FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Hotels that limit access to certain internet sites
Old Aug 29, 2005 | 7:05 pm
  #11  
ridgeback
 
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: AUS
Programs: AA Plat, HH Gold
Posts: 170
One thing that makes me angry is that I have inadvertently become a customer of a company that treats me like a child. They are within their rights to provide whatever net access they want. I didn't suggest otherwise so, robb, I'm not sure how you reached your opinion. But they shouldn't advertise that they provide it without providing a disclaimer that the internet access they provide is not "full" internet access or even the "standard" sort of access provided in hotels around the world. Indeed, if they are going to take the highly unusual step of censoring what their guests read, I think that they owe a duty to disclose that, esp. before the guests check in to the hotel.

If I were in China I would well understand that I wouldn't have unfettered access. But this is the USA. I'm surprised that so many here are willing to let corporate big brother decide what internet sites they can view or not view. What's the difference between this and when your home internet provider decides what sites they will allow you to visit? What happens when your AOL, for their own corporate reasons, decides that you can't visit the sites of Yahoo or MSN? Censorship of what an individual reads or views is highly repulsive. I value my freedom. If a hotel corporation is going to intrude on my privacy within a room that I buy and pay for, that's not a hotel company that I'm going to be frequenting.

Given that they ban "boobs" but not any other kind of information, including how to make a bomb, kill and maim, they are also a company that has their priorities in a wrong place. I find it repulsive and an indication of a hospitality provider that puts their own skewed priorities above their paying guests' preferences.

Originally Posted by robb
Presumably the other thread will be moved here, so I'll answer here.

You're more than welcome to encourage people to not stay at these hotels, but I would think that they have a right to offer whatever services they want. You say you asked them if they had in-room internet and that they should have told you it was limited by netnanny or something like that.

Is it really any different than if you had asked if they had in-room movies and they said yes without telling you they don't have adult movies?

Maybe a little bit, but not enough to get angry at them about. They can offer what they want and you can decide it's not what you want to buy.

I would, however, expect that you should get your internet access money back.
ridgeback is offline