta elettronica è impostata per rifiutare e-mail di più di 200kb.
Per favore, se *dovete* condividere file pesanti, mettetelo online e mandatemi l'URL (si può fare con http://www.rapidshare.de ad es).
NB My e-mail client is set on accepting only e-mails under 200kb.
If you *have to* share a big file, please put it online and send me the URL (you can do that at http://www.rapidshare.de , for instance).
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