FTC's Report on Adult content in virtal worlds

It's been released and posted.

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/12/virtualworlds.shtm

There's a link to a pdf of the full report.

Skimming through it, the commission observes that while Second Life does much to isolate minors from virtual content (everything the commision suggests, in fact) Adult content is still relatively easy to find.

Heh, I could have told them that.

One could say much the same of the Internet in general. Or even society in general.

When will people realize that sex is an integral, even central, part of the human condition and stop trying to cover an elephant with a handkerchief?

The report has a little something for everyone. Though the FTC seems to be leaning toward a conclusion of letting companies self-regulate, the report also provides some quotables that would be attractive to any legislator eager to regulate.

In particular, I liked how the FTC "the Commission supports virtual world operators’ self-regulatory efforts to implement these recommendations," just a couple of paragraphs after describing how operators' self-regulation is ineffective. "[T]he Commission found explicit content in these worlds despite their rules of conduct, a fact that indicates that conduct standards, on their own, are insufficient to stem the creation of or exposure to explicit material."

In fact, for every recommendation that the FTC made regarding how operators handle explicit content, somewhere in the report the FTC cited a world that used the precise method recommended and deemed that it failed to prevent minors from accessing explicit content.

While the report itself may not be very substantive, it will provide the early education to the legislators who are interested in the issues. Thus, the way the FTC defines issues is important. I didn't like how the FTC separated virtual worlds into targeting either minors, or targeting teen-to-adult. I don't think that teen-to-adult should be one category. There should be a distinction between words catering to teens and older, and worlds catering specifically to adult and not to (under 1 teens at all. If there is no separate category for adult-only, then all adult sites will have to be appropriate for 13-year-olds.

I had predicted that the FTC would come out recommending industry self-regulation instead of government regulation. The FTC did recommend that, but then cited facts that ran completely contrary to it's recommendations. That doesn't bode well.

Even before the internet(s), I remember the neighborhood with playboy and hustler magazines stashed behind the bushes (probably stolen from their father)...or at BoyScout camp, someone bringing a "dirty" magazine for us to look at when the scout masters weren't looking.

When i was 12, before the internet, i downloaded topless digitized grayscale pics of Bruce Jenner and other studs of the era from various BBS's. That was uhm.......1986.

We can hope Congresscritters read the footnotes. (I'm not sure they can read, but...) Footnote 59 says:

Nice to see Zindra was so necessary.

Did you print them on your Dot Matrix printer?

On my Apple ImageWriter and i put them on my wall. hell yea!

Not to mention the existence of a SEPARATE Teen Grid.

Yeah completely, as exemplified by footnote 60:

"IMVU, Kaneva, and Second Life reported using age-segregation measures to keep minors from 60. interacting with adult registrants. The Commission’s researchers did not enter “VIP” areas of virtual worlds, nor any other portions of these worlds that required payment for access. Because Red Light Center is designed for adults only, age segregation measures do not apply."

Umm wait a minute!

Zindra was never about underage users. It was about cleaning up the image for the big corporations and the educators.

Another unfortunate example of the government spending money to document the obvious. Adult content in Second Life is as accessible as what is available in public libraries.

Way to go Lindal with your comment with respect to the accessibility and pervasiveness of sexually oriented and suggestive content in society: "One could say much the same of the Internet in general. Or even society in general. When will people realize that sex is an integral, even central, part of the human condition and stop trying to cover an elephant with a handkerchief?"

There is a difference between sexual curiosity and sexual perversion. Children definitely need to be protected from exposure to sexual degeneracy and degradation. The ability of government to do that is wishful thinking. The expectation of government to do that is laughable...

So now you are ...


35



and



still



HOT!





P.S. Bruce Jenner still wants you... if only he knew!

and all the report proved was that foisting the problem of underage access prevention off on service providers does nothing to stop any underage person that actually wants access to it. or to be more blunt, watch the kids, not the companies if you want a prayer of it working.