CBS Creates iPhone App...And Supplies Porn

Who said CBS had lost it's cutting edge?

In a classic case of citizen journalism gone awry, CBS’s iPhone application Eyemobile has created a big stir today in the application market. Eyemobile provides users an easy link to CBS’ user generated news platform CBSEyemobile.com where citizens can upload photos and short pieces as their version of “news.” Straight from the AdAge presses:

Karl Johnson, chief operating officer of BrandContent, a Boston-based agency, uploaded the app last night and saw a picture of a young woman bent over her kitchen stove, her skirt hiked up. Later he saw video of three women performing sexual acts on one another. A visit to CBSeyemobile.com turns up a few photos that walk the line of not-safe-for-work, a jarring juxtaposition with CBS's storied news brand. What's more, Google is advertising on the clips via AdMob.

As a huge supporter of the application movement and the Mac community, I will be jumping on the bandwagon of calling out CBS’s moderating system as faulty. The same way Facebook and other massive user initiated sites are monitored, there is a built in system to track content uploads and safety of said content.

CBS does have a moderator, but it seems the system isn't working, or perhaps not as well as they would like. "We've been posting user-generated content since April, and this is the first known incident along these lines," a CBS spokesman said. "It was removed promptly and we will redouble our efforts in this regard."

While CBS’ debacle will probably only leave a temporary stain on the growing app market (enter T-Mobile and G1 stage left), we should all remember the potential pitfalls of putting the word “news” in front of the UGC acronym.

Sidenote, could you ever turn on the TV for your 6 o’clock news and accidentally get porn? No, which is why everyone loves the Internet; it keeps you on your toes.