joaoflux / digital / analog / culture

A comment spamer had found me by the time i released the mouse button after posting my first article. Despite of having a decent understanding of how the net works, I was amazed how quickly the bad guys could strike. There was also a certain fascination how public my new late night activity actually was. It felt a bit like hanging out in a half empty bar near the station at 1.30 AM trying not to make eye contact with any of the shady figures at the pool table.

Of course the fascination gave place to sheer annoyance after a couple of days. I have a black list in function now that blocks all comments that mention ONLINE POKER, GAMBLING and TEXAS.

This pretty much solves my problem. But what, if I would write about the referee scandal (1) that is taking place in Germany and someone wanted to comment on it? One would be likely to run into one of the terms I had to exclude. What, if my entire blog dealt with sex, gambling and George W. Bush? Are those topics de facto taboo for me?

I find myself imaging how it would be, if one had to use white lists: A list of some 100 words which people who I know personnally or who can identify themselves with a trustworthy PGP key can request via email. Alternatively one could agree on a secret language like argot (2). Or flee english as a language all together and seek refuge in language where the world is still intact like Swedish (3).

(1) Football referees manipulated matches so that their partners in crime could make money using online betting services. furthermore it turned out that football clubs regularly invited them to brothels before the matches

(2) A french slang which is produced by flipping syllables. It is said to have been invented by criminals as a secret language.

(3) Watching a heavy weight box fight a couple of weeks ago I learned that not only buying services from prostitutes is illegal in Sweden (that I knew before and discussed extensively with my swedish friends), but also professional boxing.