Facebook Page with "Damn" in title - and three years this violates policy?!

Thirith

For our blog A Damn Fine Cup of Culture (adamnfinecup.com) we have a Facebook page, which has been up for three, four years now, just like the blog. It's never been an issue - but today we suddenly got a message saying that "The page A Damn Fine Cup of Culture goes against our Page Policy due to profanity and must...". Not sure how the notification would've continued, since clicking on it just takes me to this page about names and user names.

I assume the problem is the "Damn" in the title, but why would it only be flagged now? And has anyone here run into similar issues? Is there a solution, other than changing the page name, or do we have to go the asterisk route?

Shadowhope

Facebook is terrible.

IMO, change one letter and lean into it, becoming a Dam Fine Cup of Culture, with a running gag about very fine dams. Like, say an author is from Chicago - say "so-and-so is from the south side of Chicago. On the south side of Chicago is the T.J. O'Brien Lock and Dam, and what a fine dam it is, with a lock measuring 1,000 by 100 feet. Just look at that dam thing! Incredible work by the US Arms Corps of Engineers. Moving on, the author also wrote. . ."

Thirith

Heh. I like that. Though since we take Twin Peaks' "That's a damn fine cup of coffee" as a starting point, I wouldn't want to do that sort of thing, if it can be avoided.

It kinda amazes me though that this wouldn't have been an issue for over three years and now it suddenly is.

Drez

Legally change your name to Adamn Fine and then tell Facebook that you're just adhering to their real name policy.

Feral

Facebook's content standards enforcement is stupidly disorganized and inconsistent. Theories abound from "they use AI" to "they use foreign contractors whose first language isn't English." It's possible both are true. If they didn't give you an appeal link, you have no way to fight it. If they did give you an appeal link, your chances of having a successful appeal are very low. You pretty much have to change the name because the Facebook machine deems it so.

Thirith

I guess that's the thing: they barely gave me anything other than a cut-off message that there's some issue. I can't even access the general message, so I don't know exactly what to do by when.

CelestialBadger

Recently I reported obvious fraudsters, anti-semitism, and a fake nude video of a female politician to Facebook, and apparently none of them violated community standards.

I guess mild curse words are easy to moderate in an automated fashion.

Thirith

Except not in a timely fashion. I think that’s what surprises me: that it’s the kind of thing I’d expect to be done at sign-up. If it’s automated, why on earth would it take 3+ years, unless they’re getting a reprogrammed C64 to do it?

CelestialBadger

Thirith wrote: »

Except not in a timely fashion. I think that’s what surprises me: that it’s the kind of thing I’d expect to be done at sign-up. If it’s automated, why on earth would it take 3+ years, unless they’re getting a reprogrammed C64 to do it?

They probably only check based on user complaints.

Smrtnik

CelestialBadger wrote: »

Thirith wrote: »

Except not in a timely fashion. I think that’s what surprises me: that it’s the kind of thing I’d expect to be done at sign-up. If it’s automated, why on earth would it take 3+ years, unless they’re getting a reprogrammed C64 to do it?

They probably only check based on user complaints.

This was my first guess, that somebody with a bone to pick flagged it

Thirith

Oh, I forgot to post how the story continued: FB blocked the page, so I was prepared to change the name of the page to something even more innocuous, but I got an error when I tried to do so. I also got the option to challenge their decision, which I did (sort of apprehensive that this would land me and the page in FB Guantanamo) - and less than a minute later I received a message that my challenge had gone through and the page was accessible again. Good joke. Everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum.