離開
進入《中英對照讀新聞》Council computer system has "erection" problem 議會電腦出現「勃起」障礙
◎陳成良
A Rochdale man has failed to prevent his neighbour extending his property after the local council's email filtering system blocked two missives containing the word "erection", the BBC reports.
羅奇代爾市1名男子無法阻止鄰居擴建房舍，因為市議會的電子郵件過濾系統擋住兩封帶有erection（興建，也可作勃起解釋）字眼的信件，英國廣播公司報導。
Ray Kennedy fired off three emails objecting to the construction, but only the third slipped the net, by which time permission for the extension had already been granted.
雷．肯尼迪先後發出3封反對該工程的電子郵件，但只有第3封過關，而那時鄰居的擴建計劃已獲批准。
Kennedy told The Sun： "Erection is a normal term in planning. But it was stopped because of its other meaning. I was shocked. Maybe if it didn't affect me I'd find it funny. This proposal was clearly passed without my objections being heard. It is not fair."
肯尼迪告訴太陽報說：「Erection是工程計畫常見的用語，卻因帶有其他意思而使郵件遭封殺，我感到吃驚。 若沒有影響到我，我也許會覺得滿好笑的。這項提議顯然是在未考量我的反對意見情況下，獲得通過，這並不公平。」
The council has promised to apologise to Mr Kennedy. A spokesman said： "The software that protects the council's email system from spam is not designed by the council and we do not control which words are blocked. We will be writing to the resident to apologise for the failure of his emails to get through."
市議會已承諾向肯尼迪先生道歉。一名發言人說：「防止議會電子郵件系統不受垃圾郵件侵擾的軟體，並不是議會設計的，哪些字會被封殺，並不受我們管制。我們將致函該居民，為他的電子郵件未能送達一事致歉。」
新聞辭典
erection ：名詞，建造、豎立。The erection of the new hospital took several years. （這家新醫院的建造花了好幾年）。erection當醫學名詞則是指陰莖或陰蒂的「勃起」。
missive：名詞，書信；公文。
spam：垃圾郵件。Spam原是一家美國公司生產的冷食肉罐頭，如今的意思源於一齣英國諷刺劇。戲中一對夫妻上餐館，妻子不想吃Spam，可是在餐館裡有維京海盜高聲地唱著讚美Spam的歌，他們越唱越大聲，最後戲中所能聽到的唯一單字就是Spam。從此人們將氾濫成災、喧賓奪主、剝奪他人選擇權的行為稱作spam。網路普及後，spam成了垃圾郵件的專用名詞。
