eBay is Retarded

Those of you with a passing familiarity with post-World War II Germany may know that any sort of Nazi memorabilia is illegal there. This includes the viewing of such material on the Internet, apparently, and eBay, in their infinite wisdom, has decided to filter their auction items so as to avoid breaking the law in Germany.

Notwithstanding the utterly idiotic censorship policy they’ve put in place — swastikas are required to be covered up in any item photos, for instance, which makes it damn difficult to present a good photograph of any Nazi memorabilia — their means of filtering auction items is even more horribly retarded.

As an American, living in the United States, I cannot view any items that even so much as imply a relationship to the Nazis, not because such items are illegal here — they’re not — but because eBay’s servers filter on the Accept-Language header sent by the browser.

That’s right. Anyone who reads German (or French, incidentally) must, therefore, be living in Germany or France.

Because no one outside Germany or France has ever read a word of German or French in their entire lives, especially on the Internets.

The really sad part is the item in question is a book written by an American ex-POW, about American POWs in Stalag Luft III. It just happens to have a swastika on the cover, and some photos of uniformed German soldiers inside.

Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do.

posted by Chris on 26 November 2005 at 1456 in sci-tech

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