Good morning loyal readers!
Doubtless many of you have been wondering where this site went to over the last couple of days, indeed I have received a number of worried emails from some of you expressing concerns about the site's unexpected disappearance from cyberspace.
Well, here we are again, I will now relate to you what happened.
Google's (the owner of Blogger) spam bots claimed that Nanny Knows Best was a spam blog and, believing in the principle of shooting first and asking questions later (instead of the more sensible reverse policy), disabled it and asked me to prove it wasn't spam.
Wouldn't it have been more sensible to ask me first if it was spam, and to say if I don't come back in 3 days or so they will then disable the site?
Having deactivated the site without any warning, I was told by Google that I would have to wait several days for them to reactivate it:
"Blogger's spam-prevention robots have detected that your blog has characteristics of a spam blog. (What is a spam blog?) Since you are an actual person reading this, your blog is probably not a spam blog. Automated spam detection is inherently fuzzy and we sincerely apologise for this false positive.
We received your unlock request on 09 May 2010. On behalf of the robots, we apologise for locking your non-spam blog. Please be patient while we take a look at your blog and verify that it is not spam."
I decided that being asked to wait for such a long period of time was not very satisfactory, given that this site has been going for many years and has a real human following etc. Therefore I enlisted your help and asked (via my other sites) for people to drop Google a note prodding them about this.
Oddly enough, for a leading 21st century web company, Google is rather hard to contact directly via email.
Nonetheless I found a number of access points:
press-uk@google.com
- Phone: +44 (0)20-7031-3000
- Fax: +44 (0)20-7031-3001
I also faxed the CEO (Eric Schmidt) in the USA (+1 650-253-0001) about it. Oddly enough, within an hour or so of faxing, the site reappeared as if by magic.
My heartfelt thanks to all of you who wrote in, and helped restore this site.
It is ironic that NKB was shut down, as it campaigns against censorship etc.
To add further irony to the story, my HMRC site (www.hmrcisshite.com) which is also on Google was also temporarily out of action on Sunday. However, it restored itself within a few hours.
However, what was really odd was that my gmail account (another Google product) was disabled by Google on Sunday. They asked me to email them my mobile phone number in order for them to send me a reactivation code.
Is Google trying to tell me something?
Once again many thanks for your support and help during this period of stupidity by Google.
Visit The Orifice of Government Commerce and buy a collector's item.
Visit The Joy of Lard and indulge your lard fantasies.
Show your contempt for Nanny by buying a T shirt or thong from Nanny's Store.
www.nannyknowsbest.com is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"
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Why not really indulge yourself, by doing all the things that Nanny really hates? Click on the relevant link to indulge yourselves; Food, Bonking, Toys, Gifts and Flowers, Groceries
Of course, someone that was a bit paranoid may have thought it was to do with criticising Nanny and the new potential Nannies during this constitutional crisis, of course, we would not think such a thing;-)
ReplyDeleteI cannot understand what a spam blog actually is; Surely spam is sent to people, I receive tons of the stuff, they think I have a small dick, i need viagra, I want to gamble, I want to work for Nigerian companies transfering funds etc etc....How can a blog therefore send out spam?,.....It makes no sense.
Anyway, its good to see NKB up and active again......
Welcome back Ken.
ReplyDeleteIt seems Google has truly achieved it's goal of being the new Microsoft.
Google's new found arrogance in its autocratic and thoughtless behaviour is the inevitable result of one company becoming so utterly dominant in its field.
I am only surprised that anti-trust/monopoly bodies haven't turned on them yet.
The question is, which is worse - a Nanny State or a Nanny corporation?
"your blog has characteristics of a spam blog. (What is a spam blog?)"
ReplyDeleteKen - This is a Spam Blog.
I fail to see how they got you mixed up????
http://30daysofspam.blogspot.com/
Glad you are back, Ken, I feared you had been 'disposed of' by Nanny's minions, or kidnapped by aliens.
ReplyDelete"I also faxed the CEO (Eric Schmidt) in the USA (+1 650-253-0001) about it. Oddly enough, within an hour or so of faxing, the site reappeared as if by magic."
Often the case that you get action by going to the organ grinder (can I say that on this site?) rather than the trained monkeys. Not only are CEOs more concerned about adverse publicity but, quite possibly, the action one is complaining about, although carried out in their name, was neither authorised nor approved.
Tonk. said...
"Surely spam is sent to people, I receive tons of the stuff, they think I have a small dick, i need viagra, I want to gamble, I want to work for Nigerian companies transfering funds etc etc....How can a blog therefore send out spam?,.....It makes no sense."
Since when have a lot of things in Nanny's brave new world made any sense? I receive plenty of this kind of rubbish too, and it gets deleted straight away!
You're missing out guys. I now have a 20" organ, with enough Viagra to actually get it erect. I can afford my large Viagra bill thanks to the fee I received from a nice Nigerian man when I helped liberate his inheritance fund.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I'm still waiting for my nude photos of Brittany Spears to arrive! :(
You can't win them all...
Ken
ReplyDeletejust doing a simple rational google search like "nanny knows best blog awards" would show that probably you were not a spam site, let alone a "nanny knows best blog" search on google, and tpresumably google has data and searxh mechanisms of its own databases which the public cannot access which would also make the fasle assertion that you are a spam site appear highly unlikely.
I am glad your site is avavilable again and you and your loved ones and business are in my silent Christian (am I allowed to say that these days?) prayers, particulalry since some people appear unaware of some of the obvious consequences of such actions against your website. For example, did you lose business ie the ability to put food on your table, did your repuation suffer unfairly, are you now on any lists etc etc. I am glad you are back on line and thank you for what you do.
Thanks anom:)
ReplyDeleteI'm already on an awful lot of lists, one more won't make much difference;)
Ken
Perhaps Sussex Police will now be 'following' Ken on Twitter?
ReplyDeleteMy guess would be that it wasn't Google's robots but human beings with an axe to grind. It's easy to report Blogger blogs for various infractions and small minded folks do it all the time out of one or various weird motivations. Maybe I'm just being cynical though.
ReplyDeleteEnough reports gets you shut down - remember you are dealing with a US organization - a country whose litigious nature makes even the UK's budding blame culture pale in comparison.
A spam blog - often for example a blog set up specifically to generate Adsense revenue and using auto posted content pulled from article directories (aka drivel often written by those for whom English is not a first language, or by pulling content from other people's RSS feeds). In other words something that really offers nothing of value to a visitor, leeches off other people's writing etc. They are invariably set up by people using various software to create large numbers of them. Years ago it was pretty lucrative until Google tightened up Adsense rules and the whole gravy train came crashing down. Plenty of losers still try their hand at it though.
Hope this helps.