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|   | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Jul 8, 2001 by ClaraBear | | Post: 1
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My vote is that URLs should be allowed more broadly in discussions. The discussions are not only for exchanging opinions, but also information, and it's difficult to have to type in the entire Encyclopedia Britannica, for example, when you could ideally just refer a person to [URL removed by moderator]
If someone should insert an offensive URL, well, that's what the complaint icon button is there for, isn't it?
I don't know if you've seen any of the threads, but this issue has been discussed multitudes of times by now. It's not really an issue of likes/dislikes, or up for voting -- it's an issue of pragmatics. The BBC has standards and rules regarding URLs (not only do they have to be appropriate, they also have to be checked regularly to make sure there are no broken links), and h2g2 simply does not have the resources to uphold those standards if URLs were to be allowed in forum conversations. Hence, no URLs in forum conversations.
Mikey
Some clarification would be useful.
For example the rules say you can post URLs in Guide entries but not in replies.
QUOTE
Do not include any URLs in Conversation Postings or Nicknames, and only include suitable URLs in Guide Entries. We do not allow URLs to external websites to be included in Conversation Postings or Nicknames, but we do allow them in Guide Entries, so if you want to link (say) to your own personal website, please do so from your own Guide Entries, and preferably your Personal Space.
UNQUOTE
It doesn't specify Journal entries one way or the other. I already use an online journal (LiveJournal) so my first journal entry points to there. It contains the URL but the URL is only a hot link because the software that processes journal entries recognises it as a URL so adds the tags. Can I take this as an implicit indication that URLs are OK?
I think that this project sounds very interesting, like a more useful version of the Everything2 site (if you want to go there you'll have to work out the URL yourself, it's not hard).
Stephen
Journal entries are actually conversation threads, they just show up a tad differently.
Mikey
Hi Stephen Booth aka Buffy
The URL you have put in your journal may not stay there. It is technically the start of a discussion thread and will probably be treated accordingly. It's hard to tell. It might survive. At the time of writing it has only been there for half an hour. URLs usually get pulled within an hour.
I suggest you repeat the link in your Space but make sure it is a reliable link. If the site in question is down when the link goes through one of the regular checks, your Space will be hidden immediately. This has been known to upset people but it isn't really a problem. You can reactivate your Space by using the edit button and removing (or hiding) the problem link.
Unreliable links are best put on a new page. Use the Add Guide Entry to create a new page.
If you need any help, give me a shout.
Amy the (Guru) Ant
|  | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Jul 14, 2001 by Mycroft
This is a reply to this Posting.
| | Post: 6
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I've not been able to find the relevant chunk of the BBC guidelines on this issue, so perhaps someone could point me in the right direction. Is it links to external sites that the guidelines are worried about or is it any references to external sites?
If the guidelines pertain to links then the problem is easily solved: URLs starting http://bbc.co.uk/ automatically get turned into links, and everything else stays as plain text. I can't understand why it is at the moment that when someone types up a reference to another internet source it gets moderated even if it's not a clickable link. Why is it I can give someone a reference to a publication by name or ISBN, or give instructions on what query can be used to find it on a particular search engine, but if I name a web site where it can be found then it'll get moderated out? Any retort which uses the argument "we don't have the staff to check all these external links" misses the point: they're not links, they're references. The staff don't have time to check when I refer someone to page 7, column 3 of last Tuesday's Daily Mirror either, but no-one stops me doing that.
That is a brilliant suggestion!
Mycroft -- Believe me, you're FAR from the first person to bring up this argument. From the BBCs perspective, anything that directs a person to another website is a link, whether it is a clickable link or not. If you dredge through some of the older conversations on the "moderation" board, you will see this discussed in length, with all the official replies from the italics which I will not replicate here.
Mikey
| | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Jul 14, 2001 by Mycroft
This is a reply to this Posting.
| | Post: 9
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Thanks, Mikey. I've now discovered that I can include some URLs in posts because italics' think they aren't, but I can't include things which aren't because they think they are.
On a completely unrelated topic, did you know that many of the themes in 1984 were inspired by Orwell's experiences working at the BBC? 
| | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Aug 7, 2001 by NinjaBoy
This is a reply to this Posting.
| | Post: 10
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QUOTE [Posting 6 by Mycroft]
The staff don't have time to check when I refer someone to page 7, column 3 of last Tuesday's Daily Mirror either, but no-one stops me doing that.
UNQUOTE
...and what if page 7, column 3 contains a URL...?!?!?
</MISCHIEF MODE>
I guess this explains why one recent posting, which I deliberately worded to make it look like there wasn't a link, has been moderated out. The powers that be think that it *is* a link, in spite of the fact that the reader has to work it out for themself. Great!  < 
| | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Nov 18, 2001 by Talyma
This is a reply to this Posting.
| | Post: 12
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Well obviously the topic has been beaten to death, but I'd like to add my two ounces to the bundle. It IS annoying not being able to send people to a site that will help their article. In the recent article about Nemo, I included a link to information about a videogame about Nemo that he didn't know about (I hadn't read the house rules yet, stupid me!) And trying to figure out an alternate way of giving him the URL without going through an unecessary amount of trouble is a pain, at best. Sigh... Running a reference website and not allowing people to post references is a bit backwards at best
Mycroft,
The one problem with your suggestion is that the following is a legal link and still would be with the changes you suggest.
[URL removed by moderator]
| | Subject: Unhelpful URL Restrictions
Posted Dec 15, 2001 by Mycroft
This is a reply to this Posting.
| | Post: 14
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My suggestion doesn't change that problem, if indeed problem it be. Given the entertainingly inconsistent criteria upon which the validity of a URL is assessed, the only meaningful determinant is whether it gets moderated or not. Your link hasn't been moderated, ergo it's a perfectly valid link.
I think two days pretty much confirms that
this feature is now available to everyone.
Hi there.
Just to confirm, we will no longer be allowing URLs like this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/openurl.pl?link=XXX
Thanks for bringing it to our attention! We'll instruct the Moderators to remove them from Postings from now on, and maybe we'll stop them working permanently.
Sorry about that, but we don't really have a choice if they can be used to break the rules. 
(Just FYI, our preferred solution would be to remove the rule that disallows URLs in Postings. We're still working on that...)
about time too, my legal team couldn't make out if it broke the rules or not is was a link to the bbc after all. I didn't report this as a bug as it wasn't.
BTW I think you might need to keep your moderators up to speed on what is and isn't allowed. One of the links like this was removed fairly quickly but the others were left untouched by all who saw them. I think a better solution would be to remove all referances to other sites, urls, books, countries, languages, people, food and thoughts that are outside the copyright of the bbc. Excepting anything that would need to be shown after the watershed, of course.
If you do disable the openurl.pl then the pulldown menus on peoples home pages will stop working.
bgs (off to the Village)
[link removed to avoid confusion]
[link removed 'cos it's the wrong colour]
can I still post in American?
"If you do disable the openurl.pl then the pulldown menus on peoples home pages will stop working."
That's why there's a tag dedicated to pulldown menus called ITEM-LIST. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A596739 for details.
The next release also disables FORM tags, so all openurl.pl forms will stop working anyway, irrespective of the issue under discussion here.
I don't use pulldown menus anyway, I find them rather annoying (disabeling the FORM tag will help many other security issues too )
On a more serious note; will the next release of h2g2 be "Betsie" compatible? Betsie is the filter program used by the BBC to create an automatic text-only version of its website so that people with text readers and those who are visually impaired and need a clearer format can use the site. If not, why not? Should I start a campaign?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/betsie/index.html
bgs (see, I do care. I'm not here just to cause trouble)
 |  |
I don't use pulldown menus anyway, I find them rather annoying (disabeling the FORM tag will help many other security issues too )
On a more serious note; will the next release of h2g2 be "Betsie" compatible? Betsie is the filter program used by the BBC to create an automatic text-only version of its website so that people with text readers and those who are visually impaired and need a clearer format can use the site. If not, why not? Should I start a campaign?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/betsie/index.html
bgs (see, I do care. I'm not here just to cause trouble)
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