Museum founded by Mr Horniman hits trouble on internet

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LONDON (AFP) - When Victorian tea merchant Frederick Horniman decided to name the London museum he set up after himself, little did he realise the trouble this might cause in the era of e-mail and internet.

Up to a tenth of all e-mails sent to or from the Horniman Museum are now rejected by computer filters designed to weed out smutty junk messages, according to a newspaper report on Saturday.

The museum's IT consultants are grappling with the problem, but have yet to find a satisfactory solution, the Guardian said.

Additionally, some computer users trying to access the museum's website at www.horniman.ac.uk have found themselves blocked, or worse, re-directed to more risque sites with similar names, the paper added.

In a similar case earlier this week, a theatre company in eastern England complained that attempts to notify schools of an upcoming production of popular children's take "Dick Whittington" had fallen foul of strict filters used by education establishments.

The problems would doubtless by mystifying for Mr Horniman himself, who began collecting works of art and other treasures from around the world in the 1860s and opened part of his south London home so others could view them, later financing a dedicated museum.

It was "a sad sign of the time", museum director Janet Vitmayer told the Guardian.