My current post, titled "A Week With Rain", has been put "behind bars" by Blogger. Apparently, my perfectly innocent description of last week contains "adult content".
Rest assured that it does NOT.
All there is to the post is what you are used to, if you have been reading my blog for a while: A short summary of the week at the top, and then for each day of the week a report of what I was doing, what the weather was like, and the photos to illustrate the days.
No photo shows anything unusual; there are sunrises and sunsets, the cat I'm looking after, the mouse he caught, and views of vineyards and the paths where we walked on Sunday.
In the message Blogger sent me they say that I can "appeal" if I feel that my post has been unjustly flagged, but it is a bit confusing how to go about it.
The post may never appear properly on my blog, but I'd be most grateful if any of you could tell me whether you are actually able to read it after you have clicked on a button that states that you understand that this post may contain adult material.
Again, there is nothing "adult" about it! I am really puzzled.
UPDATE:
Yesterday (26.08.2026) I received this message from Blogger:
Hello,
We have re-evaluated the post titled 'A Week With Rain!!' against our Community Guidelines (https://blogger.com/go/
contentpolicy). Upon review, the post has been reinstated. You may access the post at https://librarianwithsecrets. blogspot.com/2026/08/a-week- with-rain.html. Sincerely,
The Blogger Team
Thanks everyone for responding!
Yes, I was able to read the post and I am as puzzled as you about the "adult" content. Seemed like a perfectly normal post to me, Meike! I think you should definitely "appeal" their decision.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ellen! I keep wondering what could be interpreted as sensitive content by what I assume must be an AI-supported filter. Is it in the words, or the images? Does "it" think I have posted a picture of a dead cat, or a dead mouse, or both? Does "it" misinterpret my "sessions on the settee" with Neo?
DeleteHow do I click on the button in order to read your latest post, Meike ?
ReplyDeleteIs Blogger just a kind of machine ? Or is Blogger an actual person in an office ?
This is a kind of character assassination. You write in all innocence and get censored ?
Blogger is the platform, so yes, it is a kind of machine.
DeleteWhen you click on "Older Post" at the bottom of this page, you should reach the post in question, with the two buttons where you can decide whether or not to continue to the actual post.
I had no problem accessing your blog post, Meike. There must be some sort of 'bot' that went rogue, I think. Quite ridiculous. I hope it doesn't happen again.
ReplyDeleteThank you for letting me know, Janice. I even had to press the "consent" button myself, for entering my OWN post - THAT is ridiculous!
DeleteSee messymimi's comment below; I'm afraid it can (and probably will) happen again.
This has happened to me twice. I think they are training AI to spot what it believes is inappropriate content and flag it.
ReplyDeleteIf I am remembering correctly, if you go to your posts page, and open that post as if you are going to edit it, you hit the drop down menu next to "preview" and instead of just "preview post," "update," and "return to draft" it gives another option and that's the one you want. They generally get to it pretty quickly, too.
I hope this helps!
Thank you, messymimi, I did exactly as you described and hit "review". But why couldn't they explain in their email how to go about it? They only provide a link that opens the post in HTML mode, without any explanation on what to do next.
DeleteAll they say is this (copied from their email)):
"If you believe that we made an error, you can request an appeal https://www.blogger.com/go/appeal-post?blogId=1949425054295660529&postId=2607499034244400511 which must be done within the next 90 days. Appeals are typically resolved within 10 working days, though some more complex cases may take longer."
I have no clue why they do not explain better where to find the button or how to file an appeal, it took me a long time to figure it out the first time. I hope they get it resolved for you soon.
DeleteThey did yesterday, messymimi (see Addendum). Thank you once again for helping me!
DeleteIt is probably an "AI"-powered algorithm as you suspected. "AI" is notoriously bad at, well, everything. There have been cases of an "AI" algorithm flagging pictures of deserts as nude pictures of people because it mistakes the sand color for skin color. As for wording, there's no knowing what might have triggered it.
ReplyDeleteI think Blogspot's review/appeal process gets the post looked at by an actual human, so that should resolve it.
I had no trouble viewing your "Week with rain" post, so it may have been fixed already. Or maybe the flagging doesn't work properly either.
Hello Infidel753, do you remember MySpace? I was on that Social Media platform many years ago and once posted a photo of a statue in the park of Versailles, Paris. I received a warning for posting nudity! Well, yes, the statue WAS nude, but it was a statue in a public park...
DeleteMy post "Week with rain" has been released yesterday.
I read your previous post yesterday evening, without any warnings popping up? - But I may have been reading it via Feedly then, and not directly from Blogger. (I was catching up on a few blogs without commenting.) And no problem accessing the post from Blogger now.
ReplyDeleteIt was released yesterday by Blogger, see "addendum".
DeleteMaybe accessing my blog via Feedly made a difference - who knows!!
Do tell us if you find out why Blogger did this. I am curious. "Furry charges" and showing the mouse in your hand? Perhaps they thought you had purchased sex toys? Hey, I am a detective at heart! (Sad kind of toys, if that's what they think!).
ReplyDeleteSee the "addendum" in this post, Kay.
DeleteI still don't know what triggered the flag, but who knows - maybe the combination of several words in the same post, such as the ones you mentioned, plus "massage", did it. Anyway, it's been solved now. Trouble is, not knowing what triggered it means I can't be sure to avoid this happening again.
Oh well, it is resolved now. Funny how something innocent can be misinterpreted.
Delete...and we still don't know what it actually was that was misinterpreted - a photo? A word? A combination of several things? We can only assume, and hope that it won't happen again.
DeleteI sent you an email, not sure if you got it. It seems that this was due to a glitch, nothing more! Discovered this when I was trying to work out problems of not getting the feed of other bloggers posting.
DeleteI did get your email and have replied to it on Sunday. Thank you :-)
DeleteI was able to read it and certainly no 'adult content'
ReplyDeleteIt's been released now.
DeleteI can see it but suspect AI flagged it as inappropriate to due to the words below having analogy's that are used for other things - mouse, cat, massage - don't want to list the euphemisms here but suspect you can work them out
ReplyDeleteIt's been released now.
DeleteYes, I can work out what you mean but can only guess that this is what triggered the flag. Without knowing for sure, I can't avoid this happening again.
I can see and read the supposedly rogue post , as normal, below this post. I wonder if the 'red flag word' that AI picked up was 'massage'? ( Even if you qualified it by stating 'head and shoulders'...)
ReplyDeleteIt's been released yesterday afternoon.
Delete"Massage" in combination with other words in the post may have been the reason, but I wasn't told what triggered the flag so I can't avoid it in the future.
As I go for a massage regularly, the word appears frequently on my blog...
It looks like they released it from purgatory, because I can see it fine. Now I'm off to read it to try to determine why it was flagged!
ReplyDeleteYes, it's been released yesterday afternoon; I saw the message on my phone while I was still at the office.
DeleteLike Jenny Freckles, I also suspect that the word that created the alarm was "massage". Sad that something so natural and wholesome should immediately signal notions of lasciviousness. I have never received a message from "Blogger". Do you think there was a human at the other end or just an A.I. bot?
ReplyDeleteAs I am a regular for a massage at the Day Spa, I wonder why none of my posts has been flagged before, if this was what triggered it. Anyway, it was released now.
DeleteThe messages are certainly automatic and not sent by a human being, but the review of a flagged post has most likely been done by a human.
Funny how in my review of "How Late It Was, How Late", the quote I transcribed contained several swear words but "Blogger" did not admonish me. Besides - what about freedom of expression? I find it quite sinister that they might be judging is from the shadows of their AI sanctuaries.
DeleteIt really is odd that you have been getting away with the f-word and my post was flagged when there was nothing at all that could pass for a swear word or other "sensitive" content violating Blogger's policies.
DeleteAs I have said before, AI is all about probability, not about truth.