Upcoming Changes for Adult Content: Main Forum Thread

What happens if, i.e. you own a club and a shopping mall on the same property. The club is definitely adult oriented and the mall both adult and pg items for sale. What will we have to do, seperate the club from the mall? I can't afford to buy more land at these prices.

Thanks

Seriously??? If your constituents share your morally-repressive ideals, I really doubt they'll be missed around here.

what happens?
you are stuffed in no uncertain terms.

Having read through most of the postings on this issue, it occurs to me one simple facts help explain the draconian measures that are being foisted on a vast group of SL members...

The Lindens are COWARDS!

They are buckling to a vocal minority; the same minority that is running the US into the ground, has not taken their campaign online. And the Lindens put up absolutely no residence, whatsoever.

So, Second Life is dead. Long live whatever comes next.

Personally I think this whole motion is really a load of BS. We have enough places to actually say if a place has adult content in it and yet people continue to actually ignore them and go anyways. Once they're there they find out that "Oh my goodness there's naked people here" and let the massive protest begin over why it shouldn't be there.

If people can't read then it's not the fault of Linden Labs or the people that manage the land it's the fault of the people that willingly go to these places in spite of the notice they've been given. Why people should have to pay for the unending unwillingness to accept what other do that doesn't conform to their standards is horrible. Second Life has been a place for ideas, discovery, and in many cases fun. Just because some people choose to have fun in an "Adult" way doesn't mean that they should be taken and shoved aside because someone decided to ignore the well marked door and walk in on them in a sense.

People have been complaining about these kind of things since the dawn of civilization and sometimes there's not even a need for it.

Ok I found this post to be a good opening for me.

The recurring defeats on those topics was inevitable Dogboat. Linden Labs made a decision and action was taken. Gambling and might I add banking were the first major ToS changes I experienced with Second Life, but I believe them to have been needed changes. The volatile mix of ideals and beliefs will clash hardest with this topic, however I believe many are being a bit melodramatic with the changes coming. (You'll have to forgive me if I cover anything covered as I read pages 1-3, and 87-current of this topic) So far from what I have read there has been the extreme opposing sides conflicting in intellectual argument which I can more less dumbed down to being the extremist pro-adult content calling the extremist pro-censorship a prude and of course the inverse from pro-censorship to pro-adult. What I've failed to see is a continued effort at solutions although I can understand under instigation conflict is prone to happen, so Nany knock it off please.

My Issue Linden Labs:

When I started logging into Second Life I understood that I was logging into a mature game because there was a clear authority that showed teens belong on the Teen Grid and matures on the Main Grid. My issue now is that like the homestead change LL is contemplating or already commencing changes that will force more work and thought on current residents. The gist of the homestead issue was customers "misused" pre-change openspaces and change was done, however instead of LL adapting to the customer, the customer was forced to adapt to LL. Customers don't like that Linden Labs. ;p

I feel this topic is leaning towards the same wrong in the fact that actual parties to blame for the main issue of topic are not being forced to compromise. Now who am I talking about? Do I speak of the people abusing content by place adult material on PG land? No (no, but those things need to be cleaned up!). I am speaking of the parents that allow their kids access to second life and Linden Labs for not requiring age verification in order to sign up for the Main Grid. While I feel Linden Labs enforcement should definitely be "enforcing" the current PG/Mature system I feel causing so much commotion for pre-existing residents is a no go.

To the Pro-adult residents (Primarily the extremists in the last couple of pages speaking about collars and such):

I understand the concern of lost business however I do believe a system should be in place to prevent kids from seeing your sexual personal preferences. A wedding ring is a traditional symbol of marriage where as a choker chain or collar is something completely different and indecent. Maybe some see them as similar(o.O?), but I don't see one being a replacement for the other nor do I find a collar to be something appropriate for kids. If a woman in SL was wearing a collar on a mature sim it is none of my business. If that same woman is on a PG sim with me and a child... I'd find that offensive. To BDSM Bob (a fictional character I just made up for the sake of explaining a point yet not targeting any resident in particular) What you do Bob in private is your own thing, but you can't goto the mall sunday morning next to the kids rides in your hard leather or assless chaps and do your thing... That's just wrong. (and if your a rl/sl contradictory major put that vision in your head in whatever SL similarity you need to)



To the Pro-censor residents:

I believe more discussion of ideas to fix the issue should take place if Linden Labs is even willing to entertain the idea of compromise for the sake of it's residents. I hope more pro-censorship understand what the opposing side is going to have to do in terms of labor of moving and such. I've already made it clear in my writing I hold a bias towards doing something, but I do believe much much more needs to be done on Linden Labs and the actual parent's behalf. Bringing back mandatory verifications, making more use of the current system, anything would be fine by me.


My alternate concern:

So far I've seen talk about adult content involving sex sex sex. Where is the combat chat? I am thinking I got the gist of it by reading in the blog mentioning it would be rated like movies do on gore and such, but I would like an elaboration due to the fact there can be a massive gore samurai scene where some ninja is getting his head torn off and the samurai turns into some sick demented and twisted creature sucking blood from the head for sustenance... Or you have something like Cartoon Network's Samurai Jack. So please can there be more elaboration on the combat and definitely more discussion as to what is happening? I'm hoping the change doesn't effect some places with combat such as CI's Samurai edo and it's combat system where blood does in fact appear when being cut.

Blondin (or whoever else is reading through this!), I have sent an inquiry to you via notecard about an article I am writing for a magazine this week.

I write for various publications and other media and am very active in the 'Femdom' community. This piece will be about the 'Future Of Femdom' in SL. These proposed 'Adult Content' changes make the topic very hard to cover at this point, because, as I project it, Femdom culture itself may be under threat..

The time is right for more official conversation.
I have asked for official statements that are more up-to-date, for some honest opinions, and for meeting in Chat to discuss the topic. What I write may be greatly influenced by any new dialogue. Otherwise, my piece will be mostly conjecture and opinion (mine) and this will be widely read and possibly influential.

My previous posts will show that I am against rash business decisions and firmly against hurting others (people are not statistics!). I see this primarily as a moral and ethics debate., but I am level-headed and a professional in every sense. Wisdom guides my actions.

We shall see what my open invitation does. I hope real discussion occurs. - GINA

Deejay, as much as i appreciate your views i am pretty sure you have to be 18 to play SL,
Why would you have a child in a PG region in SL?
As someone trying to make a business here my partner and i have been stymied again and again by Linden Labs and in the process have lost money we will never get back.
Linden labs are trying to kill 2 birds with one stone here, at least in my belief.
concurrency is as high as its ever been with online members at the 80000 mark.
but they want more, so again in my belief they are going to merge teenlife with secondlife.
and they dont give a damn about anyone else.
Wait and see, until it affects you its hard to imagine.
LL are going to milk their cashcow dry.

Wow, so everyone who wears a collar is a sex fiend. So you call yourself 'DeeJay' have you actually ever DJ'd? I am doubting that because if you did you would realize collar wearing is a subculture iconography that spans beyond sex fetish. Skatepunks, Metalheads, etc.. wear collars as a matter of style beyond your sexualization fantasies. Using your logic we should ban schoolgirl uniforms because Britney Spears and Avril Lavigne wear them and people want to have sex with them while they are dressed like that. Nun habits as well, since there is a booming nun-fetish subculture. We should also get rid of the ability to make soda cans in world because some of us have been known to do naughty things with them. Maybe LL should just make us all stick figures, except there is probably a group out there that has dirty thoughts about their number 2 pencils.

Your dream lover BDSM Bob would be in error in wearing assless chaps with nothing on underneath, but I would suggest that if you went to many small West Texas towns on Sunday mornings and called every guy wearing chaps a sex freak you would learn new and unusual colors for bruises.

PG means watch your language and cover your naughty bits and resist the urge to dismember your fellow residents in graphically gruesome ways. It DOES NOT mean avoid any article of clothing some repressed control freak wanks off while fantasizing about. It's up to the repressed control freak to show a bit personal responsibility and not run around pulling his pud and telling everyone what nasty thoughts he is having when he sees a woman wearing a article of clothing he fantasizes about.

--

Full Disclosure: I make income in SL creating and selling fetish animations. And yes, if the grids are merged with some halfbaked (does LL do things any other way) idea about how to keep mature content segmented I will close up shop, kiss SL goodbye and go play on OS.

Patasha

If I understand correctly, the concurrency numbers include those logged into the Teen grid. There is, by what I understand, just one grid; the teen area is partitioned from the main grid.

What it boils down to is really simple,

"Lets herd this MINORITY of people into one little area, so as not to offend the rest of society." Sound familiar? It should. Mulitple societies throughout history have done exactly this same thing "in the name of god" or "to protect society" or to "protect the children", The Chinese have done it, the Nazi's have done it, and now LL are going to do it.

I am so sick and tired of everything in life being designed or rearranged "to protect the children", I got news for you all, todays children grow up to be tomorrows adults. They will have to learn how to deal with and adapt to the adult world. The planet earth is never going to be a utopia free of sex, violence and death as long as human beings have reign over it.

Instead of "protecting the children" from society, why not start equipping them with the social skills that they will need to function within it.

If the teens and people lacking the social skills to deal with reality need a place where they wont be burdened with that reality, then make a new continent, grid whatever and let them go there.

Any change that is supported to pacify or make some segment "feel good" or 'feel better about themselves" ALWAYS infringes on someone else's rights.

I have been a resident since early 2006, I have run a business for the majority of that time. While I do not currently live on mainland I have in the past and held a Mature parcel explicitly for the "freedom" to do or say as I wished on that parcel.

After reading the majority of the comments here, I am sad to say that my run is at an end. Have fun with your new found Disneyland, hope it works out for you without any residents or an economy,...

That was always my impression too, combined counts. I also saw some stats from December noting that the teen online hours are less than 1% of the total, so even if it was counted separately we aren't talking about a big difference. The whole of Teen SL is only about 200 regions, so that seems about right.

OK, found those numbers:
http://danielvoyagerblog.wordpress.com/sl-metrics/

DeeJay just to clear up a few misconceptions you have
A collar is a symbol of commitment in the D/s lifestyle much like a wedding ring is to christens.
I wear a collar in RL and I wear it everywhere it is leather and very pretty. It has never been an issue.
In SL I also always wear my collar even on the few occasions i venture into the PG areas mainly for shops. My collar is not sexual if you believe it is then you must also believe a wedding ring is also since ill assume a "married couple" will also partake in sexual relations in SL.
I DO NOT walk about naked yes some do but so do lots of ppl who are not involved in BDSM, not all BDSM are into wearing leather ( you watch to much porn) I am not into kinly sex another misconception about lifestyles we are not all into fetishes and dont tell me you have not had it done , done it or wanted a little so called kinky play in the bed room

Dont judge all by your narrow view

http://danielvoyagerblog.wordpress.com/2009/01/20/talk-of-sl-merging-with-tg-update-2/
from the same blog.
that appears to be case closed.

This is where I stopped reading your post. You insult me, and my life choices, because of what?

As I said previously, I love my Master, he is to me as you would call a husband or wife. My collar is my sign to the world of such. You want to insult me because my views on the world are different? Call me indecent because I choose to wear a collar instead of a ring?

What they signify is up to us, if you want a collar to mean something nasty and reserved for the bedroom then so be it, but do not expect everyone to agree, or care, about your opinion then. My collar is precious to me, it is my wedding ring to my Master.

Just because it isn't, traditional, doesn't mean it is any less of a symbolic part of who and what I am. If I wore a ring instead it would mean the same thing as my collar does, why is one indecent and the other not?

Well said Lylani maybe those like him should meet with a few of us who are not playing a game but are lifestyle's and see how wrong he is

The sex industry makes you a lot of money.

Adult content providers pay for land. They either pay you, or a landlord. The landlord needs tenants to pay you.

Customers of adult content providers pay you to buy the lindens they need to pay for the items.

As another poster said, the desire for adult content has driven the adoption of many forms of technology, including your virtual world. No, you don't plan to outright ban adult content, but your plans will bankrupt or scare off so many providers that it will greatly reduce the amount of money that you get paid.

So putting aside rights, morality, or any social issues that relate to the topic at hand, you are first and foremost a business. You need money to survive. The bottom line is that driving away a great portion of your income is a bad business decision. You are going to cause a recession in the virtual economy (ie your revenues) in the middle of one of the worst recessions in history. Can you afford to do this?

You'll have to do some or all of the following:

1. Raise prices, thus driving away more sources of income.
2. Shut down sims to save resources. Never mind that your plan involves creating new ones, which will cost more money to run.
3. Pack more sims onto one server. I'm under the impression you're already doing that with lower cost, lower limit sims.
4. Sell off underused servers. I hope the worldwide recession allows you to get enough for them.
5. Lay off employees, which will make it even harder for you to develop and support Second Life.
6. Go bankrupt.

I sincerely hope that you have more economic sense than you appear to, because I like Second Life and I want to see it survive, and not just as a barren wasteland. We all do.

You may own the servers, but who paid for them? We did. It's our money that allows you to buy servers, to exist, to function at all.

You may own the technology, but who owns the content? We do. 99% of the Second Life experience is the stuff we made. That's one of the things I proudly explain to people when I introduce them to the game. Without our content, there is no Second Life.

Second Life is as much our world as it is yours, maybe even more so. We all want to see your company do well, we all want to see Second Life prosper. Let us help you! Why should we have this antagonistic relationship with you? We should work together, for real, not in this pretend fashion where you "ask" us for input on a decision you've already made, ignoring 99% of what we say about it.

To the Lindens. For pete's sake, stop worrying about the negative press about every little bit of virtual flotsam that breaks out of SL into the media. 2006 was an aberration, you are going to get that level of press love forever, just be glad your honeymoon with old media lasted longer than Obama's. You are the big kid on the block now, an easy target, so no matter what you do the press are going to take shots at you.

You are the Microsoft of virtual living, accept it and get back to what caused the explosion of users to begin with before you become Commodore.. in case you forgot, it was letting the in-game world develop with minimal restrictions on your residents. If you really must neuter the world to the lowest common level to avoid offending anyone, I can see your future... it's call Active Worlds, you will be just as vanilla .. and desolate.

Big business is not your cash cow... The wild unrepressed masses that wander though the world are, that's why big business is interested in you to begin with, do you really think that without NoR or IOL or Neva's or Sanctuary Rock or any of the other places that people populate without having to be paid to do, that are ran by individuals, not corporations, SL would be anywhere near as wildly popular as it is?

Your biggest fear shouldn't be bad press, it should be that slow moving blob of incoherence that is bubbling around your feet called OpenSim. The press isn't going to end you, but you may very well end yourself if you start driving people en-mass to what is becoming a more and more viable alternative. The suits don't get it, they don't understand why people are here, they just see a ton of potential customers and want in. Educate them on what the world is, it's free form jazz on a global level, sure you have dissonance at times, but that's what we are here for, if it was all ponies and teddybears is would be BORING.

You will get investors, you don't have to try to suck up to the first ones to open their checkbooks while telling you how to run the business. Explain to them up front that yes the world is awash in sex and violence... just like cable TV. Tell me a major company that wouldn't have given their eye teeth to be able to shoehorn an ad into the middle of an episode of The Sopranos while it was on HBO.

I couldn't find the post where a Linden asked which was easier - to move, or change your store name - but tonight on The Simpsons, they used the word "orgasm" in the first 60 seconds of the episode. If it's considered an okay word for a U.S.A. family program, then it would be crazy for the U.S.A.-based Lindens to expect you to change your store name...

Because in the real world people have something called a remote that can change the channel or turn off the TV, it seems that in SL everyone is running RLV and has their teleports disabled as soon as they enter a sim they don't want to be in.

I think the problem here is that the Lindens aren't asking the right question.

They shouldn't be asking "How can we avoid alienating people with a forced relocation?"
They should be asking the real issue, which is "How can we ensure that nobody has to experience content they find inappropriate with minimal inconvenience or effect on the rights of others?"

The overwhelming majority opinion seems to be that forced relocation is not the answer. The Lindens have brought us in far too late to the discussion, with too much focus on a bad solution. The only sensible thing to do is to start the process over again, bringing us into it from the start, and asking us the right question. I guarantee there is a better solution to the real problem than the one that has been presented, but we'll never see it if the company is unwilling to consider that.

Anyone that uses the RLV and allows someone they dont know well to control them are fools, I have yet to see a need for it in the way many are using it.

As for Phoebe's comment SL have it already its called the PG area. Now this may sound to simple but if you are in SL then you are over 18 or you are breaking the TOS. To combat this LL bring in age verification it wont stop underage but it will lessen it. I believe in my time in SL since free membership the under age and the bots have gone wild.
If you are an adult then you can do one of a few things to avoid being shocked
1,Stay in PG areas
2,When searching do not check the allow mature content
3,DONT map hop
4, Dont enter private homes
5,If you happen to land somewhere and something offends you try the red button in the top Left is all else fails
6, If all the above fail then my advice is dont log in dont turn on your television in RL , dont open a news paper , dont go to the beach or the pool cause i have seen worse in those things than i have seen in Sl

I found Patasha's post particulary fascinating because today I was describing this pg/mature/adult/verification mess to my husband -- a non SL user -- and he said to me, "What companies are interested in SL right now? That's probably where this 'cleanup' started -- some large company is leaning very hard on SL."

I don't know which companies are involved with SL right now, except perhaps for that IBM project...

does this also mean that adults wont be allowed in PG areas?
i sincerely hope so or the paedophiles will have a great time, and conversely you sexually repressed prudes....
Welcome to the jungle, while it lasts....
Mwahahahaha!

First... The Casinos are Gone... No splodder at the Clubs

Than Linden Labs take the Banks and many People lost a whole amount of Money ( like me )

And i Think.. ok next time LL take us the sex.... and ???

Now a Nightmare comes true ...


Thank you Linden for Destroing a good Community