Aspiring Author K. Renee was reportedly locked out of her own content on Google Docs after Google flagged it as “inappropriate.”

  • thehatfox@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Yet another reminder that “the cloud” is really just “someone else’s computer”. The end users of cloud based products are controlled by “someone else’s” rules and whims.

    • Techognito@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      And by “someone else”, it normally boils down to gigantic corporations that would exploit everything about you to earn money

  • booty [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    1 month ago

    Guys, settle down. This is a clickbait title, google isn’t “censoring” anything and no part of the content of her silly hockey porn was deemed unacceptable by Google. What happened is that she had a ton of people accessing these documents and Google inaccurately flagged it as her spamming them at people unsolicited. That’s why she was locked from sharing them, because Google('s automated systems) assumed it was a bot account doing spam.

      • Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        I think you’re missing the point here, which is that you don’t even own the content you’ve created yourself when you use one of the corporate platforms.

            • IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world
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              1 month ago

              That’s not how that works, and if you can point out what law says that speech may be posted on any platform regardless of terms of service I’d love to see that. Is it your position that if Twitter or a lemmy mod blocks content that this is an infringement of my rights?

              • Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world
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                1 month ago

                No, my position is that you shouldn’t use these platforms or at least not make yourself dependent on them.

                • IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world
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                  1 month ago

                  Then you should have stated that rather than your inaccurate and off topic comment. I didn’t even disagree that free Google is a stupid platform to use as a professional.

          • yildolw@lemmy.world
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            1 month ago

            Google is forbidding the author from the right to make copies of their own work (aka copy-right)

      • triplenadir@lemmygrad.ml
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        1 month ago

        she gave google the valuable rights to monitor her activity, in exchange for access to some pretty shitty web services which come with no customer support.

        it was probably a bad deal for her, but there isn’t a lot of competition, there’s a lot of pressure for people to undervalue the rights they’re paying with, and it’s hard to compare how much of those rights are at stake between different companies without the assistance of a lawyer - so it’s understandable that so she and so many people fall for it.

  • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Google is going puritan now? It’s a lot more concerning to me that companies are scanning all of your personal documents than the fact that someone wrote some potential indecent content.

      • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        We’re going to end up with a digital world in which corporate AIs are the arbiters of acceptable and nothing will exist without their approval. They have successfully seized control of the internet and even people’s personal devices. It’s terrible.

    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.de
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      1 month ago

      They’ve always been strict at blocking potentially offensive text. Ever kept trying to compose a helpful, constructive YouTube comment reply that doesn’t disappear when you refresh? The AI there is really draconian. Once, someone wanted details of a rather wholesome story I had shared in a top level comment. Replying with the follow-up always failed despite no obvious trigger words. I resorted to editing the parent comment but then struggled to get a “see edit” reply through. At least 10 attempts at expressing “look at the root comment for updates” failed, eventually I managed to get a reply through with nothing but “🔝”. It got removed after I tried to edit it to a clearer expression so I just posted another “🔝” reply and hoped for the best.

  • astreus@lemmy.ml
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    1 month ago

    “Romance” is such a crap term! She was writing porn. Likely with minors. I’m involved with a lot of authors, some also write porn open-door spice, and the only things that get Google bans (from what I’ve been told) are kiddie porn and extreme gore.

    While the dangers of handing your documents to Google can’t be overstated, don’t sympathise too much with this person.

    EDIT: y’all know she was only blocked from sharing, right? She did not lose access to any of her work and no one has the right to demand a middle man for their content.

    Scenario: Jack draws some heinous CP cartoon. He wants to share it with Alice. He asks Jill to hand it to Alice. Jill says “I am not handing this to anybody.” Should Jill be on blast for censoring Jack?

    Scenario 2: Jack draws some middling soft-core porn. He wants to share it with Alice. He asks Jill to hand it to Alice. Jill says “I am not handing this to anybody.” Should Jill be on blast for censoring Jack?

    • fadedmaster@sh.itjust.works
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      1 month ago

      Original Wired article says later in it that Google thought she was spamming. This is relayed through the author though and not Google directly.

      And you’re right. She still had all her work, just couldn’t share it.

      Also, I haven’t read the author’s content, but nothing I saw when I searched the name seems to indicate it was CP. Also, the fact that Google didn’t remove the content entirely indicates it wasn’t illegal content.

      • astreus@lemmy.ml
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        1 month ago

        "Google never specified which of her 222,000 words was inappropriate. There were no highlighted sections, no indicators of what had rendered her documents unshareable. Had one of her readers flagged the content without discussing it with her first? "

        So much of her work could have broken the T&Cs that she can’t identify what it could be without highlights.

        Original Wired article says later in it that Google thought she was spamming

        Different author, but if that’s the case (and it seems this author shares files to over 80 people in one go) then it’s a spam filter issue? Again, non story.

        The headline is a complete lie.

    • OrlandoDeCabron [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      1 month ago

      Brother, people should be allowed to entertain and write down horrific thoughts, especially in a private context, and it not be censored. Policing thought crimes is orders of magnitude more horrific than whatever vile shit someone can put on a page.

      • astreus@lemmy.ml
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        1 month ago

        I think we read different articles:

        This person was not allowed to SHARE the things written. That’s not a thought crime.

  • buddascrayon@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    How do you tell people that you are now using shitty AI to evaluate the content of documents on your site without telling people you are using shitty AI to evaluate the content of documents on your site.

  • JackGreenEarth@lemm.ee
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    1 month ago

    They should switch to LibreOffice then, with Syncthing if they need to sync it across multiple computers.

  • SuperSpruce
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    1 month ago

    Couldn’t she just copy the text to a text file or .odt file and perhaps email it (or better yet, physically copy it with a USB drive) if she can’t direct share it?

    • cucumber_sandwich@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      That might be her working copy. Google docs is fine for text editing. Of course she could work offline or use other platforms, but that’s kinda besides the point of the article.

  • PhreakyByNature@feddit.uk
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    1 month ago

    Hmm I wonder if my novel started years ago and never finished past the first scene is still on hiveword…