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Content Most Foul: the British Library's Nanny Filter Blocks 'Hamlet'

Posted by timothy on from the censorware-is-the-right-word dept.

An anonymous reader writes "A man using the British Library's public wi-fi found that access to an on-line copy of 'Hamlet' was blocked for 'violent content'. Now, it is true that 'Hamlet' is pretty violent (8 murders, including one before the play starts, plus one suicide). But the heavy-handed irony of a guardian of British cultural heritage censoring the greatest work of British literature is just too blatant to be ignored. Library staff initially didn't seem too interested in fixing the problem, but in the end they adjusted the filters."

5 of 107 comments (clear)

  1. Why are they blocking violent content? by Rob+the+Bold · · Score: 5, Insightful

    TFA's a little short on detail, but why are they blocking violent content in the first place? I assume they have some reason to do so. And if that's the case, should it matter how old or famous the unacceptably violent work is?

    Bottom line: if Hamlet fits their definition of inappropriate content, should they make explicit exceptions for particularly famous and important works, or should they evaluate the overall filtering/blocking objectives and rationale as well as the mechanisms and algorithms implementing those restrictions?

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    I am not a crackpot.
    1. Re:Why are they blocking violent content? by idontgno · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Or the Bible.

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      Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
    2. Re:Why are they blocking violent content? by SoTerrified · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This, in a nutshell, is the real problem with censorship, even well intended. If you have a human doing the censoring, you'll get personal opinions influencing your judgement. (Example, see the judge who prevented parents from naming their child 'Messiah' because "There is only one true Messiah".) If you automate it, you get pieces falling through the cracks like Hamlet. Now, in this case, they were able to reverse the censorship because everyone knows Hamlet. But suppose this wasn't already well known? What if this was the first work of a new author? And you saw it, thought it might be interesting, but it's blocked. Are you going to 'know' it's not really something that should be censored? Are you going to know that it's a mistake and get the library to do something to fix it? Nope. A potentially ground-breaking work like Hamlet gets buried, never to see the light of day instead of becoming a classic for the ages.

  2. Re:Not So by dkleinsc · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The old joke: Hamlet is a lousy play because about half its lines are cliches.

    Not that Bill didn't write some other great stuff, but the fact remains that Hamlet is more influential than Lear or The Tempest or Richard III.

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    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  3. Re:Not So by interkin3tic · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Rule 18.1: if you admit to liking some popular work of art, be it a song, a painting, a book, a movie, a videogame, or a play, and do so on the internet, someone will immediately criticize it. "Overrated" has a 50/50 chance of being used.

    Observe. (ahem) The Beatles were a pretty good band. They had good songs. Like "Hey Jude." That was a good song.

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