Seeking anecdote on impossibility of making online communication safe?

June 28, 2019 9:50 AM

I just told this story to a friend, and I cannot for the life of me find it online:

There's a great article from a long time ago about the essential impossibility of algorithmic child-safety-fication of communication in online communities...

...I believe it was a Disney property - and the developers thought by creating a finite set of words and symbols that they could prevent anyone from soliciting information, creating innuendo, come-ons, etc. They were pretty proud of it and it was immediately put in front of teens who were hired to break it. They immediately created something like "I want to put my banana in you".

I don't know which of the details I have wrong, but I suspect the storyteller told it in the early 2000s? Maybe it was Doug Crockford? Maybe Clay Shirky? Maybe daynah boyd? Could have been another online service than a Disney one, Nintendo? LucasArts? CompuServe? Or someone adjacent to those "social software" folks. Or maybe it was in a video - though I think this would pre-date YouTube and easy online video. Could have been a blog post? Maybe an article? Help!

posted by artlung to Computers & Internet (5 answers total)

I think this was about Club Penguin and their Ultimate Safe Chat mode. Will poke around and see if I can find the exact article you're looking for,
posted by jessamyn at 10:08 AM on June 28, 2019 [6 favorites]

Best answer: "I want to stick my long-necked giraffe up your fluffy white bunny.”
posted by jimw at 2:36 PM on June 28, 2019 [5 favorites]

Best answer: (This is the original source of that particular story.)
posted by jimw at 2:38 PM on June 28, 2019 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: That's it! Thank you jimw!
posted by artlung at 2:51 PM on June 28, 2019

Ok, I don’t understand the wand story though! How was she describing the wand?!
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 3:55 PM on June 28, 2019