Upcoming Changes for Adult Content: Answers to Questions

Yeah, that's basically the plan, as of this moment.

I think Blondin said there would be some flexibility and certainly at the BB meeting I attended it was said that LL would be more accommodating than Blondin has said so maybe and i hold out a small hope that they will be, but time will tell and not everything has been made final by LL yet so i keep my fingers crossed

Exactly- The difference between someplace like Nautilus and Ursula is simply this- We are being *forced*, by changes LL is making, to move there. A choice between moving and closing your business is no choice at all. IT's like charging for air- you can pay, or you can die. People who take advantage of that situation in order make a killing in the land market *should* be restrained in some way.
Which is one of the reasons why I advocate allowing *all* residents who currently own mainland parcels to be able to choose a land swap for Ursula parcels. People who are currently on private estates and are going to be tossed off their land because of what their landlord is going to rate their property should also have the opportunity to buy in to Ursula at a basic rate, or onto PG or Mature land vacated by the Ursula-bound.

After all, LL's changes affect them too, don't they?

Once the new status quo is established, *then* go back to speculating to your heart's content, but this is a special situation- a *very* large group of people is going to be made homeless but an arbitrary decision of Linden Labs, and frankly, if they *don't* to anything about it, it comes to the same thing as fraud.

Nautilus was *supposed* to be high rent, premium land- Speculation in a luxury commodity is all fine and dandy- the prices got obscene, but hey, Caviat Emptor, right? As long as LL did nothing to undermine the value of "mature" property, the parcels should hold their value, right?

oops!

Looks like maybe there's a reason or two for even a land baron to have a problem with this stuff, huh?

-V-

Ok Well at the Brown bag I was at

We discussed this and came up with an idea of having two or more Lindens reviewing content to decied if it is adult or mature, so that it can be impliment more fairly across the board. So that one linden wont say its adult and another wont, causing confussion. With all due respect in a professional setting the way questions are asked has alot to do with if they will be answered. As a professional speaking to another If i feel I am not being treated as a professional or feeling attacked by someones manor of asking quesions im more likey to move on to the next.


I'n not sure I am following you but correct me if I am worng you feel that those acts should be Adult too?
Well Linden has stated that they would.

As with nudity and mild violence not being extrem they will both stay mature and not be required to move. Its the more hardcore RP buisnesses that LL is targeting

Not at all Lord, i think everyone should have a say, my problem is who they didn't invite, not who they did.

I just want to know who these "People most effected by the changes" are that they say they invited, since not one fo the major adult content providers i asked was ever consulted. And today at a meeting with Jack, it appears several major sim and land owners were never consulted.

Oh and Blondie, Jack Lindens says you can answer this one, so how about it, who were these major content providers that will be most effected that Cyn refers to as being consulted on all this??

Lord if it came off like i did not think you qualified to be there, sorry that was not the intent. The intent was to get a list of what major adult content providers they asked to attent and who they claimed were consulted with in her blog entry.

or munti sim owners, or major Mainland land holders.

Because right now we can't find one that was consulted.

Actually, that's not a bad theory- There are around one million "account/age verified" people on the grid, and more than *Three* million NPIOF accounts.

They are in the process of closing off practically *any* land ownership options for the unverifieds- the only places they will be able to rent will be in mature and PG private estates.

All who want adult content, and all those who live on private estates what flag as adult, will have to move.
And there will be a *bunch* of mainland waiting for them to rent now.

However, LL is forgetting something. Mature and PG Private estate owners can set their own covenants, and set the land access however they like. If a private estate wants to keep the "mature" rating and still allow adult content, they could probably get away with it- they could develop code words for this- "Private, unregulated estate seeks unverified residents for fun, games"- that sort of thing.

There could be a huge niche market in ducking the lindens and providing "mature" but unrated housing.

Of course it wouldn't work very well for businesses- how do you advertise and not give away the scheme?

-V-

A Shakespearian play is not an edge case. A typical play contains violence and sex, and there are often references to alcohol. There is no way a typical Shakespearian play can be described as PG, if the definition is that it must not include "any content that is suggestive of any (even mildly) sexual or violent themes, or references to social drug or alcohol usage"

What you seem to be saying is that mature content is permitted on PG land for the purposes of education?

Matthew

well, they certainly didn't ask me but then I'm just a mouthy nobody

Okey dokey I have set up the historical wiki and would be happy if things like this maybe were listed there ie: those that had been invited, once this sort of thing gets put down in writing in one place then maybe we will start to see pattens emerging and i would like your input to the wiki as well. If people start contributing to it and documenting things that are already available we can better analysis these pattens in one place as so much information is getting lost here and i will try all i can to pull the information together but i have a RL business to run as well lol

I seem to be spending more time here than with RL work, poor Consie she is doing all the other stuff herself with our coder



This is where we need the lists of names of who attended the meetings for a start



Thanks for the sorry, it is genuinely appreciated and i am in agreement with you we need to start collecting and cataloging this info on the site i have set up today. As a footnote to that we are not running adverts or anything else on it, we really want it to become a historical wiki full of information on this and other things SL

#1 I was sitting next to you, stroker, alfa winger & Andi Lopez at the Brown Bags, even got pics on my group myspace to verify this along with the Text Chat that everyone at the meeting gave me permission to post publicly for my group members to read. (including you)

#2 Yes, I feel that Combat Simulators should be given the ADULT Rating due to the fact on a combat sim, people engage in acts of Violence, Mature language (on voice), Killing one another with weapons (guns, knives, swords, ect...) and other extreme acts of violent behaviour

#3 IMO Linden Lab *MUST* treat all residents on SL Equally, not just single out the sexual content creators, Merchants, and RP areas. with these new regulations, but everyone.

#4 just to repeat myself here:

If an Avatar can not visit a Sexual Theme Region in SL w\out being age verified, then an avatar should not be able to play soldier engage in Violent action and Kill on a combat region in SL w\out being age verified.

So let me get this straight:

So far by current definitions and/or Regulations for all this I due belive I can subdivide a say 16m parcel in the middle of my larger parcel and put it in search while making sure there is no adult content directly on it, meanwhile the large parcel sorrounding it can have whatever/whereever in it since it's not in search therefore not public?

I'm pretty sure that was said in a brown bag but I'm not listening through them again.

LOL see fixed it

You know you can download pages from a MediaWiki in batches in a format to upload back to another MediaWiki.

Well you'd think so, but Linden Lab seem to want to heap the blame on Estate owners in these circumstances and are refusing to offer assistance.

I suspect that the G Team would have no sense of humor at all about that kind of thing, were it brought to their attention. Not that they're commonly known for a sense of humor in the first place.

so the rules forbid that?

The wife just told me she knows, but as i am the beginner with wiki i suppose i will ask her to show me tomorrow but let me know if you have time

The rules don't specify what "advertising" consists of. Having a 16m2 parcel in search in the middle of a larger parcel containing adult content would potentially be seen, hypothetically, as an attempt to advertise the larger parcel. I mean, just hypothetically, now.

Not only shameful, but out-and-out *fraud*. In fact, I know of at least one instance where I believe that LL made a *landlord* put a clause in his rental agreement to say the he made no guarantees that any land he sold would keep its characteristics after the sale.
Before i joined them, The group I'm with rented an oceanfront parcel, advertised as such, on the edge of a sim.
After living there a month, they logged on to find that their beach now led down to... the *back* of a fully-built-up-right-to-the-*very*-edge, mall sim. When they complained to the landlord, he laughed at them and told them they were stupid to think he'd keep his coastline the same- he planned to expand in all directions!
They took screen shots of his parcels, including the land descriptions, and sent these to LL with a notecard that said:

"This landowner says that he will expand in all directions, and that no coastline he currently has will *stay* that way. (see enclosed notecard of chat log<date> Yet, he is offering "oceanfront" "Beachfront" and "on the water" parcels for sale. (See notecard images 1-5)
We are notifying you, Linden Research Inc, of this impending fraud, and giving you specific knowledge of who is perpetrating it, and where the crime will take place. A failure to act on your part could be construed as "depraved indifference" and make you liable as an accessory. Thank you."

Less than a week later, he'd changed his Covenant to say "I make no promise that any Sim edge properties I sell will remain next to the water".

Maybe we have the option of pressuring them to make an In-world announcement by some similar method?
I mean, I'm pissed about the changes and all, and I don't want things shook up. If My groups has to move to Ursula, then we *better* get a swap for the mature land we have now.
But what *really* grinds my gears is the fact that it would be the simplest thing to link to the blogs and forums on the *login screen* and let *everyone* know what is going on, and LL *isn't* doing it.
They would rather con people out of their land price and a couple months tier fee than play *fair*.

I honestly believe that this non-disclosure breaks the fraud and Due-diligence laws, and that anyone in a position to do something to stop the crime that doesn't might be an accessory.

Maybe that's why they're keeping everything so "tentative"- move dates, definitions of adult content, none of them are set in stone. So there's no "specific knowledge of a crime about to be committed.

Does that make any sense to you folks?

-V-

I age verified me and my alt not long after the age verification thingy first came out.
It took quite a few attempts, the system being as flaky as anything.
For a while, whenever I clicked on the "Age Verification" link in "My Account", it would show "You are already age verified". Now, it just shows the form to complete.
There's nothing, anywhere, on the account pages to tell me whether or not I am still age verified. As far as I can tell, there's no definitive way of telling inworld whether or not I'm still age verified.

If I'm not now age verified, after jumping through hoops to get the flaky, buggy system to accept my details, then what did LL do with all that information? Sell it? lose it? Leave it in a briefcase in a bar?

I was just wondering, because if the age verification has been removed from my account, then I should imagine that I'm not the only one. Since there's no way to find out if this is the case before the new rule is enforced, then I would imagine that LL would lose quite a few of its customers when it is. Certainly I for one would not want to pay for a membership to some sort of "Stepford meets the Waltons Online".

And on another note, the layout of the Ursula Continent (from the map view) looks curiously militaristic. That grid layout reminds me of the kind of street plan that so many fascist dictators were so fond of. Just a thought....

EDIT: I just went to a few parcels that have the block on residents not age verified. Guess what? DESPITE my getting verified already, it now appears that I'm not. Great stuff LL! You're restricting the use of your product based on a technology that doesn't work. I may as well go back the "There". It's predictable, and it's compleltely free!
I just tried at the Bay City verification place too - same result. In the FAQ boards it mentions that age verification is required to get into some places in SL "just like a bar".
Excuse me! I thought that when I joined SL it was for adults, and therefore I was already IN the bloody bar!

Yep. LL ignored the 'slippery slope' warnings early on in the first wave of forum threads by sticking with their effort to define and separate things, so I'm not surprised to 'illicit drug use' make the latest list.

I guess, unless they backtrack very soon, by August and very likely after the policy implementation we'll be seeing more restrictive regulations (or at least 'guidelines'). So yes, I can see depictions of gambling eventually become, at least, criticised - along with expressing one's sexuality, choice of avatar appearance, etc. etc. (even more than it is already, eventually leading to an endorsed, official LL ToS 2010) - that is, if LL are able to keep up with the ARs. I guess creative Residents will just leave, or will just never register.

For example, a lot of folk would likely extol the virtue, in REAL LIFE of regulations that prevent infringements of basic 'freedoms'; e.g. right to life, freedom of expression, speech and assembly, equal employment opportunity, prohibition of slavery, privacy rights, right to a fair trial, prohibition of discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or other status... etc. etc. - but the same people can understand the difference between RL and SL and that here some of those things (inter-Resident-wise, e.g. roleplaying) can be consensually, safely and sanely ignored or questioned (read: played with) for the pursuit of mutual creativity/fantasy/play etc. (whether you like to represent your RL self or are a purist roleplayer 'in character', we're diverse after all).

That is, IF you're a mature adult.

Contexts and locations in SL are fluid. We're humans, no worse or better in SL than we are in RL (although, I like to think that SL offered us the opportunity to at least explore our better selves in a wonderfully safe and creative way). But I can see a very dismal, grey future for SL after this, with a lot of the creativity marginalised and disenfranchised, or just gone.

Add to that, one practical thing... consider the pain in the ass it's going to be to explain to the growth in ignorant visitors to one's Ursula-based adult content location (e.g. club, store, home) that 'just' because they are on the adult continent, does not mean they can ignore that particular landowner's rules. I've dealt with this often on Mature land, and it's hard enough (or time-wasting enough, rather)... I foresee a lot more grief from Residents contesting local rules, because, after all, "It's Ursula, I can do what the f*** I like". Getting the message across that the land is yours (or you admin it) is likely to become a more stressful job, by the nature that the land is separated.

Sure, this may go on in Mature right now, but surely not to the extent it will in a compartmentalised continent, especially one with a 'city' as a possible focal point? I don't know if I'd want to even voluntarily relocate my home there, maybe.. I certainly don't want to risk being stuck in Bigotdom. But that said, do I want to spend my leisure time ejecting folk from my sexbed, just because the proliferation of wandering sexxers has increased in density, because they see all the free sex clubs grouped together? At least now it's spread out.

In the end, if I stay using SL, I'll follow my friends.

Enough rant, off to bed.

*I* Am Adult Content (and formerly a public sex club owner until I abandoned and tiered down earlier this month due to this policy)

Makes perfect sense

I been screaming about this too. This needs to be on the log-in screen. The press release is all fine and good...but.. Blondin spoke like it was an old thing, when in reality it was published the same day it was mentioned. They need to make EVERYONE aware of whats going on.

~brie

You know, It just occurred to me that they *did* have a poll in the last year asking about predictability- I said it wasn't predictable, and I wanted it to be *more* predictable, but I was thinking along the lines of "I know I can log in whenever i want", or "I know that all of my inventory will still *be* there when I log in", or "I know my region won't crash for no apparent reason", or "I know that when I buy something , the terms of the sale will stay the same, and it will still be useful for what I bought it for".

I have quite literally *never* seen any *content* that offended me unless I was wandering and ready for it. As in:

"This search description is *too* weird! I *gotta* see this! <teleport> "Oh God! My *eyes*! I feel violated! Well, I *did* ask for it..."

The only thing that has *ever* offended me in SL that wasn't in a situation like that was some of the *behavior* of other residents. (bumping, Being force-included in RP, stuff like that)

Trust LL to decide that "predictable" meant "Mr Rogers' Neighborhood".

"You know, almost all of our residents said that wanted a more predictable SL experience"

"Really?"

"Yep"

"Hmmm... Well, they *can't* be talking about the hardware or the software because those are *spot* on! No problems there. We even have *voice*!"

"Yeah- they must be talking about all the porn they run into"

"Yeah! They want it all to be like EuroDisney!"



I mean how dumb can you get?

-V-

Its more or less just what i, and a lot of people gathered by reading everything to date.. not one specific post. Thanks Lord for posting this

~Brie