The Sex Continent: some thoughts on it

I don't have an opinion as to whether or not it should exist, but I do have some thoughts about it from my point of view, which apply to many other store owners ...

About 5% of the items I sell contain sex animations and, in displaying them for sale, it is possible for customers to spend a short time going through the animations to find out if they want to buy. It doesn't happen a lot with the sex anims, but it does happen occasionally. A Linden stated that stores that sell some sex furniture would not need to move as long as people were not "having sex" in them, but whether or not trying the animations constitutes "having sex" wasn't addressed, and LL's point of view about it isn't yet known (as far as I know).

Assuming that trying the anims is considered to be "having sex", the store would have to move and I would end up with a store of 95% non-sexual stuff that can only be accessed by age-verified people - probably a minority of people for quite some time. This also applies to stores on private regions because the region will have to be changed to Adult - it's not just those who have to move to the new continent who will be affected.

That's one thing I don't like about it. Another is that it is almost certain that existing Picks won't be changed to point to the new places, so everyone who has to move will have to start again from scratch in building up in the All search.

It feels almost worse for similar stores with their own private regions, because they are somewhat stuck with a whole region that must be Adult rated, which will prohibit the majority of people from going there, at least for some time.

Of course there are ways round it, like having a small store on the new continent just for that 5% of sex items, but those are two things that I don't like at all, and it will affect many people. Anyone who has to move will suffer from the loss of Picks and many customers, and anyone who has to change their region to Adult will suffer from the loss of many customers.

Just my thoughts on it at the present time. I used my store as an example, but it applies to many stores.

Violence! You forgot violence.

It's a sex AND VIOLENCE continent.

Sheesh people...it isn't all about the naughty bits you know.

lol. My mistake...

The sex and violence continent

Did anyone ever determine if this would apply to skinners too?

Whatever. The idea that a separate continent is being formed for such a small percentage of content scares me. It implies that this will be policed in some way to ensure things stay they way LL wants them to stay. Big Brother is going to be watching us.

A separate PG continent would have been a lot easier to oversee, and a lot less headache for everyone. Aside from asking what all this is going to solve in the first place ... it seems more like an act of censorship than much of anything else.

I didn't read all the posts (way too many of them), so I've no idea, Oryx, but one Linden did say that nude beaches and naturist places would be fine where they are as long as people don't have sex there. In that case, I can't see that pictures of nude avs (skins) would need to be moved. But I don't think that these decisions have been cast in stone yet.

My guess is that if you have signs up and specifically say "please keep clothes on when testing animations" and don't allow any private area for "testing" it should be fine to stay where you are. Advertising is another matter entirely, however, and my guess is that there is a line yet to be drawn as to how much you can advertise sex animation items and still stay Mature. I say that because I really think the object here is to get sex out of the search listings unless Adult is checked.

Controlling your shoppers is another matter entirely and no one will be able to do that. I find people nakie and "fully attached" in my kissing gazebo on PG land all the time. I ask politely for them to get dressed, but I can't sit there watching 24/7.

From what I've read, no, I wouldn't say so. The impetus seems to be on sex, and not nudity. It's a difference between 'mature' and 'adult'.

Lots of ambiguity. But Blondin Linden has been implying that skins don't rise to their "Adult" tag....as long as a merchant's adverts aren't too sexualized that is.

No, Lindens have said skins are unaffected.

Gotcha, thanks gang. Just curious.

I'm thinking that too, Isablan. I won't have any problem in removing the models or in removing the word "sex" from any text in search if necessary. Neither will I have a problem in putting signs up with words to the effect of nudity is prohibited, but I can't prevent people from trying the anims (they have to see what they're buying) and even stripping off to do it, which is something I've never seen in the store, except in the models cubicles.

That' the way I read it too - they don't consider nudists to be "Adult" content but do consider it to be "mature".

And my understand of the sex animations would be true too - put up signs telling people to keep their clothes on and I don't think it is "Adult" by their definitions that I have seen them talk about on the blog and forums...

The reason they are moving the adult stuff, rather than the PG stuff is that they feel that there is far more PG stuff out there than Adult, and that this would involve the smallest amount of disruption.

Also, I think that long-term they would like the majority of SL to be PG and Mature, and allow people to visit the "Red Light District" as a conscious choice.

Apart from the disruption of moving and the details about how they are going to do it without putting the "Adult" business out of pocket, I actually think this is a good idea. I have a number of friends who would join SL if they thought it was a tad more than virtual sex (which they regard as pathetic - or claim to, anyway ).

Good point. As far as logistics, this would be the most logical way to handle it. I'm more concerned with how LL is planning to enforce this, however - and from what I've seen so far, the level of misunderstanding as to what is getting sent to naughty-land and what isn't is going to be causing a lot of false ARs and misunderstandings.

I think it's a precursor to merging the teen grid into the main one - a move which I am FULLY opposed to. There isn't any need to remove adult content from adults, after all, and inworld age verification isn't needed on an adult grid. Most corporations and educative institutions obtain their own sims, thus having better control over access and content than LL could do grid-wide.

Well, it jives fairly well with LL's assessment of the 2-4% adult content (with yours being in the high end). Just too bad you'll have to split up your store in two if that ends up being the final interpretation.
As for Blondin Linden's comments, that's just one Linden. Somebody else obviously thinks the rules should be different, since they wrote it and initially published it in the knowledge base. -And LL doesn't have a good track record of loosening up on their initial ideas, despite making a show of "listening to the residents". So I am not too optimistic on this one.

Ghosty, I kind of disagree....

I mean each to their own - I'm pretty broad-minded, but sometimes I just want to wander in SL and not randomly encounter the extreme adult stuff. I don't have a problem with nudity and pretty much anything else that goes with a "Mature" rating, but often it's just..well.. if your face, if you know what I mean.

So instead of two levels (PG and Mature) they are adding a third.

The reason they need to put it on a separate continent, rather than just having sims rated like that is because of the "camming across sims" issue that has been brought up countless times.

I think that if LL could have a "do-over" they would have ratings on a continent-wide basis - they would have PG continents, Mature Continents and Adult continents, because that would stop the camming issue for once and for all. But of course, they don't.

The more the Lindens expound on what they are after, the more it seems that they are more interested in changing first impressions than anything. One of their statements was that stores selling mostly mainstream stuff, but with a few "adult" items, would be allowed to stay put. It's the places where the main attraction is the naughty stuff that they want to hide behind this verification thing. Going by what Lindens have said so far, fully functioning demos of boink beds would probably be OK if they were kept in a back room and distributed in plain brown wrappers, and the advertising for those items is soft pedaled.

It sure would be nice if the Lindens would come out and say exactly what it is they're trying to accomplish, but so far it looks like they are trying to mirror typical US zoning. Under that model, any old corner store might sell nekkid magazines, but they are behind the counter with boards covering up all but the names. A strip club or brothel, on the other hand, gets pushed out to the industrial part of town, or outside city limits.

Well in the UK the dirty bookstore has blacked out windows or something too. Strip clubs are usually in the entertainment area, next to pubs and clubs but that's still not far from your normal stores usually.

I'm more bothered about the implications of having to flag a whole island as adult if there's a store selling sex beds or something on the island.

The ironic thing, as has been pointed out several times, is that this new policy does absolutely nothing for that, since the "offensive first impressions" which scare people away are almost invariably deliberate griefing.
Then there's the news stories about "vice in the virtual world" which scare some people away even before the first impression, but, well, making a dedicated red-light district is hardly going to change *those* stories.

We're supposedly all adults here on the main grid, so why is camming an issue? I'm certainly old enough to 'cam' - or indeed, get up and walk - into whatever sim I'd like. We ALL are, or at least we all should be. The only ones doing the camming are the ones who want to look.

Now, if we had (legal) teens on the grid, the argument makes sense and I'd be in favor of it. However, I'm not in favor of teens on the grid and therefore the point is moot.

At least they don't yet. Once the Adult continent is finished, who knows what they'll do next.

Ghosty, you have a point on the camming and are completely right. I guess the other problem is the sim boundaries. I am standing on my PG sim and have no choice but to stare at picture of people procreating (or at least practicing) not 10 feet away from me and there is nothing I can do about it. I know, I know - I should have bought land so close to a Mature sim....

I'm just trying to find some sort of middle ground and find a lot of the stuff on the Linden threads a tad extreme and hysterical.

I appreciate that I may be flagellating a deceased equine, though.

Well, you could build a wall.

I've told a couple of friends that I may close down if I have to move, and I'd consider having to move part of the store as moving. I told one that I'd probably close down.

I agree that these things are not yet cast in stone - as far as we know, anyway.

What I really dislike about it is forcing people to lose All search rankings so they have to start all over again, and forcing people who sell some sex stuff, but don't encourage people to have sex in the places, to lose the majority of users as potential customers.

Another thing that crossed my mind:- the sims are going to be really laggy because of the nature of everything in them. Imagine putting putting a store in a sim with one or two sex-type clubs.

Actually, it occurs to me that this is the reason why an all "Adult-rated" zone is being created, as opposed to an all-PG zone. The all-PG zone would require a lot more policing on the part of residents and LL, whereas within the adult zone, pretty much no policing needs to be done at all because nothing is restricted there, apart from the normal TOS.