The Real Reason Behind LL's Adult Content Changes

And in fact the legislation protects the anonymity, limiting the use of the verification information provided to the intended use (i.e. age verification).

And parade a phalanx of "experts" who sit there and wring their hands over "why" the piece of garbage committed the act, and where did "we" go wrong".

Television has made the world a Global Village. It takes a Global Village to raise a Global Idiot.

Talon I am glad you clarified your position and made it clear you do not endorse virtual depictions of sexual acts upon children.

Show me how your original post matches what you just wrote above, though, and your continued snide tone might seem justified. Also please do not place quotes around something I did not say.

If you want to portray an obvious assertion that any depiction of sexual child abuse is wrong, as "emotionalism" then I can't stop you. I can only hope your own tone will become more objective.

ETA: Your "however" statement STILL lumps child abuse in with adult on adult acts simply because you find it ALL incomprehensible. That shaky sub-heading does not justify writing it off as "something two adults do" or "inappropriate by you or anyone else." Do you not see your language is minimising it. It is inappropriate, PERIOD. The only other 'viewpoint' on sexual acts upon children is NAMBLA's.

I read Talon's first post several times, and I understood it's point. There was no advocacy of child sexual abuse at all. Just making a valid comparison, in my opinion. The theory is sound. there are things that are so viscerally offensive that there is no doubt as to their not being allowed. But once you move from there, we all have things that we find abhorrant. We would probably like to see them done away with, but where do you draw the line, and who gets to draw it?

I understood his/her point.

I still find the language lumps child sexual abuse in with things he or she personally finds offensive and in so doing minimises it.

It isn't a domino effect. It isn't a slippery slope. One is ALWAYS wrong, the rest is a matter of personal choice. Period, end of story.

This discusion about sexual ageplay in sl brings another related question to mind;
most people posting here find sexual ageplay in SL offending for whatever reason, it is their good right to have that oppinion but what makes me wonder is do they find RL sexual ageplay offending as wel? afterall the persons are the same, 2 concenting adults and the roles played are also the same, 2 kids or an adult and kid, what differs is the "outfit, in SL it is a pixel doll, in RL it is a sized up child dress or pjs etc.

There is at least one difference.. you cannot radically reduce your body size in RL, so it is harder to appear as a child (rather than as an adult dressing like one).

In other words, the distinction between play with someone acting young and play with someone who is actually underage is clearer in RL.

Perhaps there is a slippery slope. This is a good question. In SL you can appear as a child in all ways, but are still an adult. But in RL, if I were to dress up like a cheerleader, or put my old Catholic School uniform on *like it would fit *, there are still visual cues that I am not really a child or teenagaer. I think it is that visual of what appears as a child engaging in sex with an adult that offends, and rightfully so, whereas an adult avatar wearing clothes associated with children is a different story.

Pictures please

Lady, I dunno what your problem is but once again, THERE ARE NO CHILDREN INVOLVED IN SL. That's my point. Of course child abuse is wrong. I /never/ said otherwise. RL child abusers should be dragged out into the street and shot. However, what does that have to do with ageplay in SL? Nothing. Because no actual children are being abused. If some dude and some chick (or another dude pretending to be a chick) want to ageplay in SL we all agree it's creepy but they are adults and I have no interest in telling adults what they can and can't do in private as long as they're not harming anyone or anything else.

Am I making myself clear now? Child abuse: Involves actual children and is evil. Ageplay in SL: Involves adults pretending to be children, or underage or whatever the hell they do and is creepy. (Yes, I'm being condescending now. I'm sick of trying to explain myself to you when you manage to parse malicious intent into something I say every damn time.)

It was probably unclear, because you took the second part ... the part that was clealry meant as illustrative on a completely different topic, while leaving out the part where he clearly stated that he did not support this ... and then you used it to attack.

The problem is that without some form of verification, that statement is hardly a given. Even with verification, there will still be minors in SL, just likely fewer.

The problem with the 'yes I am 18 and consent to this' solution is that by definition, those under 18 are already not considered developed enough to be able to understand the question, and by that I do not mean that they do not understand their age, but that they are considered too young to understand the ramifications of saying yes, not only to entry into SL in the first place but also to anything they might consent to in SL.

If that was not the case, if they were considered mature enough to provide informed consent, then they would not be considered children and there would be no need for concern.

Stealing mommy's credit card (to register) is easier to link to immediate consequences and thus is more of a deterrant. Also it takes more effort than simply clicking yes, so there is also at least a minor deterrant from the extra effort needed.

This.

I would agree completely, but would bet my SUV that there would be very few kids on Second Life, playing with a kid avatar.

So, Clarissa, you're saying that if someone finds something disagreeable, they should be on the 'ban-it' wagon?

I mean, personally, I don't care to see gay dudes (or ladies) doing their thing. According to you, I should be trying to lobby LL to get rid of it because 'someone is offended'. Is that the vibe I'm getting from you?

If so, you're probably the loudest moron on the forums. Do yourself a favor, and log in to your ideal world, the real one, and leave the rest of us alone.

The ironic thing is that while I was writing those posts, I was talking to a friend inworld and she predicted this would happen. "Someone will accuse you of supporting ageplay." I was confident it wouldn't happen because I clearly said I didn't support it. She told me it didn't matter, someone would manage to accuse me of it anyway. Wow, was she ever right...

all verification does is take data given.

It provides a deterrent for the curious kids that were raised knowing right from wrong.

Nothing will keep out the kids that don't know right from wrong ... or want to get in anyway.

This reminds me of when the FTC investigated AOL and the like for their chatrooms and what not... concerning keeping kids form 'obscene' content... it was ruled: Parents are the ones responsible for monitoring what their kids do online.

What happened to the last ones you took?

Are you now, or have you ever been an ageplayer?

I would tell you, but those words are on the LL censored list.

Wow, she did not earn or deserve that sort reply.

One doesn't have to draw up elaborate conspiracies theories here. Sure, Linden Lab lied to us. But it was for the plain and obvious reason that most of us guessed- they are trying to clean up Second Life's image as a seedy cesspool to attract corporate interest.

It's not about morality. It's not about a conspiracy.

It's all about the benjamins.

Even if Congress passes whatever anti-porn laws one or two legislators may envision, it would be years before Linden Lab would actually have to do anything to comply. Passing legislation (if it's not a bank bail-out) takes time. What takes longer is the lawsuit filed by the ACLU to strike down the legislation, during which time a federal court will stay enforcement pending the outcome of the lawsuit.

There is absolutely no reason whatsoever that Linden Lab would need to try to comply with legislation before it even passes, which is no certainty anyway. If it did pass, then Linden Lab could do it's adult clean-up, and not be the bad-guys- they could blame it on Congress.

Cleaning up the image to attract the corporations to Second Life is truly the far more immediate concern to Second Life, than pornography regulation that might be years in the making.

A legislative drive to regulate pornography on the Internet is not recent over the past few years. It has existed since the Internet went mainstream- 15 to 20 years, depending on when you think the moment was that it went mainstream. And the legislative fight against Internet porn has gone absolutely nowhere in all that time.

There are two reasons. One is that, despite the fact that the anti-porn consituents are more vocal, the corporate constituents are more powerful. And the corporate constituents are not only the pornographers, but the ones who would fear that once the pornography battle were lost, it would set the precedent for the legislators to come after them. The other reason is that, when Congress has actually gotten unconstitutional regulation passed, the Supreme Court has been doing a good job of striking down those laws.

The drive to legislate away internet pornography will continue to stall at about the same places that every attempt to regulate "adult entertainment" in the U.S. has stalled historically. It's possible to regulate such entertainment out of plain sight, but that's where it stops; getting rid of it in the land of the free just won't happen. As long as we remain the land of the free, at least.

Edit: One last point. The FBI, which goes after online predators, has no interest in shutting down the places where pedophiles gather. It's pretty easy to find them when the FBI knows exactly where they are. The FBI, by the way, is the world's largest distributor of child pornography, a fact of which it has proudly boasted. (FBI sting operations to catch the people who want child pornography greatly outnumber the actual illegal distributors of child pornography.)

The real reason why SL made such quick changes to adult content

For Immediate Release
May 5, 2008
Kirk, Parents and Police: Delete Online Predators

Four-million-strong Second Life site offers “rape rooms” – easy access to children

Kirk: “FTC should investigate the growing vulnerability of children to predators on Second Life”

Mount Prospect, Ill. – U.S. Representative Mark Kirk today joined with local parents, teachers and law enforcement to call for federal action to protect kids from child predators and registered sex offenders on “Second Life” and other social networking Web sites. Congressman Kirk was joined by Mount Prospect Mayor Irvana Wilks, Mount Prospect Police Chief John Dahlberg, Mount Prospect Officer Dirk Ollech and 10th district parents and teachers Janet Joy and Bonnie Graham of Arlington Heights.

“During the past five years, social networking Web sites like MySpace, Facebook and Second Life exploded in popularity,” Congressman Kirk said. “As more kids flock to these sites, we’ve seen a corresponding increase of online sexual predators targeting children. According to a U.S. Department of Justice survey, one-in-five kids have been sexually solicited online. As new technologies develop, more disturbing revelations unfold. Sites like Second Life offer no protections to keep kids from virtual ‘rape rooms,’ brothels and drug stores. If sites like Second Life won’t protect kids from obviously inappropriate content, the Congress will.”

To raise parent awareness of these growing threats, Congressman Kirk sent a letter today to the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission requesting a consumer alert warning about the dangers of Second Life. On the site, kids create an online persona called an “avatar,” and interact with the program’s more than four million users. While Second Life claims to prevent children under the age of 13 from accessing the site, there are no age verification features built into the registration process. Second Life’s own lawyers admit that its “teen area” may have adults prowling and the adult area may have children present. Outside of the pre-approved “teen area” are countless locations where users engage in virtual prostitution, drug use and other wholly inappropriate activities. Drug dealers and predators routinely attempt to contact users in the real world once a meeting happens in Second Life.

According to I-Safe America, nearly one-third of kids have chatted with strangers on the Internet, and 12 percent have met online strangers in person. Social networking Web sites are often the entryway for predators to build trust with a kid online, preparing for an eventual “in-person” meeting.

With more than 150 million registered users on MySpace.com alone, children’s detailed personal information – last name, address, phone number, school, schedule and photograph – can be easily accessed by sexual predators. Last year, the Illinois Attorney General discovered nearly 850 registered sex offenders in Illinois who use Myspace.com.

Congressman Kirk also detailed his legislation to help parents play a larger role in the safety of their kids. He introduced the bipartisan Deleting Online Predators Act, which passed in the House in 2006 by an overwhelming vote of 410-15, but did not see Senate action. The bill currently has 91 bipartisan cosponsors.

The Deleting Online Predators Act requires schools to prevent children from accessing social networking Web sites and chat rooms like MySpace unless they are doing so for a legitimate educational purpose and are under adult supervision. It also requires public libraries to prevent children from accessing these Web sites unless they have the permission of a parent.

The Predator’s Act also requires that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 90 days:
• Create a Web site with a distinctive Uniform Resource Locator to educate parents, teachers, school officials and others regarding the dangers on the Internet to child users. This Web site would include information about commercial networking sites like MySpace and chat rooms.
• Issue consumer alerts to parents, teachers, school officials and others regarding the potential dangers of Internet child predators and their ability to contact children through commercial networking sites like MySpace and chat rooms.

The Predator’s Act requires that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC):
• Establish an advisory board to review and report commercial social networking sites like MySpace.com and chat rooms that allow sexual predators easy access to personal information of, and contact with, children.

At the press conference, officers with the Mount Prospect Police Department detailed their work to fight child predators in the suburbs. Mount Prospect was home to one of the first online child exploitation crimes. More than 10 years ago, a sixth-grade boy was lured by an adult man posing as a child on the Internet. The Florida-based predator convinced the child to board a bus for a rendezvous. Quick action by the police department and the FBI prevented the child from reaching the criminal.

Demonstrating the risks in MySpace, Mount Prospect police officers created a fictional profile of a 15-year-old Mount Prospect girl. A 29-year-old man sent the fake girl a message, calling her “adorable” and asked to get to know her better. An individual also encouraged her to prostitute herself by sending her a message about a companionship service in Elk Grove.

A copy of Congressman Kirk’s letter to the FTC and the Predators Act legislation are below. Screengrabs of inappropriate Second Life locations and MySpace predator messages are available upon request.

May 5, 2008



William E. Kovacic
Chairman
Federal Trade Commission
600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20580

Dear Chairman Kovacic:

I write to share my concern regarding the increasingly popular virtual reality webspace, Second Life, which contains explicit content that can be easily accessed by minors.

Second Life and its owner, Linden Lab of San Francisco, has no controls in place to prevent minors from creating an account, giving minors access to pornographic and explicit material for no charge. Second Life claims to prevent children under the age of 13 from accessing the site, but there are no age verification features built into the registration process. Although many of the program’s features require a credit card, there are many areas in which sexually explicit content is free and readily available.

Using the search tool, minors have the ability to teleport to locations where there are brothels, rape rooms, sex clubs and bondage stores. The images and language in these parts of Second Life are graphic and inappropriate for children.

Not only does Second Life contain explicit material but it also can pose as a “virtual hunting ground” for pedophiles to prey on young children using the anonymity of the Internet. Second Life has over four million users across the world. Reports of sexual assaults and kidnappings linked to the Internet are growing. According to the Justice Department, one in five kids have been sexually solicited online. I-Safe America estimates nearly one-third of kids have chatted with strangers on the Internet and 12 percent have met online strangers in person.

In 2006, Representative Frank Wolf and I wrote to your predecessor asking her to issue a consumer alert warning parents of the dangers social networking Web sites pose to children. Then-Chairman Majoras acted quickly to increase awareness of this threat among parents. I urge you, on behalf of the Commission, to take action to warn parents of the similar dangers and sexually explicit content found on Second Life. If Second Life is unwilling to protect minor children from explicit material on their Web site, it is imperative that we warn parents of the danger Second Life represents so they can effectively monitor their children’s Internet usage.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

Mark Kirk

Member of Congress


H. R. 1120


To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require recipients of universal service support for schools and libraries to protect minors from commercial social networking websites and chat rooms.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

February 16, 2007

Mr. KIRK (for himself, Mr. MATHESON, Mrs. BIGGERT, Ms. GRANGER, Mr. ROGERS of Michigan, Mr. SHAYS, Mr. FOSSELLA, Mr. KUHL of New York, Mr. DAVIS of Kentucky, Mr. MARCHANT, Mr. MCKEON, Mr. GERLACH, and Mr. ROSKAM) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce
________________________________________
A BILL
To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to require recipients of universal service support for schools and libraries to protect minors from commercial social networking websites and chat rooms.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,


SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the `Deleting Online Predators Act of 2007'.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
The Congress finds that--
(1) sexual predators approach minors on the Internet using chat rooms and social networking websites, and, according to the United States Attorney General, one in five children has been approached sexually on the Internet;
(2) sexual predators can use these chat rooms and websites to locate, learn about, befriend, and eventually prey on children by engaging them in sexually explicit conversations, asking for photographs, and attempting to lure children into a face to face meeting; and
(3) with the explosive growth of trendy chat rooms and social networking websites, it is becoming more and more difficult to monitor and protect minors from those with devious intentions, particularly when children are away from parental supervision.

SEC. 3. CERTIFICATIONS TO INCLUDE PROTECTIONS AGAINST COMMERCIAL SOCIAL NETWORKING WEBSITES AND CHAT ROOMS.
(a) Certification by Schools- Section 254(5)(B) of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 254(5)(B)) is amended by striking clause (i) and inserting the following:
`(i) is enforcing a policy of Internet safety for minors that includes monitoring the online activities of minors and the operation of a technology protection measure with respect to any of its computers with Internet access that--
`(I) protects against access through such computers to visual depictions that are--
`(aa) obscene;
`(bb) child pornography; or
`(cc) harmful to minors; and
`(II) protects against access to a commercial social networking website or chat room unless used for an educational purpose with adult supervision; and'.

(b) Certification by Libraries- Section 254(6)(B) of such Act (47 U.S.C. 254(6)(B)) is amended by striking clause (i) and inserting the following:
`(i) is enforcing a policy of Internet safety that includes the operation of a technology protection measure with respect to any of its computers with Internet access that--
`(I) protects against access through such computers to visual depictions that are--
`(aa) obscene;
`(bb) child pornography; or
`(cc) harmful to minors; and
`(II) protects against access by minors without parental authorization to a commercial social networking website or chat room, and informs parents that sexual predators can use these websites and chat rooms to prey on children; and'.

(c) Definitions- Section 254(7) is amended by adding at the end the following new subparagraph:
`(J) COMMERCIAL SOCIAL NETWORKING WEBSITES; CHAT ROOMS- Within 120 days after the date of enactment of the Deleting Online Predators Act of 2007, the Commission shall by rule define the terms `social networking website' and `chat room' for purposes of this subsection. In determining the definition of a social networking website, the Commission shall take into consideration the extent to which a website--
`(i) is offered by a commercial entity;
`(ii) permits registered users to create an on-line profile that includes detailed personal information;
`(iii) permits registered users to create an on-line journal and share such a journal with other users;
`(iv) elicits highly-personalized information from users; and
`(v) enables communication among users.'.

(d) Disabling During Adult or Educational Use- Section 254(5)(D) of such Act is amended--
(1) by inserting `OR EDUCATIONAL' after `DURING ADULT' in the heading; and
(2) by inserting before the period at the end the following: `or during use by an adult or by minors with adult supervision to enable access for educational purposes pursuant to subparagraph (B)(i)(II)'.

SEC. 4. FTC CONSUMER ALERT ON INTERNET DANGERS TO CHILDREN.
(a) Information Regarding Child Predators and the Internet- Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Federal Trade Commission shall--
(1) issue a consumer alert regarding the potential dangers to children of Internet child predators, including the potential danger of commercial social networking websites and chat rooms through which personal information about child users of such websites may be accessed by child predators; and
(2) establish a website to serve as a resource for information for parents, teachers and school administrators, and others regarding the potential dangers posed by the use of the Internet by children, including information about commercial social networking websites and chat rooms through which personal information about child users of such websites may be accessed by child predators.

(b) Commercial Social Networking Websites- For purposes of the requirements under subsection (a), the terms `commercial social networking website' and `chat room' have the meanings given such terms pursuant to section 254(7)(J) of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 254(7)(J)), as amended by this Act.



http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/il10_kirk/Kirk_Parents_and_Police_Delete_Online_Predators.ht ml

http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/05/11/congress-awaits-ftc-report-explicit-content-virtual-worlds

http://www.virtualworldsnews.com/2009/05/ftc-reporting-to-congress-on-virtual-worlds-kids-and-explicit-content.html

That says 2008, not 2009.

Yeah. And that was the press release dated 2008. About a bill that was submitted in 2007.

Oh, and an attached letter from Rep. Kirk, complaining how the FTC ignored the issue when he brought it up in 2006.

Perhaps the thread should have been titled, "The Amount of Power that Rep. Mark Kirk Really Wields."