Good videos, with context.
Why Web Filters Don't Work: Penistone and the Scunthorpe Problem

Why Web Filters Don't Work: Penistone and the Scunthorpe Problem

Tom Scott
2 HN recommenders · discussed 2017–2026
Open YouTube ↗

About this video

Tom Scott visits Penistone to explain the Scunthorpe problem, showing why naive web and profanity filters block innocent words.

Why it appears in the archive

The go-to explainer whenever content filters wrongly flag innocent words, well made and short.

AI-generated summary and labels from the source dataset; verify important details against the video. Source & credits.

From the Hacker News discussion

colemannugent · 2017-04 · rec

Tom Scott did a video on this: Why Web Filters Don't Work: Penistone and the Scunthorpe Problem - [VIDEO] It's well done, like the rest of his content.

Read original comment ↗
thepete2 · 2020-05 · rec

There is a video [0] about this censoring-"problem" by Youtuber Tom Scott. He talks about how it's impossible to implement with all edge-cases, easy to circumvent and thus usually not a good idea. Fittingly, the video is filmed in Peniston. [0] [VIDEO]

Read original comment ↗
Crosseye_Jack · 2021-03 · reference

Penistone and Scunthorpe and now Memphis. [VIDEO] As much as I dislike Twitter (I only really use it for work reasons) they are in a no win situation. They either moderate what people post with a flawed system that will never be 100% or be hounded by the "Why won't anyone think of the children" group.

Read original comment ↗
varun_ch · 2026-08 · reference

With Tom Scott in particular, there’s a number of his videos that are kinda eerie to watch now with today’s LLM context eg. [VIDEO]

Read original comment ↗