Upcoming Changes for Adult Content: Answers to Questions

I seriously doubt anyone in SL looks like their avatar. Reality just isn't that blingy or sexy looking, believe me! And since EVERY avatar in the game is a cartoon -- period -- it should not matter if the cartoon is of a four-footed fox with wings, a pixie with aerodynamically impossible breasts, or an AV of Brittany Spears complete with stretch marks and a bottle of Beam. Every avatar in SL is a cartoon, no matter what.

I'm just trying to stay on message:

Just to clairify, your furry avatar or a human avatar?

Which does not justify taking that message beyond context. Again, you are better than that.

Why is completely irrelevant. They are obviously cartoons. The law in question requires a reasonable person to believe they're looking at a real person, and exempts animations. It does not say "except if you wish the animation was real".


It's not relevant because the subject in question, animations, is EXPLICITLY EXEMPTED.

The context is "are people more passionate/emotional about realistic worlds". If you've been to an SF convention and seen the kinds of emotional melodrama that people get involved in over completely ludicrous and imaginary things... I mean, I've seen people spend half a day debating the meaning of the final episode of Sailor Moon... I can't see how you can think that.

An interesting example of realistic avatars is an old 1981 film called "Looker". The distinction between real and representation is the basis of the plot.

Both.

And again, even if they had 10million pixel resolution and accurate mesh topology of my body, they are still only cartoons and only people with an axe to grind will consider it too real. But these people don't care how realistically one portrays what they see as sinful - it is the portrayal itself they consider wrong, not the resolution of it. They would be just as offended by a picture of stick figures en-coitus that they cammed and found in my home. So the argument about "how real is too real" is kinda silly. It's not how real one looks that offends thin skinned folks. It is that people are defying their proper and holy way, and it's their self-appointed job to clean us up and set us straight.

I remember that film. No, the premise was that they could better control the 3d models and use them for subliminal suggestion. And a severe hole in the plot was that after they kill the real actresses to avoid paying them, making new commercials from their scans would certainly gain lots of unwanted attention.

And even today, no 3d character is indistinguishable from real, no matter how many weeks you take to render the graphics. Even if we get to that point and can generate the image in real time, it is STILL just a cartoon on a flat computer screen.

When you can generate a hologram of the person that would be indistinguishable from the real person standing beside it, then you will have a case.

BINGO.

Skinny Barbies and slutty Bratz dolls? Musclemen with tattoos everywhere? Fallen angels with wings and horns, and sea sirens that swim in the sky (just two of the forms my avatar takes)? These are 'more realistic'??? You're making a gross generalisation based on what a percentage of the SL population looks like, a percentage of the time.

Boredom or intellectual challenge - maybe. Creative challenge - most definitely. Call it 'playing dress-ups' if you like - that still doesn't mean there's intent to make them look 'real', and Shockwave's point is a good one. Maybe your delusion that your avatar is 'real' engenders a greater emotional tie for you, but it's certainly not where it's at for me. I'm not emotionally tied to my avatar, nor do I see it as a representation of myself, and any interaction I have with other avatars depends entirely on whether I'm role-playing or not.

Seems like your idea of 'real' and mine are very different.

(Edited to add that I agree with Shockwave's post above, too.)

I'm actually agreeing with you. An image is not reality unless it is a documentary recording.

I think that the term you're looking for is "Parental guidance" no?




Which is why the onus is on the *parent*, not the content provider. The content provider is in no position to do anything other than make a good faith effort. The parent is in a position to actually control the child's behavior.
Which one is the more responsible for the child's welfare?



Well, my point was actually to compare fritz and south park to point out that Fritz's "X" rating is entirely undeserved by today's standards.

But since you bring it up, who says that what makes South Park objectionable is "*how* the sex and violence portrayed, rather than the fact that it is *there*?

And my attitude isn't that all the sex and violence in SL someone else's problem. It is that this is someone *very specific's* problem, and that unless my kids are the ones sneaking into SL then that someone isn't *me*.

LIsten, I have kids. I know about the horror of having them maybe see a titty(eeeek!). I've had to have awkward discussions with them about many awkward things.

I have always known that it was *my* job to prepare them for the world, and the world includes many things I'd rather not have them see.
So I know that since I can't stop them from eventually *seeing* it, I'll have to teach them how to *deal* with it instead.
That's *my* job. It's nobody's job *but* mine, and I want them to learn how to deal with things the best way *I* know how to do it. I don't want them to learn to deal with things in someone *else's* way. I want them to learn to do it in *my* way.

That means that I cannot leave the moral instruction of my children in someone else's hands, no matter how well-meaning they are.
If I want it done *my* way, then *I* have to do it. And I can't split hairs while I'm doing it either.

Which means that if I have a problem with my kids seeing something on SL, then it's *my* job to either make sure that they aren't *on* SL, or that I've taught them how to deal with the sorts of things that they might see. And since they're kids, I also need to punish them if they break the rules I have set down.

See, *that* is what a parent does. A parent doesn't Whine to LL saying "Waaa! My kid snuck onto my account and saw a bare titty! waaaa!"

A parent supervises their child, and teaches how to deal with the inappropriate things that they might see when supervision is impossible.

The parents in south park *don't* think like me. If they did, there wouldn't have *been* a movie in the first place

The only difference between *your* position and that of the south park parents is that while you still "blame canada", you are also trying to put the V-chip in everyone *else's* head so that we won't swear in front of the children in the first place.

You're putting the cart before the horse, is what I mean to say.

And BY the way, I'm a big south park fan- and one of the awkward discussions I had with my kids was when they showed up at my place for the weekend singing "Blame canada!" because their mom had rented to movie and watched it for the first time with them in the room.

Of course, this is the same woman who took my 13-year old daughter aside before she went to the junior prom, and taught her how to use a condom because "if you're going to the prom, you're going to need to know how to use a condom"

When my daughter told me about this (she was freaking out, as her mom hadn't gone into detail and I think that she was expecting some sort of mandatory orgy at the prom), we had a chat about how condoms were very important to know how to use properly.... *in college*. "In the meantime", I said, "I have a much simpler method" I handed her a fairly hefty stick and said "This is a stick- and if you see anything that looks like it needs a condom put on it, just hit it with this until it goes away."

-V-

I don't care how realistic my avatar can look..._it_ isn't_me. I control it and give it a personality, which may be the same as mine, but it still is an artificial character. Nothing that happens to it is happening to me. When I log off, it ceases to exist.

Thank you Brenda - you made my point in far fewer words!

For the same reason Hollywood spends billions of dollars getting an explosion to look 'just right'. As my BF woud say, "It's a movie, dude."

And for all you people who still don't get it, when you play Pacman in the arcade, are you upset when the ghosts eat you?

Sometimes, Less is more.

There's no such thing as "The freedom not to be expressed at".

There's the freedom to *walk* away, change the channel, or express yourself right back at 'em.

Freedom of expression is a two edged sword. You get to express your opinions, but everyone else gets to express their opinions of *you*, and sometimes, those opinions are strong enough to bust a guy's jaw for him.

This is why humankind invented *manners*.

-V-

I'm curious, I've never been in EverWorldofWarQuest or any of those other places, but do players there have the same personal emotional attachment to their avatars as here?

And why Al Gore invented the Internet. So you can be a douche and not have to pay for it.

The US Supreme Court has expressed the opposite opinion in upholding laws that restricted the *manner* of expression.

Here's the thing...

Every parcel that LL free swaps is money they are losing from a potential auction. It would behoove them to do free swaps for as few people as possible.

I predict that they will give many "borderline" parcels a free pass to stay on mature mainland. They might recommend such owners move to Ursula, however, this move will NOT be free.

Essentially though, the free land swap is a bit misleading. The vast majority of residences will not qualify for it. However, after the initial candidates get their free land and "free swaps" are nullified, there will probably be a rash of ARs and reevaluations that go on. Owners who were previously given a pass will be told that they have to move afterall. THIS TIME however, they will not be offered a free swap. They shut their doors or break out the credit card.

This is why I think that "smutting up" my parcel won't work...

Blondin says they will evaluate each lot on a case by case basis. The reasoning for this supposedly is to address what Brieanne Bomazi said about people buying up land, "smutting it up", free swapping, and selling it for a nice profit. This in essence robs LL of potential land to auction. Nothing new goes into their coffers.

My thinking was... what if I started a legitimate adult business on my land several months from now. Then I get AR'd and told I can't do that. Would LL give me a free swap? No. Right now if you have such content on a PG land, they don't free swap you to Mature. They hold a gun to your head and say "do it or else". If I smut up my land now in an attempt to move to Urulsa, I think they'll notice and slap my hands. It may even hurt my chances of working with them in the future.

I don't know if all this is true or not, but it did seem like a possibility...

I think they'll probably give people on the line and even a bit under it a free move.

Part of their real rationale for this project must be that they know the gteam is not horribly consistant. It's cheaper for them to just eat the cost of moving more people than it is to clean it up later.

Then again, it actually makes a lot of sense so who knows if they'll do it...

If they insist on this incompetent path, in spite of our dire warnings and proposals of a less damaging alternative that does even more for them, then they can pay the ultimate price for their stupidity.