except you cannot unblock sites you never get to see in the first place, and thus remain ingnorant about their very existence
If you don't know about a site you don't care if it's blocked or not. If you do know about a site you'll find out if it's blocked as soon as you try to visit it.
Explain the difference between website discovery pre-block and post-block? How would someone before the block discover a website, and why wont that work after the block?
I may see an interesting reference with a link to a page which will just not work. Firstly, people will not know if it is because the page in fact ceased to exist or the server is down or it has been blocked and by whom exactly and where? If it keeps happening, most people will just not have the patient perserverance and/or the know-how to keep unblocking such sites. You have to admit that at the very least it is bound to drastically reduce their hit rates. It may well be done to your website, perhaps because of some trivial filter 'mistake'. Are you going to get redress? Will you get your customers ever back?
Mission accomplished, browsing experience essentially destroyed and www turned into another dumbed down TV.
A site that has been blocked will return a fucking huge spalsh page saying it has been blocked, with instructions for removing the block. The customer does not have to unblock each individual site. They call, once, and have the filter removed. It's removed for all sites (except those already on the IWS lists - and they've been blocked for years.)
> perhaps because of some trivial filter 'mistake'. Are you going to get redress?
I've already said it's a bad idea. The difference between me and you is that I'm basing my arguments on fact and I'm not spouting hyperbole based on inaccuracies.
What I have been trying to say, perhaps clumsily, is that accepting the precedent of censorship on the basis of something offending someone seems like a very bad idea to me. Anyone can, and will, claim to be offended by almost anything, especially if it offers them an easy opportunity of hampering a competitor. The polititians too are only human, after all, and get easily offended by effective criticism.
I am glad you said somewhere that you think it is a bad idea because all I can see coming from you is that it is just fine because it can be turned off.