From: Alexander Harbrough
Isn't the advertisement itself considered half the problem? Or else, why are people complaining that their goods might not show up in appropriate searches?
The *new* restrictions are absolutely the problem. Enforcing the *existing* rules regarding advertising might be a nice thing to try before doing something more drastic.
From: someone
Also, yes you can teleport out, but if someone sets up that 'dog and pony show' next to you, you are still stuck with living next to a dog and pony show. Avoiding, or at least mitigating such issues is what RL zoning is used for. The principles are the same in SL.... giving people some idea what they can reasonably expect as neighbors.
If you do not want a dog and pony show being set up next to you, buy land in a PG region, or in an estate with a "no dog and pony shows" covenant.
It is not the D&P show owner's fault that LL puts mature regions next to PG ones. Perhaps they ought to build some ALL PG landmasses?
From: someone
Because the viewer might have been there first, as the owner and/or tenant of the site next to where the person sets up shop.
Not if they are in a PG sim, or in an estate with a covenant that doesn't allow such things. if they don't like such things, why are they in a mature sim? and why do they think that someone else's idea of "mature" is less valid that their own?
Finally, if it is *really* an issue for them, they can move. I didn't notice LL turning the world upside down the last three times *I* had neighbors who had stuff on their land that bothered *me*. To paraphrase Blondin, being an obnoxious neighbor isn't against the TOS.
From: someone
Again, automating some of the enforcement is a cost saving measure, and by reducing enforcement costs, you also make enforcement easier to maintain. The existing measures are not working.. why? Because they are less cost effective. It is easy for customers to insist a business incur higher costs, the customers do not have to pay those costs up front and will not connect any increase in fees charged by the business with their demands. They will expect the business to simply operate at a lower profit margin.
In what way is the new program more cost effective than simply having a few worker bees running prurient searches once a month and smacking around the people who don't check their "mature" box after a week's warning?
From: someone
Semantics, especially since the most commonly proposed counter-solution is 'move everyone else', irrespective of what the numbers *really* are, what the relative costs are, or anything else.
No, not semantics. a weak argument that won't stand against anything other than assuming your opponent wishes unrestricted porn piped directly into children's heads
in church.
And the answer isn't "move everyone else". the answer is "why not allow a free move to a better spot for the folks who *have the problem*?"
That isn't the same thing as "Involuntarily move the people who are annoying the minority".
From: someone
And yet there is a real concern about buildings not being that easy to move. If that concern was not there, would there be as much opposition?
Because there is a difference between moving a house and moving an entire *Sim*
From: someone
Also, virtual settings have a huge advantage over real settings when setting up zoning. In RL, you have to compromise due to there being limited land. In SL, the land itself can be restructured when need be. You can simply create a new continent for any given zoning. That makes it a lot more practical than in RL.
Ah, so now we hit the crux of your argument- because LL can simply print up more land, no compromise is necessary? And if LL can create a continent for any given zoning, and the existing zoning favors "mature" 3 to one. then why not make an all PG continent? something that has been suggested several times, and only seems fair.
From: someone
I was using that as an example of where age restrictions are used in RL. Like most analogies, it is not perfect, but that does not mean it has no bearing.
No, your were trying to apply a real+physical world paradigm to a virtual world setting where it would simultaneously do too much to be practical *and* too little to be effective.
It isn't really that great an example then, is it?
From: someone
Note that there is an alternative legislators (or LL) have to using flawed age verification.. outright banning. I have also agreed that LL should be pressuring Aristotle to clean up its act. If there are lists of dead people posted for public use in getting around the verification, that list is also available to Aristotle and they should be filtering that list out of their database. If they do not, there is the potential of a major breach of contract suit against them, as they would be failing to hold up their end of the contract... and not just the contract with LL, but contracts with anyone else who uses them. The alternative is that the contracts with Aristotle are improperly worded, in which case LL's lawyers need to look at them and renegotiate (as do everyone else's).
LL should *absolutely* be banning any children they find on SL, and an accounts which *allow children to access* SL.
This isn't *doing* that. it is attempting rather to make the prohibited activity *safe* for children, instead.
Rather like "solving" teenage drinking by prohibiting alcohol (or in this case restricting all sales and advertising of alcohol to the state of Nevada).
And the fact of the matter, as told by Aristotle itself, is that the program *doesn't work* for age verification. It isn't a matter of getting Aristotle to "clean up their act". It is a matter of waiting for them to have a product that *works*. And according to all of the major players in ID verification, there simply *is* no reliable age verification software out there, because they can all be bypassed in an absurdly easy fashion. short of a face-to-face meeting at the point of sale, there isn't a good way to restrict or verify age in a virtual world.
From: someone
Without those third party lists, would it still have been so easy? Not to mention not everyone would think to look for those lists, and that the only thing preventing the use of those lists from being identity theft is a minor technicality in the wording that I am not sure would stand up in court. It is certainly common sense that you are meant to use *your* id (that would likely be enough of a test for a civil trial, maybe not criminal though).
Actually, Aristotle makes it *easier* to fudge your identity. you don't even need a parent's credit card. just an address for someone from the phone book. Even someone *dead* and Famous. Might just as well call Aristotle an "Identity theft enablement service".
From: someone
Again, get Aristotle to clean up their act. There are pretty simple measures they could use to counter the identity theft issues, and the cost to them would likely be neglibile. The cost to them of not cleaning up their act would depend on the wording of their contracts.
There isn't any act to clean up it is, in the absence of a worldwide database of accurate census data, and impossible task to automate age verification. there is no form of age verification that is useful unless there is an actual check of records, and there cannot be such a thing as a check of records that is *anonymous*.
The whole paradigm is unworkable with the present technology and the present state of computerized records.
From: someone
Has that safe harbour rule been tested in the case of SL? They are more than just the server, they also provide the means to create, and already have ratings rulings in effect (regardless of the extent to which they are not enforced, they are at least partially enforced, and as I understand it when they are it is more often too agressively than otherwise).
SL provides Server and the tools to create content. So do web-hosting services. and the safe harbor rule has been tested *repeatedly*, since the 1980's regarding these issues.
From: someone
I maintain that is not a function of the plan itself, but rather their lack of support and clear communications on implementation. Also keep in mind that I agree that businesses will need means to advertize in a practical manner.
They are a part and parcel of the plan itself. in fact, since they are leaving all other methods by which a lack of predictability can take place, I would say that this plan is *specific* to the advertising and operation of *businesses* who are, for the most part, plating by the rules, and aren't found unless they are *looked* for. thus hamstringing their advertising is in direct opposition to what LL *says* they want to do.
From: someone
I don't see that as being the case. That kind of thing already exists in many aspects of RL policing, but the RL business world has not fallen apart.
You see a lot of Burger Kings opening in Iran, Cuba, or Myanmar do you? You need a rule of law, recognition of property rights, and political *stability* in order to do the necessary planning ahead to run a business.
SL is *no* different from RL in those respects. In what way is removal by executive fiat from one's property at any moment, for any reason (what LL claims as its rights), indicative of a stable business climate?
From: someone
Mirroring RL censorship laws is not in and of itself restraint of trade. For restraint of trade to be considered to exist, it has to be 'unreasonable' restraint of trade. Some of the things that exist in SL now, many in RL would simply consider unreasonable period (and I am talking the extreme subjects such as rape RP, Dolcett, etc). Again, push that kind of thing too much publicly, and even if the trials win, those pursuing them will likely lose.
No, but in the absence of laws prohibiting activity, saying that *this* business but not *that* one must move, for no other reason than some people are annoyed by the *sight* of that business, *IS* 'restraint of trade. This is *not* the real world. this is a *virtual* world, global, multicultural, with its own social mores, and its own "community standards.
The RL zoning laws of *any* nationality do not hold here, for the very thing that Zoning governs, *land*, does not exist here. this is more like arguing that your file shouldn't be next to Hugh Hefner's in the file cabinet at the DMV because you don't like what Hugh does for a living!
From: someone
There are potential issues with breach of contract, but even there, the issue is 'fair use.' Some restrictions are legitimate. Moreover, this is one of the reasons I feel LL should be doing a LOT more to accomodate moves. Simply telling people 'oh, you will have to move in a very short period of time and we will give you some nice help files' does not cut it. They do seem to be showing signs of doing more, but more may not be enough. They need to be really careful there.
No, in fact it *isn't* "fair use". it is "You changed what I bought *after* I bought it" Fair use is different- "You shouldn't be able to tell me how to use what I bought after it leaves your store."
LL doesn't sell us a *disk* of the SL program. they sell us *server space* under certain terms and conditions, that a *judge* has said may not change without some sort of due process or recompense.
Due process starts what you notify your customers *individually*. LL hasn't done that yet. And no recompense has been offered yet to those who don't want to move, those who will be put into the situation of having their tenants evicted from private estates, and a whole raft of others.
From: someone
There will be short term variations, that is a given. The effect on the long term is much harder to predict.
Not all *that* much harder- especially considering that the business cycle of SL is still in "the short term". Land prices will dip for the foreseeable future. that isn't something that's actionable by the way, but it's a good reason why LL might want to look at it's plan again.
From: someone
In SL it *will* be legal, and with no risk of STD's. Just because the majority will be in mature zones does not mean they will not be verified. In RL, not wanting to live beside a brothel does not equate to never wanting to visit one.
Yes, but it's legal in the Netherlands and the State of Nevada too. That doesn't stop brothels, out-call services, or street prostitution from existing in Great Britain or The State of California. There are customers there, and the trade goes underground.
In what way is a lack of ability to travel in RL different than the lack of ability to access because of account verification in SL?
From: someone
The majority in RL are 'anonymous.' If the police hear a complaint about vandalism or other RL griefing in progress, the vandals will likely be gone by the time they can get a squad car there. That does not invalidate the existance of police.
Similarly, the police cannot prevent every noise complaint, but by keeping clubs out of residential areas by way of zoning, there are fewer noise complaints to deal with.
You are making my point for me. Griefers and seeing terms in search that one doesn't like are the two biggest causes of an "unpredictable experience" followed by something that you don't like moving in next door, and accidentally teleporting into some situation that you don't like.
Of those 4 causes, the two biggest are simple enforcement issues, and the LL plan does *nothing* about one of them, and essentially solves the next three by essentially doing away with advertising, and by forced relocation and censorship of those who do not move,
Creating a host of replacement problems in the process.
LL is doing all of this to *avoid* the need to "police" their rules. they are instead changing the rules.
From: someone
Again, zoning has merits, and both those examples relate well to SL.
Zoning does have merits, as does *changing* zoning. but if local city councils tried to do it by fiat, they would be dealing with lynch mobs. hell, they sometimes face them even when doing it democratically. In this case, LL needn't consult with *anyone* before changing their zoning. they could simply have re-tasked their servers and stuck all the pg sims on an island somewhere and sent in the landscaping crews, and told everyone "sorry we didn't do this from the start"
But they decided instead to do something that has all the worst features of "fiat" and "democratic", and to do it to the 3/4 of SL that is "mature" presumably those people who didn't *want* a "pg" experience.
From: someone
Pardon, but you are arguing that by reducing the quantity, you increase the odds of coming across these things? Pardon? And you are going to tell me that people are going to come onto SL, then stake out random houses just in case someone does something naughty in them? Does that really sound like a productive way to find adult entertainment to you?
If a merchant on mature land, that carries adult items cannot *say so* in their search entry, because to do so would require adult search terms, and someone mortally offended by things adult shows up looking for a saddle for their virtual horse and sees pony play gear in the corner display, does that not *add* to the unpredictability rather than reduce it? does it not make it *worse*, because rather than just getting a search screen fully of vendors of pony play gear, the searcher doesn't find out until they are *actually* on the premises?
How is that a *reduction* exactly?
And whether or not is sounds "productive", in a system which will depend upon "citizen informants" (AR's) to find wrongdoers, You bet your *ass* people will come in *looking* for people to report. we already *have* a couple of big groups who do that... *FOR FUN*.
From: someone
Pardon, where *anywhere* has LL said anything about this being about shielding people from griefers *or* tourists? Straw man, sir, nothing more than a straw man.
They haven't. and griefers in welcome areas, are the single greatest instance of people being shocked by porn in SL, and are the ones responsible for people thinking that SL consists of nothing *but* porn. the plan does *nothing* about griefers and that is one of the worst things about it.
As for tourists, those are the ones who bob randomly around the map and are *surprised* to see something that they don't like rather than simply motivated to go somewhere else. they also are something akin to griefers when they show up in role-play sims with their freebie guns and mow down a bunch of elves with their M-60 and run off spewing gestures looking for more victims.
Like i said A more predictable experience means more than not seeing "fuck" come up in the search window.
That doesn't make it a "straw man" by the way. that makes it pointing out the *deficiencies* of the plan.
From: someone
You are forgetting something... those other sites are small enough that they can relocate easily if threatened. SL cannot relocate so easily as they. Also many of those sites already voluntarily use forms of adult verification.
first of all, nobody is saying that either the porn sites *or* SL is doing anything *illegal*, so relocation isn't necessary by *anyone*.
Second, they use what the USG tells them to. make sure of the intent of the viewer, make them *say* they are of age and seeking the content and aren't violating community standards by downloading the stuff.
These things are for the protection of *website*, not the kids. The kids are the responsibility of their *parents*, not "Wet & Wild Productions".
From: someone
And whether you feel those or any other kids are worth effort to protect or not is academic. It is not you that you have to convince. There is an arguement that we surived as a society with a lot less legislation, including less civil rights not only for women, children, minorities, but for anyone. That does not mean it was a better world.
Excuse me, but where *anywhere* does LL say that their plan will result in a "better world"? How is it *my* responsibility to make sure that someone *else's* idea of "better world" comes about?
Besides, my point is *not* that kids aren't worth "protecting" but that I'm not sure that they need to be *protected* from adult content in a virtual world (Lord knows we don't protect them from virtual *murder*, do we?), and that I don't think that LL's plan does *enough* to protect them to be worth the trouble it is.
From: someone
The very consumer legislation and contract law that you feel LL may be violating are similar rights. Which rights are the important ones... just the ones that protect you from harm?
No. the ones that protect the consumer from the supplier. The fool from the folks seeking his money. Nobody is guaranteed by law that *others* have to follow *their* moral code.
From: someone
There is obviously a limit to what is reasonable in legislating rights, but if you are going to arbitrarily declare any given group 'not worth protecting', especially writing them off as already having 'little black hearts', don't expect to win over anyone who does not already agree with you.
Kids who are seeking porn will find it. they are not *trying* to avoid it. *We* cannot protect them from it, only their *parents* can do that. I am referring to the children who are seeking out porn whn I say "little black hearts" because such children are natural pirates- I know, I *was* one of them!
And adults have *choice*, and by definition, do not *need* protection from it.
From: someone
I feel that you have set up a straw man in your head by choosing a definition of the goals that is easy for you to dismiss. I think you really believe what you are saying, though.
It is possible that I am doing the same, but at least my interpretation is consistant with the changes they are making.
Absolutely. you are looking at the changes they are making, and adjusting your interpretation of their stated goals to fit their actions, whereas I am taking their stated goals, and testing their actions to see if they will *accomplish the stated goals*.
I'm saying that they will *not*, and because they will *cause* a whole host of new problems, they should either not be done, or should be changed so that the *do* accomplish the stated goals.
From: someone
You are repeating yourself. I responded to this earlier in this post.
I'll stop if you will
From: someone
Its funny how this is a game when it makes for an easy defense agaisnt these changes, even though many consider it as not a game, and something more, and that many who form relationships in SL are not merely RPing them. And yes that will still happen, but when you add in BDSM or other complications, it takes a higher level of maturity to deal with the situations. Not all adults handle that well, let alone kids, even if a 'game.'
Then those adults should stay away from this "game", and those parents who don't want their children exposed to it should watch to make sure they don't. Besides, it was an example- I think that SL has more to it than a simple game.
From: someone
But in both cases the patron is dealing with virtual sex. My response was to ask why one requires verification and the other only requires a positive response with nothing backing it up. How is my comparing the two ad absurdium? In fact, in SL, the patron can participate in the virtual sex. Their avatar can have role in the film. That constitutes a greater level of involvement, not lesser. In SL, that role can include D/s aspects, which constitutes a *much* greater level of involvement. Whether the minor is playing the dominant role or the submissive, it is not always easy to cope with well, nor to keep the lines clean between real emotions and RP.. for either side.
See? you really *don't* understand what an "Ad Absurdum" argument is.
Real life has all those things too! Does that mean we shouldn't allow children to participate in it? Or that everyone who feels like having sex must live only in Mature areas, and cut it out as long as they are living in "PG" areas? (ad absurdum argument {tm})
From: someone
Instead of 'can clearly see it is a child', substitute in, 'it is unclear if it is a child or adult.' It is possible that I put in 'can clearly see it is a child,' but I am willing to bet that is something you added or assumed. And if you think it is always clear whether someone in front of you is a minor or not, I take it you do not live in an area with a high asian population, or for that matter that you pay no attention to conroversies over the ages of olympic gymnasts.
my point is that you will *never* be sure that it is not a child on the other end of the internet connection. you simply *cannot* be sure, and anything which claims that it can make you so is lying to you. There comes a point where it can be more trouble than it is worth to *try*. I would argue that LL's plan has passed that point. I would want a whole lot more assurance for the level of trouble they are putting their customers to
From: someone
With due respect, I presented my reasoning why I feel that the current 'are you 18?' question constitutes 'nothing,' and as such do not agree that I was putting words in their mouth. If you want to respond to my arguement that the status quo constituted 'nothing' then please do so.
No, you presented a *comment* that people who were asking for LL to try *enforcing* the existing rules before making drastic changes were advocating doing "nothing".
The context was about the entirety of the plan, but particularly about search. not only about age verification. besides, they *aren't* changing their age verification plan. they are simply applying it more stringently.
From: someone
Just because you do not like a comparason does not mean it is a bad comparason, and you seem to be willing to go to extra lengths to assume the absurd. I get the impression you are honest in doing so, though, that you really believe what you are saying.
You are absolutely right. If it was just that I didn't like it, I would call it a "bad" or "inappropriate" comparison, indicating it was my *opinion*. But when you take something and run off the end of the internet with it, it *is* an "Ad Absurdum" argument. That's a technical term, not a value judgment
^V^
