How to prove you are not a minor in SL?

Get a yahoo account for the messenger... you'll find otu all about them

While checking out the competion to SL, I came across one called Red Light World, whose sole purpose is to provide a venue for virtual sex. No, I didn't join, I hasten to add.

That puts the goings-on in SL in perspective!

QFT. I had a friend from my Sims online days that invited me to try it out. I had never heard of it and the name should have registered in my head. When I got to the website for sign up I was stunned.
I didn't sign up. I am not against pixel slapping for those who like it.. that place just looked like more pixel slapping then anything lol.

I'll be on the lookout for "RepKirk Shepherd" (Not a real SL name). Probably with extra prim attachments!

See also...

http://valleywag.com/387829/congressman-gets-in-on-second-lifes-rape-rooms

If he is hoping to get hit on he is going to need a better skin and some prim hair at minimum.

Frankly I wonder what took so long for someone to start focusing on the rape aspect of SL. I figured it would have happened right after the sexual age play stuff.

http://www.secondlifeinsider.com/2007/03/08/just-killin-avatar-murder/

Lookie: My moment of fame.

I don't entirely get it.
I know and I personally have no problem with pixel sex or kink but I personally never participated any of that but when I was younger here I did in search when I was looking for parks, and in search I stumble upon a Man & boy love park...
I seriously doubt it exist now.
And I didn't stop by, I had no interest in doing so.
I can't be the minority that would never participate in anything like that here.
I had no interest in going to that online "red light" district place either.
SL got my banking information, in this day and age they can find out whole lot about me without just a name and address, without me ever age verifying if they really are that concerned.
And US Government is known to spy on their own citizens and can find out almost anything they want without the persons consent if they think they are involved in illegal activities.

Payment Info On File

WHAT THE HECK!!!?????

payment info on file is possible for minors.

There are several ways of doing it, including parents getting a debit card account for junior and depositing the allowance into it (which allows them to set up a pay pal account or directly to LL )

A recent research report sheds some light - a different light - on the issue of online predators and child sex abuse. I think it deserves to be required reading for any member of Congress trying to exploit this issue.

There's a brief summary of the report at http://www.unh.edu/ccrc/internet-crimes/ . The full report can be found at http://www.apa.org/journals/releases/amp632111.pdf.

Bottom line: The primary solution is better education of youth.

And if he has, he only sees what he wants to see

Sorry, that makes too much sense - our politicians will never go for it. Besides, it doesn't allow them to run around assigning blame.

any parent who allows their minor child to participate in the adult SL needs to have their child taken away from them. if that does occur, i'd say LL is off the hook and the parents are in deep doo-doo if that child has a traumatic experience.

Not always aware of what the child does, many do this to control playing of other online games (using the debit cards)

And the verification does not mean they pick up a paid account or even buy lindens.

So not much of a paper trail even if the parents are looking at the balances.

It's forgetting a common incident in the world: Little bobby is 7 and playing GTA4 cause mommy got it to shut him up, and after seeing it played is now screaming at the front desk at the video game store

Who gets blamed by the media and politicians... not the hard working parent but the games industry

Regardless of posturing politicians and irresponsible parents to blame, SL, because of it's adult nature, has to have an ironclad way of determining age and there is no way other then 3rd party, real world, face to face, verification (short of thumbprint or retinal identification readers which would be overkill)

Each person would have to submit a form they print out and have physically signed, by a verifiable person, such as a bank officer or Notary witness and send into LL. As cumbersome as that may be, I don't think there would be any other way. Maybe someone could think of a better way--but thats all I can think of.

As long as it is easy to fake age in SL under the current setup or even the verification they have proposed, SL will still be a target.

The issue also relates to each residents confidence in knowing that that person they are interacting with is not underage.

Just because adult websites are so flakey about it, does not mean SL should.

here is the rub: when does the verification pass the point of being a detriment to commerce.

Undo hardships on the content providers and industries will stifle development and such

There is a reason it's called reasonable effort to verify.

People often have to fill out real world forms for all kinds of things. Its not that big a trouble. Having a major scandel would set back SL far more then the trouble of haivng to do real age verification. or how bout people who get tricked by a minor that they are an adult and Sl-marry them and settle down in a nice little beach hideaway? or a seller, selling a adult item. Suddenly no one is going to care about technicalities and reasonableness.

And this, of course, is right where my head went with the 3 AM comment.

Yes, for Real World things. How many here are going to go through that trouble just for SL? And even if many will, how many new people would run out and get a notarized form for it right off the bat. I know I wouldn't have. Adult sites far more lascivious than SL manage to cover their legal tails. The only thing stopping LL is their own desire to eschew any accountability, which has become SOP by now.

And even that has loopholes, since Bob can be needled into letting his buddy Joe use his info to get on for the combat sims... and then go wandering.

Happens already.

Short of killing the anonymous nature of the internet, there is no hard way to verify. Short of biometrics linked to a database on login.

And even that would have to force them to reverify after leaving the computer

Taking reasonable measures both in signup and ToS is the only real way to do it. It's all that can be done short of outright invasive techniques that punish the legit users.

don't want your kids online at risk, then be a parent. Instead of making the burden harsh on the companies that produce content, make them do a reasonable effort (like they do now) and punish the kids (and/or parents) for lies to get around them

QFT

SL is entertainment for me and probably for a lot of others as well. If I had to jump through that many hoops just to log in, I'd get my entertainment elsewhere.

Think it would have to be explained to a new customer why it's important--or maybe make them stay on a conservative General Audience grid first and then they could decide if they wanted to go to the mature grid or sell adult items.

Knowing the way things are, sooner or later it will explode in their face if they don't make more than a perfunctory effort. All it would take would be one big isolated scandel for big problems and then the boom would fall.

Oh... is that a new GAP ad?

But imagine how you would feel, if someone lied to you and you were their boyfriend or girl friend for 6 months. Lots of people have relationships in SL.

Yawns

And how many are hurt when it turns out the person is of the other gender?
How many are hurt when the sassy redhead is really a brunette in rl?
How many are hurt when the 20 something partner is actually a 40 something one?


Are you going to make it so the mystery and chance to be something else is removed for the majority of folks?


"for the kids" is one of the worst arguments to ever use for punishing the innocent

A kid lies to get into places he/she shouldn't then they should be punished, after all a bar that checks IDs can have someone with a good one slip in. But is the bar punished or the person with the fake ID that got them past the standard entrance check?