Facebook Community Standards Update

Everything has been going well in the Facebook group. The activity level is at record highs despite a total ban on nudity. The record activity proves what I suspected, which is that nudity isn’t what drives facebook group activity.

We went sixteen days between posts that were deleted by Facebook, which is also a record for us. Generally, people understand the rules, but I’d like to clarify one point further. It’s not just nudity. If your photo is close to being nude for the point of being titillating, then it’s too much for Facebook.

For example, someone posted a photograph of himself in his briefs. He pulled the briefs down with one hand to tease the idea that he was nude. Actually, to show as much of his body as possible without violating Facebook’s nudity policy. Facebook deleted his image.

It’s why handbras aren’t allowed either. They aren’t technically against Facebook’s rules, but they have implied nudity. Therefore they are either intentionally being targeted by Facebook or are just a casualty of their sloppy program.

Facebooks censorship is automated. Humans are not looking at your photographs. If you built a computer program that detected and deleted nude pictures, what would set it off, and what would not? I guess that it’s searching or a certain percentage of pixels that are cloth covering a certain portion of the body.

Consider two “Hump Day” images:

Image A: The underwear is prominently displayed, with the point summarized as “This underwear make my ass look amazing!”

Image B: The person is wearing a thong, that is wedged so far in their ass that it takes a second look to realize it’s even there. The point of the photo is “I’m so close to nude, look at all of this bare flesh.”

Image A is likely to be okay. Image B is going to be deleted by Facebook every time. Both technically pass Facebook’s Community Standards, but that doesn’t matter.

I believe some people cannot separate the emotion from the situation. I agree with anyone who believes Facebooks Community Standards are a joke. However, once you understand what they are allowing and what they aren’t, it’s not difficult to know what to post and what not to post. Facebook sends the moderators a copy of every photo that is deleted by Facebook. So far, I’ve not been surprised by any of them. I wish I could share them with you because I think we’d all learn a lot from them.

In summary, everything is going better than I even imagined. There is record activity in the group, and people aren’t being bullied by Facebook anymore. Please keep in mind that teasing nudity is the same as being nude and you’ll be fine.