A week and a half ago, Grant and I wanted to take a break from the city (Dublin is lively, bustling and really fun), but we wanted to spend some time in a sleepy town on the coast. We had been to Bray a few times, and found it nice and charming with a breezy coastal town feel. We packed on a Wednesday morning and made our way down the coast on an hour’s train ride. As soon as we got out of the train station, the scent of salt was in the air, and there was a summer carnival in full swing despite being a weekday.
The hotel that Grant had booked is called Esplanade Hotel and is right on the shorefront across from the beach. The location is very nice, down the street from some accessible restaurants, and is in a historic building with the interior redone in good taste. We settled into our hotel room and despite it being within sight of the DART train tracks, was very well-insulated and quiet. ‘The perfect hotel room for a nice seaside getaway’, I thought. And it was, we had a great time there.
I brought my computer along, just to check up on our website. Imagine my shock when the web filter of the hotel’s wifi had blocked our site. And it was because the website had been categorized as “alcohol and tobacco”, whatever that means. Yes, Grant has written a scathing critique on e-cigs, and yes, we have a review on our experience with whiskey tasting at the Whiskey Experience in Dublin. But it is a travel blog. What wasn’t banned for displaying “alcohol and tobacco” was the Guinness Factory website itself or Trip Advisor, which has thousands of reviews on bars and whiskey tasting. What was blocked though was a local pub in Blackrock called the Dark Horse, and the Jameson’s distillery tour website. Hmmm, sounds like arbitrarily applied rules. The hotel uses a web filtering program from a company called Cyren that states they allow you to submit a website for review if “you feel it’s been misclassified” but this wasn’t working from within the hotel’s internet filters.
Normally, I wouldn’t care and would have laughed this off as something funny, but I care very deeply about freedom of speech. And I don’t know how widely this company’s web filtering software’s influence stretches or what other companies, businesses, hotels, or God forbid public wifi systems use this. So, we continued to apply for the website to be reviewed and get off the banned list, but we have not heard back from Cyren. I’m beginning to think their website reviewing submission process is a sham.
A hand written note was left for Orla Coogan, the Esplanade Hotel manager, at the front desk, but I’ve not heard back from her at all.
Another website that is similar to ours is www.worldwidewaftage.com and their site is also banned from the Esplanade’s internet service. And unfortunately for this site, a reason is not given at all and is just listed at “Uncategorized”.
If you have any suggestions on how to get our website re-reviewed, that would be great, or if you have had any experiences with your website getting censored and how you were able to successfully deal with it, we’d love to hear from you.
As for the Esplanade Hotel, we had a nice stay despite our experience with their internet service. As a relaxing vacation spot near the beach, we can recommend this place and the town of Bray is lovely. Just be forewarned, if you plan on getting work done via the internet while staying in the hotel, there is no guarantee that you’ll be able to access your work site, which could be a big problem for people on business, or if you are a tourist and wanting to look up local attractions, you may have problems. Also, the customer service at this hotel is not very responsive. Grant ordered to use an iron, and we were kept waiting for it and the iron never arrived.
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