Google Places has a word filter in place that prevents the use of certain terms and phrases in a listing. It is a particularly “nasty” filter as it doesn’t allow the record to be verified and offers no way of working around the ban other than removing the “offending” word. Even hospitals get swept up in its reach. If you are a Sex Therapist (XXX Therapist?) it becomes kind of awkward but what are you supposed to do if you live on Pine Street or your last name is Martini?
Begging in the forums in the hopes that a Googler will lift the flag is the only way to have this particular penalty removed . I, in a fit of ecentricty, started catologing these banned words. Now in an effort to provide the transparency that Google lacks I am sharing my secret list of naughty words with the world.
In September, Danny Sullivan wrote a post on the The Five Words You Can Never Suggest On Google Instant. Places, not happy with 5 is going for broke… here is my list of 25 31 37 55 banned Places words from the past 4 or 5 months that I have cataloged. I am sure that there are many, many more, so feel free to add to the list:
Adolf (you remember, that pesky fellow Adolf…also a very common German street name)
Bang as in Bang Software
Cummer (as in the Village of Cummer)
Fan as in Fan Base
Fanny as in Fanny St, Cardiff
Fantasy as in China’s Food and Fantasy
Fountain as in Fountain Civil Engineering
Konak (Konak?)
Pikk (apparently refers to the male genitalia in Norwegian but is a common street name in Estonia… who knew?)
Pill as in the Village of Pill
Pine (What don’t I know about the word Pine?)
Prick as in Prick U Body Works
Sex as in Sex Therapy
Venus as in Venus Hotel
Any use of 4 or more capital letters in a row
The other day I received this email from a German TC in the Places forum that demonstrates that Google has scaled this “solution” worldwide with equally odd results:
In German the verb “to tickle” (kitzeln) which is a very normal and “good” verb as well in German as in English I’m believing so.
In German a person who is tickling an other person is a “Kitzler”. Unfortunately in some parts of Germany & Austria there are many family names like ”Kitzler”.
Now the joke:
Google’s translating systems knows ”Kitzler” obviously only as “clitoris” – banning therefore the German word ”Kitzler” from GooglePlace entries. Therefore a Austrian vinary “Hans Kitzler” can’t get onto GoogleMaps. Here his thread at our forum
Best
Helmut
I wonder if they ban the word beer in Germany? That would be reason for an international conflagration, no?
Definition Update: This just in from @sammurray: I just found out but I wish I never. My poor eyes. This should come with a warning alert :0) http://bit.ly/geZnOO
Great stuff, thanks Mike.
I was having an up and down stat dilemma with one of my clients and I think it is because of the word “Beer”, I’ll keep you posted, thanks again.
–Dennis
Comment by Dennis (47 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 10:00 am
It does seem that mention of any alcoholic beverage is ver boten… I assume that it applies to non alcoholic and 3.2 beer as well….
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 10:14 am
Thanks, for compiling, Mike. Love the Kitzler anecdote!
Comment by Justin Seibert (26 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 11:05 am
@Justin
He sent me a similar one about the common German name “Fick”….
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 11:10 am
@Mike – That’s fair – I can definitely see how they wouldn’t let that one fly (it’s very close in spelling to the English translation). Mind you, I mean “fair” in the context of something they would want to flag and hold for approval, not outright ban for even legitimate purpose.
Comment by Justin Seibert (26 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 11:13 am
@Justing
Yes IF they had a mechanism for flagging and holding for approval… these result in being unable to get to the verification or pending state. There is NO mechanism to deal with them in a rational way like you suggest.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 11:28 am
A few more banned terms include:
Teeny
Eros
Joints
Domination
Erection
Most of them are pretty obvious, but I hope it helps.
Comment by Shawn Hart (14 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 12:55 pm
@Shawn
I had seen the domination and erection (scaffolding erection) but couldn’t find the links to them… I had not seen Teeny, Eros or Joints …
Thanks!
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 1:02 pm
Pine? What on Earth? So much for fence builders, woodshops, furniture makers et al. Would very much like to be enlightened by Google regarding that one.
Comment by MiriamEllis (636 comments) — December 15, 2010 @ 5:13 pm
RE: “Pine” it could be that the proper Latin name for Pine being “Pinus” is just a little too close to something else for the Nanny Bot to tolerate… Just a thought.
Comment by Tyler Robertson (13 comments) — December 16, 2010 @ 3:51 am
[...] Google Places, Google feels a need to control language. Perhaps that is a good thing, limiting use of drug and sex terms in a public directory. But it [...]
Pingback by Google as Big Brother in the Forums | Understanding Google Maps & Local Search — December 24, 2010 @ 10:13 am
“Mauser” (ok – there is a weapon) but even if Mauser is part of a streetname in Germany (Wilhelm-Mauser-Str. 50827 Köln) GooglePlace doesn’t accept it.
“Schlüsseldienst” (same meaning as Locksmith)
“Fick” (same meaning as fuck – however “Fick” is a German family name being not much rare)
I consider this compendium very useful & will hint the German (and if applicable the Spanish help forum too) on it.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 10:30 am
just a supplement:
I as TC in the English, Spanish and German help forum informed the German GoogleGuides already about the terms
Mauser, Fick, Kitzler and Schlüsseldienst
And I will continue to do this for any new words if there is a concrete GooglePlace entry – provided by screenshots – posted in the according help forum thread showing the banned words.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 11:11 am
I checked “beer” as well as “Bier” on my active entry “domain”:
Neither “domain beer” nor “domain Bier” leads to any problems in my end
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 1:05 pm
References:
Nanny Bot –
http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/search.py?hl=en&forum=1&query=nanny+bot+more:forum
Comment by Andrew Huskinson (64 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 2:53 pm
regarding to Andrews comment:
If I apply a search for “Nanny bot” using the feature of the GooglePlace forum for “Nanny bot” I get this result:
http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/search.py?ctx=en:searchbox&query=nanny+bot
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 3:23 pm
“escort” is also a bad word
You can also check out:
http://www.2600.com/googleblacklist/
Comment by Spinatmensch (2 comments) — December 24, 2010 @ 5:42 pm
@ehg
The reference is ‘A container for the thing contained’ James Thurbers English Teacher
There is a reference to this Blog and a thanks to Mike.
Things that go round come round. Spirit of Xmas present.
Also the first post Places and Maps users should read before making a post to save us all time. No one has suggested and update since the first stable version.
Cheers. Andrew.
Comment by Andrew Huskinson (64 comments) — December 28, 2010 @ 7:50 pm
But why Google has banned the word Piranha? What’s the reason for it??
P.S. Spinatmensch thx for the link.
Comment by Valentine Rash (2 comments) — January 3, 2011 @ 12:43 pm
we have in Germany a doctor in “Ludwigshafen am Rhein”.
His family name is “Wanger”.
You probably already suspect it:
an entry Dr Wanger gets rejected with a message ‘the word “Wanger” is not allowed’
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — January 9, 2011 @ 6:36 pm
@Ehg
Thanks for the update. I am sure that this a “big deal” to the good doctor.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — January 9, 2011 @ 6:45 pm
There is in Zagreb (Croatia) a Hotel of the Chain ‘ARCOTEL’ called ‘Allegra’.
GooglePlace refused this word ‘Allegra’ as not permitted.
One of the German contributors figured out in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegra
There are plenty meanings of “Allegra”. One of them says Allegra is a drug.
Otherwise I wonder what female people can do having ‘Allegra’ as their names?
Seems they never can get a Place entry.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — January 27, 2011 @ 9:16 am
[...] example of a how a business affects a solution to the situation of their name triggering the “Term not Allowed” filter in Google [...]
Pingback by Graphic: How an SMB Solves a Problem in Google Places | Understanding Google Maps & Local Search — March 18, 2011 @ 5:03 am
Some of these words are nasty… but in French. I guess it’s the reason they’re not allowed?
“Bite” is a quite dirty and very commonly used word for “penis”;
“Nique” is a conjugated form of the verb “Niquer” which means “to have sex” (well, it means “to f**k” actually);
“Pine”: this one is quite funny, because it’s an old word/verb that I don’t hear often. It’s vulgar indeed, but also quite childish. So: as a verb, “Piner” means “to f**k”. As a noun, “une pine” is a penis. That said, I really enjoyed Tyler Robertson’s explanation of this one!
Comment by Ben (12 comments) — April 4, 2011 @ 6:42 am
Freudenhaus is also not allowed (it’s a pretty old and more literary word & means in German almost the same as a brothel but it sounds much more nice as brothel (brothel is translated into German as “Bordell”)
You can presumable compare the pair “Freudenhaus / Bordell” with Ben’s pair of words “to have sex (or to get [paid] love) / to f**k”
But very strange: GooglePace offers in its German list of main categories the German word Bordell though…
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — April 4, 2011 @ 12:32 pm
Google is kidding a German user rejecting the word “kiddy”.
This is ridiculous for an owner of a shop selling toys for kids.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — July 19, 2011 @ 7:58 am
correction: the rejected word is “kiddys”
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — July 19, 2011 @ 7:59 am
Are there additional words since this posting?
Comment by Ant blair (1 comments) — August 1, 2011 @ 11:01 pm
@Ant Blair
I have been adding words on a regular basis so the words are as up to date as I am… there may have been some that I missed but otherwise it is relatively current.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — August 1, 2011 @ 11:16 pm
Mike — I found this list online. It’s for Google Instant, but I have to believe there is some kind of sharing between Google products…
http://www.2600.com/googleblacklist/
Comment by Mike Bunnell (16 comments) — August 17, 2011 @ 4:07 pm
‘headshop’ is a triggert category – a user of swizzerland figured it out today
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — September 5, 2011 @ 9:44 am
at least for German entries the word “gay” is not allowed (“nicht zulässig”). See the screenshot:
http://bed-and-breakfast-in-cologne.de/images/gay_unzulaessig.png
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — October 13, 2011 @ 4:46 am
in Germany we have a worldwide known first name “Adolf”.
Unfortunately the Nazi-Dictator Hitler wasn’t the only German person with first name “Adolf”
More: sometimes people have family names “Adolf” .
So it happens there is a street in Germany called “Hans-Adolf-Weg”.
Its very badly for businesses in that street.
They get the message “Adolf” isn’t permitted and the entry not activated.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — October 26, 2011 @ 9:24 am
Google banned “tai”.
But my client’s company name has a “tai” in it!
It’s just a Chinese word pronounced in English, and it’s spelt like that.
What’s wrong with the word “tai”?
This is the link to my post in Google Places, but no one replied me.
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Places/thread?tid=031feec34aed00d0&hl=en
Hope Google can lift the ban of the word “tai”…
Comment by Eva (2 comments) — November 2, 2011 @ 9:30 pm
A German User gave today the proof the word “Pix” is a triggered word – triggering an entry for pending.
Regardless “Pix” is part of the entry name or just part of the email or website.
His entry was a long time “pending” – then after I recommended to remove “pix” completly from his PlaceAccount it was set to “Active” immediately.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — January 10, 2012 @ 9:22 am
“Hacker” is a triggered word.
A German Vinary got pending for three month – removing only this single word “Hacker” returned the entry immendiately to “Active”
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — March 9, 2012 @ 5:05 pm
Spic is also not allowed (as slur for Hispanic), allthough there are a lot of cleaning companies in our region named “spic & span” after the brand of cleaning products.
Comment by koen (1 comments) — March 15, 2012 @ 7:54 am
Kamasutra
Which makes things very difficult since “kamasutra” is part of my domain name.
Comment by Joline (1 comments) — April 25, 2012 @ 12:31 pm
a Russian user got banned the word “cul” (part of his website though)
Note in Russian “cul” means nothing bad as it is apparently in English
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 2:01 pm
“cul” is used in the Russian like “cool” and for a website of a company dealing with “air conditioners”
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 2:05 pm
@EHG
I have no idea what language “cul” means in English that is bad…. it might be some language other than English
Comment by Mike Blumenthal (1962 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 3:17 pm
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cul
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 3:44 pm
@EHG
Ah its those darn Frenchmen that have given the word a bad name. The Dutch didn’t help either. Its interesting that the Russians are punished for a word that is not bad in their language.
I wonder does the word “cul” trigger the flag when entered on an American or German place page?
Comment by Mike Blumenthal (1962 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 4:23 pm
I tried it in a German sample Place entry – it got it accepted and it will displayed as part of a certain URL of one of my sample entries since about two days.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — May 22, 2012 @ 4:45 pm
the word “baton” gets rejected for Ukrainian entries.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — May 28, 2012 @ 12:18 pm
“Anime” (see en.wikipedia.org for ‘Anime’ and /or ‘Manga”) is a triggered word If it is part of a GooglePlace entry the entry gets immediatety “pending”.
This happens at least for any German place entry (I have tried it with one of my testing entries too – getting it immediatety “pending” and re-activated after removing the word “Anime”).
No idea what the GoogleGods consider bad on “Anime”.
Strange enough:
I manage in my same account an entry for a real business in Belgium.
using “Anime” in that Belgian entry nothings happens. The entry still remains active!!!
Compare this behavior with other “country-specific” handling of triggered words:
‘cul’ & ‘baton’ only for Ukrainian entries and now ‘anime’ for German entries.
Googles doing on triggered word is very weird.
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — June 6, 2012 @ 3:52 am
@EHG
Thanks for the info.
I think it might be necessary going forward to indicate in the list which countries the word is banned in.
Comment by Mike Blumenthal (1962 comments) — June 6, 2012 @ 10:03 am
nanny-bot gets stupid:
it now rejects numbers:
the term “141″ isn’t allowed for Vietnamese entries.
Only the GoogleGods know why.
See more in here:
http://goo.gl/ZBoCv
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — June 8, 2012 @ 12:56 pm
the word “Messer” (German word for “knife”) is triggered for “pending” – again:
only for German businesses.
For a Belgium entry it was accepted.
Strange: there ie an english category “Machine Knife Supplier” though!!!
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — June 17, 2012 @ 4:53 pm
the word “raja” gets rejected for entries in India. See more in http://goo.gl/qvo9J
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — July 11, 2012 @ 4:19 pm
TCP? What’s naughty about the Transmission Control Protocol?
Comment by BJHibbert (1 comments) — July 25, 2012 @ 2:57 pm
the word “bites” gets rejected for swizzerland – this sems to be the reason: http://translate.google.com/#fr/en/bites
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — October 1, 2012 @ 10:33 am
the term “jur” get rejected as not permitted for any entries in the Ukraine
Comment by ehg (34 comments) — November 12, 2012 @ 1:24 pm