Maker of Keyboard App Fleksy: Google Upped Age Rating Over Middle Finger Emoji

Google's Play Store labeled the keyboard app Fleksy as being appropriate only for ages 12 and up because of a middle finger emoji, while Google's own Gboard app is rated suitable for all ages, despite containing the same emoji. From a report: The Fleksy keyboard app has been available in the European Play Store for about eight years and had a rating of PEGI 3 (the equivalent to "E for Everyone" in the US) up until earlier this month, TechCrunch reported Wednesday. At that point, Google reportedly made the team change the rating to PEGI 12, with the specification of "Mild Swearing." Google told the company behind the app that Fleksy contained content that wasn't appropriate for all ages, and included a screenshot of the middle finger emoji, according to emails provided to TechCrunch by Olivier Plante, CEO of Fleksy developer ThingThing. Google also apparently told ThingThing that it wants to push the rating higher.

They should appeal the rating.

[SlashDotCanSuckMy777]

And in their evidence as to why, include a screenshot of the middle finger emoji in Googles own app and its lower rating.

Oh great

[the_skywise]

This OS is rated R and shouldn't be used by anyone under the age of 18.

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[93 Escort Wagon]

The vast majority of people I've seen "flipping the bird" are far younger than 18.

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[ShanghaiBill]

The vast majority of people I've seen "flipping the bird" are far younger than 18.

The concern is about people under 12, not under 18.

Much happens during those six years.

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[Calydor]

According to the summary, Google wants to increase the rating further. Secondly, a middle finger emoji will make as much sense as an eggplant emoji if you don't already KNOW what the middle finger means. It's not like a five year old will look at the app, see a middle finger emoji, and suddenly realize that it symbolizes a penis and is meant as a gesture to tell people to go fuck themselves.

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[Swave An deBwoner]

So that's what it represents?!!!

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[Rockoon]

Do you see penis symbolism in other places?

Exactly how far does your complex go?

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[Calydor]

Considering in my native language it's referred to as a fuck finger it's not exactly my complex.

It always represented a penis.

[BAReFO0t]

Everyone knows that. Just like the thumb between the index and middle fingers represents the clitoris between the labia.

Maybe they don't tell children in religious fundamentalist countries, as they prefer to ram a real penis into them.

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[antdude]

Good. Let's keep the younglings away!

How to disable this emoji?

[OrangeTide]

I don't really want to see this fucking shit.

Move to a religious fundamentalist country ...

[BAReFO0t]

... and apply for a retardedness passport that says your mental age is below 12.

Of course, in such a country, you will have real "fingers" rammed into you, when you're below 12.

That's only the beginning!

[silverkniveshotmail.]

Think of all the filth you could create with all those letters!
A keyboard is basically a toolbox for obscenity!

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[PolygamousRanchKid]

Think of all the filth you could create with all those letters! A keyboard is basically a toolbox for obscenity!

Just google on "ASCII Porn", and view the grand works of the Old Masters.

Re: That's only the beginning!

[Way Smarter Than You]

In a sense but you don't think they did those by hand a character at a time?

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[Anonymous Coward]

can't hear you, fapping to letters

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[Rockoon]

If you think its unlikely that ascii porn was created by hand... then you need to stfu on the subject. Seriously.

Dude, we literally created them by hand!

[BAReFO0t]

There were no tools to convert images like that! AAlib came muuch later.
We also wrote the assembly ourselves!
I even made animations (with the help of some self-made code as a teenager).

You can visually tell whether an ASCII art image was created with a converter or not, by the way.

Finally Goatse is on topic

[tepples]

I'm pretty sure ASCII Goatse [github.com] was created a character at a time in a text editor, not by converting a photograph using an automated process.

(Caution for those new here: Goatse is sexually explicit.)

That's not even the half of it

[xaosflux]

I'm surprised they got away with such a low rating for swearing, have you even seen what kind of foul swears that keyboard app can produce?

Number one!

[Nethemas the Great]

Number one! Number one!

Slashdot is safe

[arielCo]

It's 2019 and doesn't support non-ASCII characters, let alone emoji.

Where Flesky went wrong.

[fahrbot-bot]

They should have made a separate emoji for each finger, then it would simply have been one of five.

Internationalization

[TechyImmigrant]

The middle finger is not offensive in many cultures around the world, just as an upwards thumb is offensive in others.

Insulting

[Gabest]

As an adult, I am offended that they think the middle finger is for me.

Dammit people

[LeeLynx]

Google's Play Store didn't become the town from Footloose just because they don't want to have an app with obscene gestures aimed at 10 year old kids. I don't know what sort of seedy bars some of you were raised in, but there's nothing particularly prudish about not wanting preteens flipping people off with emojis. Not every age-rating change needs to be some kind of call to arms, every now and then it's perfectly OK to give kids a few years before turning them into foul-mouthed assholes.

Re:Dammit people

[jonwil]

The issue is that Google is forcing a 3rd party app to have a high age rating due to particular content but their own app with identical content gets to keep the lower ranting.

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[LeeLynx]

You will note that this is NOT the point of most of the comments as they stood when I posted this. Whatever the point of posting this bit of news was, the general tone of the comments here is "pfft, what's the big deal, kids swear all the time, this is just ridiculous censorship!", not "what hypocrites!".

"Obscene gestures" ... *facepalm*

[BAReFO0t]

It's like you don't even realize that all this making sexual things and swearing taboo thing emerged from the fucked-up minds of religious fundamentalist puritan nutjobs of the same league as the IS, Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican and the Westboro Baptist Church.

FYI: They came up with the concept of relating nudity, sexuality, swearing, etc as "dirty" and "foul". They suggested eating nothing but unsweetened corn flakes, specifially because the were bland and the opposite of aphrodisiacs.
They invented th

Re: "Obscene gestures" ... *facepalm*

[Aldenissin]

Learn to speak for yourself and see how alone with your thoughts you are. There is no doubt being exposed to porn and other things as a child was detrimental to my health. And to assert otherwise is shortsighted, at the least, as is much of your post constructed from your observations.

You will never gain any benefits from spiritualism because you think it is phoney although billions disagree. The beautiful part is that it is hidden from you, because you don't deserve it. You sling mud over everything and th

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[LeeLynx]

I honestly cannot even wrap my head around this notion that at least attempting to teach children to be civil to one another is somehow equivalent to religious fundamentalism. Irrespective of *where* societal norms arise from, they are there, and teaching children to at least try to not willfully violate them from an early age is what societies and cultures throughout history and the world do. That's what socialization and parenting are all about. I don't know if you have kids, but if you don't see a differ