FanFiction.Net adult content purge felt across fandom two weeks on

Saturday, June 16, 2012

Two weeks ago, FanFiction.Net purged the site of much of the adult content, surprising many fan fiction readers and writers; leaving several archives on the Internet unprepared for a deluge of new users, problems continuing to this day. FanFiction.Net removed around 62,000 stories after a change allowing writers under the age of eighteen to register.

FanFiction.Net spelled out the reasons for their purge on the front page of the site:

According to alixe75 on LiveJournal’s ffdotnetrants, FanFiction.Net deleted 2,002 Naruto stories, 1,497 Twilight stories, 1,256 Harry Potter stories, 670 Glee stories, 364 Inuyasha stories, 364 Hetalia – Axis Powers stories, 282 Kingdom Hearts, 213 Pokemon stories, 143 Yu-Gi-Oh stories, 127 Dragon Ball Z stories and 47 Doctor Who stories amongst others. rahirah on Dreamwidth provided another statistic, “Approximately 11% of all BtVS [Buffy the Vampire Slayer] stories were zapped. That may not sound like much, but FFnet is big – that comes to thousands of stories.” feckless-muse on Dreamwidth reported the purge included banning users. Despite the purge, Alexa reports no drop in traffic to FanFiction.Net.

Thursday, August 14, 2008

A man living in South Wales, United Kingdom was ordered to destroy his entire music collection after creating a ruckus by listening to the music at an extremely high volume. Police seized his stereo equipment in a raid. Karl Wiosna, a 44-year-old resident of Graig in Pontypridd, was playing Cher‘s album Believe at extremely high volume. His neighbours complained under the Environmental Protection Act and he was warned not to play the album at such high volume. However, he thought the warning was only for the Cher album, and he then started to listen to a U2 album a week later. His neighbors said they could hear the lyrics in their living room.

Before the Rhondda Magistrates’ Court Wiosna admitted breaching the noise abatement notice, with which he was served. He was ordered to pay a £200 fine. He was also ordered to pay £50 in costs, £15 in victim surcharge, and to destroy his music collection.

“They took £500 to £600 worth of stuff,” complained Wiosna. “I don’t think they should be able to do it, it isn’t right.”

“A legal notice under the Environmental Protection Act was served on Wiosna demanding he reduce the volume or stop playing music,” read a statement by the Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council. “Just a week after the legal notice was received, officers were called to the address during an out-of-hours emergency by a neighbour.”

“In this case, the swift and effective actions of environmental health officers enabled the issue to be dealt with and I hope it serves as a reminder to others, that we can take them to court and seize their belongings if they do not cease causing a nuisance to others,” said Councillor Mike Forey, the cabinet member for environmental health.

Monday, April 11, 2005

Anna Ayala, the Las Vegas woman who claims to have found the notorious “chili finger” at a Wendy’s outlet in San Jose, California, has filed lawsuits against other businesses, according to researchers at the Associated Press. Her previous court battles included the national El Pollo Loco chicken-chain, a previous employer, and even General Motors.

Ayala successfully won her suit for medical expenses against El Pollo Loco, after her daughter Genesis contracted salmonella poisoning from eating at the restaurant. However, Ayala lost another suit in 2000 claiming that a wheel fell off her car.

Ayala’s original account of the incident spoke “emotionally and with disgust” to the San Jose Mercury News when she described it to the paper.

“Lies, lies, lies, that’s all I am hearing. They should look at Wendy’s. What are they hiding? Why are we being victimized again and again?” Ayala recently told The Associated Press. Ayala is now in her Las Vegas home, avoiding reporters.

“It doesn’t prove anything,” family spokesman Ken Bono told the San Francisco Chronicle. “My mom has 10 lawsuits. A lot of people have lawsuits. Why would she sue for money? She has plenty of money,” he said.

Nick Muyo, a spokesman for the San Jose Police department, said not to expect new information in the case for at least a week.

“We just want to step back and take a deep breath,” Muyo told Knight Ridder Newspapers. “From a law enforcement point of view, once you establish it is a human finger, you have to wonder is this a case of industrial accident or is this a case of unreported homicide,” he said.

Las Vegas police searched Anna Ayala’s home on Wednesday, retrieving a cooler and other effects from her home, such as a makeup case.

Despite the incident, which has dramatically reduced sales at Northern California Wendy’s outlets, die-hard Wendy’s fans are still turning up for lunch, even at the outlet where the finger was found, at 1405 Monterey Highway, just south of downtown San Jose.

“We’ve eaten here for years,” a police officer told the San Francisco Chronicle under the condition that he remain anonymous. “They’re very nice people. When we work Spartan Stadium, we always eat here,” he said.

San Jose City Council candidate Andrew Diaz still eats the chili. And he witnessed the finger discovery.

“I walked away real slow,” Diaz told the San Francisco Chronicle. “I didn’t want any commotion,” he said.

Monday, April 3, 2006

High winds and multiple tornadoes caused destruction across the American Midwest yesterday, killing 18 people when they hit five states in the early evening, although that figure is expected to rise.

In Dyer County, Tennessee alone, 12 people were killed, and in Gibson County, Tennessee, a further three were lost, bringing the death toll up to 15 in that state alone. The remaining three lives were lost in Missouri as a result of high winds, although the freak weather also hit the states of Arkansas, Kentucky, Ohio and Illinois.

When asked about the storms which caused chaos in Tennessee, Dyer County Sherriff Jeffrey Holt said, “This hit about 7:40 last night, so the warnings were out. They were being tracked all the way across Arkansas and Missouri as it was coming in. We had plenty of warnings, I think, just the amount of destruction in the area is what caused our fatality count to get so high. Destruction is almost absolute total destruction along some of the path of this. There’s just nothing left of houses but foundation.”

Numerous power failures were reported across the affected areas, with some county authorities reporting that the blackouts may go on for several days.

A dispatcher in Pemiscot County, Missouri informed the press that, as of Monday morning, some people were still trapped in their houses as a result of the storms.

In Illinois, tornadoes touched down across at least seven counties according to local emergency officials, but no-one was severely injured or killed. The Emergency Management spokesperson for Illinois Patti Thompson reported that a large storm front which spanned the breadth of America from Illinois southwards was the cause of last night’s dramatic weather.

In the state of Ohio, a Wilmington-based meteorologist informed members of the Associated Press that “In every county in southwest Ohio there has been some type of damage.”

Repair costs for damage across the affected area are expected to be six-figure sums, and extensive work to replace destroyed segments of the infrastructure such as gas and power supplies is already underway, said officials in all seven of the states hit this morning. The current death toll is expected to rise today, with at least one more unconfirmed death reported in Missouri already.

Sunday, October 7, 2012

A Norwegian University of Science and Technology study released Thursday found electric vehicles have a potential for higher eco-toxicity and greenhouse impact than conventional cars. The study includes an examination of the electric car’s life cycle as a whole rather than a study of the electric car’s environmental impact during the use phase.

The researchers conducted a comparison of the environmental impact of electric cars in view of different ratios of green-to-fuel electricity energy sources. In the case of mostly coal- or oil-based electricity supply, electric cars are disadvantageous compared to classic diesel cars with the greenhouse effect impact being up to two times larger.

The researchers found that in Europe, electric cars pose a “10% to 24% decrease in global warming potential (GWP) relative to conventional diesel or gasoline vehicles”.

The researchers suggest to improve eco-friendliness of electric vehicles by “reducing vehicle production supply chain impacts and promoting clean electricity sources in decision making regarding electricity infrastructure” and using the electric cars for a longer time, so that the use phase plays a more important role in the electric vehicle life cycle.

Sunday, October 7, 2012

A Norwegian University of Science and Technology study released Thursday found electric vehicles have a potential for higher eco-toxicity and greenhouse impact than conventional cars. The study includes an examination of the electric car’s life cycle as a whole rather than a study of the electric car’s environmental impact during the use phase.

The researchers conducted a comparison of the environmental impact of electric cars in view of different ratios of green-to-fuel electricity energy sources. In the case of mostly coal- or oil-based electricity supply, electric cars are disadvantageous compared to classic diesel cars with the greenhouse effect impact being up to two times larger.

The researchers found that in Europe, electric cars pose a “10% to 24% decrease in global warming potential (GWP) relative to conventional diesel or gasoline vehicles”.

The researchers suggest to improve eco-friendliness of electric vehicles by “reducing vehicle production supply chain impacts and promoting clean electricity sources in decision making regarding electricity infrastructure” and using the electric cars for a longer time, so that the use phase plays a more important role in the electric vehicle life cycle.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

The Dutch coalition government has collapsed over “irreconcilable differences” between the two largest parties over Afghanistan troop deployments.

According to prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende, the Labour Party, the second largest party in the government after the ruling Christian Democratic party, was resigning from the government, effective immediately. Balkenende said, “You could see from the last few days that we couldn’t come up with an agreement.” He added, “Where there is no trust, it is difficult to work together. There is no good path to allow this cabinet to go further.”

The split occurred after 16 hours of talks over the future of the Dutch presence in the Afghanistan War, which ended early Saturday. While the Christian Democratic Party supported keeping a reduced military presence in the Uruzgan Province, the Labour Party demanded the immediate return of all Dutch troops in August.

With the resignation of the Labour Party, the Christian Democratic Party is left with an unworkable majority in the government. While Prime Minister Balkenende made little mention of the future of the government, saying only that the remaining two parties would continue in office, with the Labour Party’s seats being “made available.”

According to the leader of the Labour party, Wouter Bos, the third party in the Dutch government, the Christian Union Party, would also resign its seats along with the Labour Party’s seats when he offered the resignation of the party to Queen Beatrix later on Saturday. Despite Balkenede’s statements, political analysts said that early elections seemed inevitable, despite a year remaining in the current term.

Dutch troops were deployed to Afghanistan in 2006, and were originally intended to return in 2008, but were forced to remain as no other nation was willing to provide replacement troops. Under the new commitment signed in 2008, Dutch troops were to return in August, a stance reinforced by a Dutch courts’ ruling in October 2009 requiring that all troops return by that time, although that ruling has yet to be ratified by the government.