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Yahoo! Closes User Created Chat Rooms
karvind writes "Chatmag News reports that Yahoo! has disabled all the User-created Chat rooms. According to Yahoo's chat log page:'The ability to publish user-created chat rooms in the public Yahoo! Chat directory is currently unavailable. We are working on improvements to this service to enhance the user experience and compliance with our Terms of Service'. This may be true but Yahoo! is also facing a $10 million lawsuit that accuses it of cashing in on some disturbing chat rooms. The companies are paying huge fees for their ads to appear on Yahoo!. But many are now canceling those ads because of the report."
I know the freedom of speech zealots will cry wolf over this but I'm very glad to see this happen. Although the room names don't imply that something illicit is going on, it would be nice if there was a way to keep kids chat rooms for kids and adult chat rooms for adults. Yahoo has been VERY lax about this in the past and it's good to see them make an effort. Even if it's being forced by a lawsuit.
My sig of choice is Marlboro
Naw, there are probably far more IM Chat users than IRC users these days. IRC is very complicated to use for a newbie compared to Yahoo Messenger or AIM. I know my mother uses Yahoo Chat for the voice messaging functionality in the chat rooms.. it's unfortunately one of the reasons I couldn't switch her to a Mac since the Yahoo for Macs supports neither voice chat or chat rooms! Switching her to iChat is out of the question since all her friends are on Yahoo Messenger in voice-enabled chat rooms playing music. She's unfortunately very addicted to it and gets downright depressed if she doesn't have access to it. I hope they get this resolved soon if it affects her chat rooms or I'm going to get a frantic call that her computer is broken. *sigh* You can't teach an old dog new tricks.
How many (total) channels were actively run on Yahoo Chat--basically, how hidden were these channels in the first place? Did Yahoo make an effort to police their chat channels, or were they neglected entirely (and thus encouraged to degrade to the point they were at)? Is Yahoo even liable for the actions of other people? Why is congress discussing MORE LAWS when obviously they're being sued so they already (may have) violated existing ones?
I seem to recall similar channels all over the fricking place when I was kid, on AOL. Why was AOL never nailed like this (or was I just too young to care/remember)?
The lawsuit by the family of one child porn victim said Yahoo! could have removed the sites, but instead chose to make money on them.
Oh. Okay. Nice big accusation at the bottom from an anonymous source and no support to follow it. Now that's inciteful writing!
Eh, it looks like the Religious Uptight learned how to astroturf.
DRM = Digitally Restricted Media. This is a viral sig, pass it on.
because somewhere along the line every irc server relies on some company
and if that company can now be sued for supporting 'disturbing' channels . . .
There are disturbing chat rooms in any chat medium that supports "rooms" as such. However, if my memory serves me right, there used to be a part in MOTD on IRC servers that said something along the lines of "IRC is an unmoderated medium"... If Yahoo is not a moderated place either - who is a judge of what is shocking and what is not? Not that i am advocating sick stuff, and not that i don't see how they (Yahoo) can give in to litigative pressure.. but still?
All Yahoo chat rooms :
joeuser: where are the ladies
joeuser2: HI R U FEM?
adbot: jargonlkjdsfhgnbfoo
adbot2: 25/f/perfect nudexxxpics.sex.ws click here for my pics!
Followed by the hammering of your desktop full of randomly generated adult website advertisments and emails. Things have gotten so bad with the bots that people are relying on 3rd party programs to block the sheer amount of crap that an average yahoo user receives every day.
I'd honestly say a good 30-40% of the "users" in the rooms are adult website advertisement bots. I've spent a few minutes on this comment and I already received at least a dozen bogus IM's / ads from them. The news about companies not wanting to deal with yahoo's obvious chat room problems doesn't suprise me in the least, I say good riddance.
Not surprising at all...
Microsoft's media portal in australia, "ninemsn" (think msnbc) recently had to explain how it failed to notice its members had set up a "Rape Club" chatroom devoted to discussions a photos of, er, rape.
I just tried to track down a link through google news.
Which (at the moment) leads to a news article on ninemsn (!) Amusingly, follow the link and receive:
"The article you have requested does not exist"
Tinfoil hats ahoy! Instead, try this link to read about the whole sordid affair:
Nah, actually these rooms are getting closed, because the undercover law officers wasted tremendous time and effort fishing for pedophiles in it, for no good. Thing is there IS a line between reality and fiction, and in fiction people will do countless things, including butchering each other in games. But when it comes to reality, there is a little inner voice that goes off, that makes people care about each other. I wonder how many pedophiles they set up who actually treated their bait very very decently and with respect, and stopped the contact after coming to their senses. Like, look, even Michael Jackson got let off, so why waste time fishing for these people if the law will just let them go?
PS. Chatting is a bit impersonal, and because of that it can get rude. If you don't like it, flip the switch off. How many times have you seen people talk really nasty in 3rd person, but when they are face to face with someone, they shape up and behave, and become less offensive? Well in chat the "I" can talk to the "You" as if it were a "he,she,it." Webcams and voice can aid making it more personal, but it's impossible for everyone to voice-talk at the same time the same way as they can type, it'd be a mess. Of course there are two sides to every story, and the opposite is true too, when you get to know someone very well even through "impersonal" means such as letters only. Also I'm sure there were some true pedophiles that stop at nothing, caught. It's always funny when they catch a 50-year old judge or respected person about to meet a 17-year old. I always think of salmon or black widow males. Sex is a funny thing, I tell ya, but without it you wouldn't be here, nor would the little salmons.
"Yes, more legislation is required. The law has not kept up with this type of criminal activity," U.S. Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, told the Houston television station KPRC." With a nod from Gitmo Gonzales ""Short of changes in the law in Congress, we may be limited about what we can do in this area," U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said."
It's yet another shenanigan and publicity stunt by a *Texas Republican* and a Texas local TV station. I resent that the article submitter did not mention that. Not that I ever was fond of the bot-infested Yahoo chat, but the action of those US Talibans reeks of stink; we found something we didn't like on this thing, nevermind that we shouldn't have been looking for it in the first place, so we'll mess it up *ALL*, for all, and let's take a chance and excuse to legislate!
Remember that 'sexy cheerleading' legislation?! I hate those folks; buckle up for their attempts, onslaught after first step, to legislate their morality and force it upon all!
Does anyone have any legal pointers to what Yahoo! was obligated to do (if anything)? I've tried looking for info on the relevant US law or case law, but I've not seen anything.
It seems clear that Yahoo! was operating a website in a hands off fashion. Slashdot does the same, right?
I can image a court could hold Yahoo! liable for any bits they serve (ala China or France), but that sounds un-American.
The various articles mention that Yahoo! cannot be held criminally liable. Does anyone have further info?
What about USENET? There's probably tons of illegal stuff floating around on that.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
Yahoo IM and Yahoo personals have become the EXACT same as their chat rooms - just ways for the sexually perverse,incredibly strange, or overly obnoxious marketer to gain attention.
Yahoo Personals/Yahoo Profiles for instance are about 60% fake - there to be front end or link builders for XXX chat/websites
Yahoo IM has become almost unbearable to be visible with fake "bot-women" IMming me and inviting me to sex cam chats
Yahoo auctions are over 90% fake - just look at the Mac Category - I don't think there are but two out of the 45 auctions that are currently up in the Mac category that are legit.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
Chat-room paedophiles are like email viruses - it can easily be stopped but everyone is too stupid. Ok so the paedophiles shouldn't be around in the first place, but that's not the point: bad people _do_ exist and that will never ever change so its about fucking time that parents took some responsibility to stop it at their end. I see no reason why a private chat system couldn't be set up were all users are pre-screened or identified. Its very simple: to join kid-safe-chat.com parents would provide ID such as a credit card or kids could get their school to do it. The kid can then choose whatever screen name they want and the parents wont know it. Chats are monitored/logged but privacy is maintained so that parents/teachers etc can't read the logs or do any monitoring other than what they could do by simply creating their own account (otherwise your kids will just walk right around it). If anyone dodgy gets on they will know that anything they say or do on this chat system can be fully linked back to their real identity.
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Negative, they are shot on white backgrounds. Large sweeps of seamless paper that blend the join of wall and floor into a a curve("sweep").
Instead of the right angle the paper forms an arc to bridge the transition from verticle(wall) to horizontal(floor) surface.
Shadows are minimized/eliminated by 1) using broad lights (such as softboxes) that create diffused and soft shadows, 2) keeping the subject a distance from the background to further diminish the appearance of shadows, and 3) using additional light sources aimed back the background to "fill in" any weak shadows cast by the subject.
Often white backgrounds are even given MORE illumination than the subject, this guarentees that they will be rendered pure white (by either being 100% clear in a slide, or going white beyond the dynamic range of the imaging sensor in a digital camera.)
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups. -- 0 1 My two bits