Seems silly. I could possibly see that point if you HAD to view his public profile, but it seems like that's entirely optional. Millions of users never see his public profile image. Those offended can simply not "follow" (circle?) him.
It would be easy to justify NOT removing it, even if EVERYONE else found it offensive. There's an option to not follow/view his profile. Under your view, the only votes would be those who found the picture offensive. If the criteria to remove something is that more than one person finds it offensive, almost everything on the internet would be removed.
A (much) better solution is that items that are flagged as potentially offensive come with a warning. Google+ users could choose the level they're comfortable with, much like they do with Google's search results. They deserve to be called out for making an arbitrary decision here, on something so trivial.
> If the criteria to remove something is that more than one person finds it offensive, almost everything on the internet would be removed.
Reductionist strawman. While a middle finger may not be particularly offensive to most people (including me), more people are likely to be offended by it than are likely to get their knickers in a twist over such a photo being removed. Ergo, it gets removed.
Waste time with warnings about offensive content and blah-blah-derpa-blah? No. Your potentially-offensive content can be kept in private circles and you can exercise good judgement about what you make public. That is the better solution. (And just in case--save the "well, what is offensive, how do we know?" silliness. That little brat Siegler knew perfectly well that he was doing something stupid and possibly/probably in contravention of Google's rules. Anderson called him out on it, too.)
It's not at all a reductionist straw-man argument. The post I responded to argued that if more than one person flagged the post as offensive that the content should be removed. The argument assumed that there should/could be a vote on if something is offensive, and if more people found it offensive it should be removed.
That line of reasoning is flawed, especially since there's no way to vote that you're not offended (other than the original person posting). That's an absurd system, where only the offended can voice their opinion. Even if those not offended could vote, who would vote on everything they're not offended by. That's still silly. Any system that attempts to allow people to vote/flag offensive material is inherently flawed.
That leaves us (or really Google) with an arbitrary decision on what should be allowed and what should be banned. Asking me (or anyone else) to save the "well, what is offensive" argument is silly. That's the WHOLE point. It's an arbitrary decision, one we all might come to different conclusions on. That underlines my point, that it's an arbitrary decision, and one that's been made for no good reason, given a system where you don't have to follow MG on Google+. There's a natural option (and given your obvious attitude on Mr. Siegler, the one you'll likely take), just don't follow him or look at his Google+ page. There's no reason to remove the content, and Google should be called out for it. MG might have over-reacted, and might be worthy of being called out too. I'm only calling out the system of "voting" to determine what's offensive. That's just a silly system.
Right. It's an arbitrary decision. The fact that they made a (arguably silly) decision doesn't prevent that decision from being called out for being silly. It is silly. G+ is certainly entitled to make whatever decisions they want to, provided those decisions are legal. That doesn't make them impervious to criticism.
It would be easy to justify NOT removing it, even if EVERYONE else found it offensive. There's an option to not follow/view his profile. Under your view, the only votes would be those who found the picture offensive. If the criteria to remove something is that more than one person finds it offensive, almost everything on the internet would be removed.
A (much) better solution is that items that are flagged as potentially offensive come with a warning. Google+ users could choose the level they're comfortable with, much like they do with Google's search results. They deserve to be called out for making an arbitrary decision here, on something so trivial.