Can FT switch off the profanity blocker for a particular word in a particular forum?
 

Posters are turned into sh!takiri suzume (tongue cut sparrows) in the Japan forum when they try and relay information about places and ideas.

ie.: Sh!tamachi, Kudansh!ta, Matsush!ta... Wakarimash!ta ka?

There are many more.

When I'm responding to queries I often forget that place names will be rendered unintelligable once the automatic profanity censor snips out four innocent little letters. And like it or not, there's an awful lot of occurrence of sh!t in the Japanese language. Having to go back and edit a post to correct the 'correction' is a major inconvenience.

Many posters unfamiliar with the forum never realise their submission has been chopped up, and their entry either remains a conundrum for the unititated, or a forum regular needs to step in to clarify.

Japanese names and place names are confusing enough for most visitors. Does FT really have to make it worse?

Can't we allow for a few 'sh!t's in the Japanese forum?

This seems like a very sensible request. I will check and see if it is possible to permit the use of a previously proscribed word within other words for a particular forum.

(But I alone cannot implement such a change, more discussion is indeed welcome!) :)

Totally agreed with LapLap--I have had to go back many a time and add in hyphens so I'll end up with Kudan-shi-ta or Shi-tamachi, which looks rather ridiculous in addition to being incorrect.

Agree this seems sensible if technically feasible.

I'd support it if TB needed to recommend this.

Glen

I'll third (fourth??) this. As a Japan Forum regular, I have had to go back and manually correct the corrections on numerous occasions. In such cases, I know what has happened, why and how to fix it. Newer users frequently do not. If the TB can influence the situation, I urge favorable consideration to this proposal.

JR

I had the same issue with the Hilton family hotel master thread. It turns out many hotel website links have s, h, i and t in sequence. I've gotten around that by replacing with tinyurl links (at least I'm in the process of doing so - there are a lot to do).

Must be even more annoying when it is text not just a link.

Isn't this more of a technical question than a TB question?

Perhaps Spiff or someone ought to move or post a link to this thread in Tech Issues so we can get the 2 pennies from Joshua or Tim?

Moving this to Technical Issues for HOM review.

And let's not forget what the biggest American bank in Japan is called in Japanese -- yup, it's Sh!ttybank!

I support this - W e need to be able to type sh*t in the middle of so many Japanese words.

I'd throw in my hat and support this cause -- the Japanese language has so many words with "percieved profanity words" in them.

Sanosuke!

If this option becomes available, what will the procedure be for those who ABUSE it and use language that is not appropriate?

I think this is a reasonable proposal but someone is bound to abuse it.

Thankfully, 'real' profanity rarely contaminates the Japan forum. I'm only aware of two (perhaps three) occasions in the past year where external moderation was required (and my own views were involved in one of these :o ).

I'm completely satisfied that fellow contributors will help to keep an eye out for any abuse. And I've seen for myself that moderators have taken swift and sensible action when inappropriate posts have been reported.

I just can't believe there will be an influx of giggling ne'er-do-wells venting an irrepressible need to scrawl naughty words in the forum. If they do, I'm positive that between us, as a community, we'll be able to tackle their potty fingers.

Slightly OT, but one of the early FT controversies was when someone claiming to be Japanese registered as Fukusan

Gave Randy more than one grey hair as I recall.


Glen

FWIW The Japanese word for "The Gospel" is Fukuin
There's isn't much that's less profane than that.

If someone wanted to put dirty stuff on the Japan forum they could try to do so in Japanese... and slip by any filters that FT is likely to create. But really, if someone wants to be an ..., they will do so whether we filter their language or not.