27bees_2_190iReport.com

In January 2008 CNN acquired Ireport.com and I-report.com for $750,000[3]. A beta version of the site launched on Wednesday, February 13, 2008. The site, which had its complete launch in March 2008, allows users to submit media and have it instantly appear on the site. CNN Producers will then go through the online submission and select reports for possible airing on the CNN television networks, CNN.com and other CNN platforms. The site also allows i-Reporters to contact each other. The site functions similar to YouTube and popular social networking sites.

iReport has Terms of Service that are liberally construed to ban users. Email notification is sent to banned ireporters, absent any reason for banning, and sent from a non-reply email address. Pages of submitted material on iReport have names crossed out, and what was once an avatar, shows as a blue shadow-type figure for banned iReporters.

Banning iReporters was not a common practice until after the November 4th 2008 election. The political opinion pieces submitted to iReport demonstrated a great divide between those who were Hillary Clinton supporters, Barack Obama supporters, and Republicans. During the election, iReport became the dumping ground for political opinion pieces of the strongest wording, name-calling, and labels.

Following the election, trolling attacks on iReport members by iReport members was moderating through the use of banning of ireporters on almost a weekly basis.

Starting in March 2009, several groups of ireporters, a conservative group and a liberal group began blogging from wordpress.

Bickering continues but due to wordpress moderation tools for each individual blogger, the two groups are free of unwanted trolling on their wordpress blogs unlike the case at ireport.

New users who post political ireports or comments at iReport are often accused by former ireporters of both groups now clustering at wordpress of being returning banned users under new handles and when ireport moderation determines a banned user is back under a new identity they are subsequently banned by the iReport Community Manager as a returning “Flatliner”.

“Flatliner” is a euphemistic term for a banned ireporter derived from ireport.com’s displaying a banned ireporter’s username with a flat line drawn through it wherever a comment or ireport appears authored by the “flatliner.” Some dislike the term “flatliner” and try to characterize it as something it is not and have made frivilous and false accusations with regards to the term “flatliner.”

The disgruntled liberal group that now blogs on wordpress failed to prevent Conservatives, Republicans and members of PUMA from contributing to iReport. They trolled the comment logs and openly posted the handles of iReporters that they seek to silence and refer to those iReporters in terms that convey their comtempt. In response, this practice was returned in kind in some cases.

David Williams, iReport Community Manager, and Johnita P. Due, Assistant General Counsel for CNN, are doing a good job of keeping ireporters out of ireport who were previously was banned for conduct in violation of the terms of use.

CNN use of banning is quite effective in bringing disallowed behaviors under control at ireport.

CNN invites the public to contribute news and comments to their assignments on iReport. However, those doing so need to be aware that this is the internet thus if they make their their photo, real name, city, state and other personal information public, they risk troll attacks by anyone. A Google search for the handle of an iReporter subjected to banned behavior often returns the humiliating, slanderous comments if they draw attention of people who disagree or dislike what is ireported or commented.

CNN corrected an ongoing problem of ireport flatliners creating and using new accounts by the institution of new moderation tools which ensure that when a ireport user is banned, they stay banned.

Currently, iReporters are now much safer from the bad behavior of a few who would not abide the terms of use and are now gone for good from ireport.

Above is from the link below….least IT WAS from the link below until it changed yet again–LMAO— and from personal experience aka eyewitness account–except this is more unbiased than I would have written, so whoever wrote this, I agree this is more ‘fair’ to both sides, well done.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNN_iReport

A Prediction of things to come for those that partake of deception and demonization of others.

Here’s a link to “Wired” with the story on the Scientologists being banned: http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/05/wikipedia-bans-church-of-scientology/