Fresh Loaf

For several excruciating hours Sunday evening and Monday morning, Atlanta city employees were unable to get their online Creative Loafing fix because access to our website was blocked by city servers.

The only explanation given was the slogan, “Internet usage policy restricts access to this web page at this time,” which appeared when loyal CL readers at City Hall tried to call up the familiar blend of hard-hitting news, insightful features and waggish commentary they’ve come to expect.

Why had we been banished from city computers? Was it because someone didn’t like Mara Shalhoup’s drugs-and-murder coverage involving Mayor Shirley Franklin’s former son-in-law? Or perhaps the culprit was one of John Sugg’s pieces criticizing the police department’s handling of the Kathryn Johnson shooting? Or maybe Andisheh Nouraee’s blog postings on the mayor’s travel schedule had rubbed someone the wrong way.

Or could it be that we’re just getting a little paranoid?

“It was a computer glitch,” explains mayoral spokeswoman Catherine Woodling. “It’s not like someone said, ‘We hate Creative Loafing.’”

On Sunday, she says, miscommunication in the IT department over a routine software update had resulted in the blocking of many sites that are normally accessible, she says. Like most large businesses and governments, the city uses commercial software — in this case, Websense — to block employee access to porno, as well as to such online time-wasters as YouTube, eBay, MySpace and my personal favorite, catsthatlooklikehitler.com.

Woodling, who had the problem corrected within minutes, says she looks at CL online every week. Of course, as a PR professional, she gets paid to keep tabs on the local media. Now, if we could only find somebody willing to pay us to watch YouTube. …

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