Upcoming Changes for Adult Content: Definitions

The real reason for the problems with "adult content" is LL's decision in 2006 to allow people to register without using a credit card. If SL forced users to register with a credit card issued in their own name (using age verification techniques only as an alternative for those without credit cards) it would ensure that everyone in SL is an adult. After that the use of adult material and the visiting of adult areas would be voluntary and need no enforcement.

It seems to me that any set of definitions are going to be highly culture-centric. The US can't even decide what's illicit and what's not, illustrated by the fact that the FCC recently revoked its ruling against the infamous Janet Jackson Superbowl wardrobe malfunction.

The most obvious solution is not an easy one to implement, but it's a very straightforward one. Tag the content, and put controls on the browser.

1. Allow people to block out adult content to their browser to their choosing. Filter language, nudity, graphic violence at their own whim.
2. When a user flies onto a plot, and the browser is loading the content, when it detects adult content, have an option to the user so that a pop-up can come and ask "Adult content here. Do you want to continue loading?"

It seems there are HUGE HUGE HUGE loopholes and troubles with the current thoughts on implementation.

Q: What if one day a mainland shop is PG, then someone adds something adult-content related. Are you saying Linden Lab will patrol the whole grid? Linden Lab can't even deal with the abuse reports it currently gets.
Q: Will someone have to relocate in response adding something adult?
Q: Who will pay for the relocated land? Won't all the abandoned land lead to massive fluctuations in the land price market?

And more. I'm going to blog about my full thoughts on this. I think using browser-side controls is an everyone-wins situation, and it allows for even more bonuses.

EDIT: http://secondtense.blogspot.com/2009/03/linden-labs-red-light-district-idea-re.html

Are you defining sexual as overt acts of intercourse, using poseballs, or touching ... if people stand perfectly still on the nudist beach, 2m away from each other, and engage in flirtatious or sexually-charged chat, is it now Adult? How will you police that?

Would a strip club that employs nude dancers who do NOT engage in-club intercourse activities and merely dance around naked and flirt with the guests, be considered sexual? Again, how will it be policed?

i own a privit regon desigend for people of the ab/dl world. people like adupt babys, diaper lovers, pants weters, people that suffer from incontance, and so on. the sim is a no sex sim. it is seined as a safe place for the people to come thers a dancing area a small bar, a mall for abdl vendors, a amusemnt park, beach, ect.... we have a adult only island.

i want to know if ab/dl themed would be clasifyed as adult.

Can this quote be used in order to support the concept of non-sexual nudity? Or, will the Gteam continue to view ALL forms of nudity generically as "sexual" or potentially "lewd" by default? (T_T)

I'm also still not seeing how LL will police this; clearly many users have profile content which violates the stated "mature" and "adult" content guidelines as currently stated in the FAQ. Just googling at random I came up with 11 profiles that are publically accessible and in content violation. How does LL propose to enforce these new definitions you are asking us for, when your current standards are not even being met?

I have one simple question:

Please tell me that you have lawyers drafting these guidelines. Please tell me that you have people with actual legal experience and JD degrees working on this and that it is not just Customer Service and G-Team staff. With all due respect to those employees, and all of the hard (and often thankless) work that they do, this is one situation in which you absolutely must have lawyers involved. You are getting into tricky legal definitions, and it has already been mentioned that these situations have made Supreme Court Justices throw up their hands and say "I'll know it when I see it."

There must be precise legal definitions here. This is for the benefit of us residents and for your own benefit. Mistakes will be made, people will tag their parcels "Adult" when they do not have to, people will fail to tag their parcels as "Adult" when they should, and most importantly, people will file ARs against content or parcels for having "Adult Themes" even when they do not, and no matter how hard you try, some people are going to wind up facing very real disciplinary measures, which could cost them hundreds or even thousands of USD, through error, misjudgement, and mistakes. This is unavoidable, and while I do not expect that Linden Lab will perform flawlessly, I do expect that you will have done your due dilligence and drafted clear and concise guidelines with precise legal definitions, and that you stick to them.

What none of us want to see is what we have seen in the past, where fuzzy definitions are rolled out, and LL's response to questions is that they'll wait until ARs are filed. Given that ARs for issues involving sex and/or age can result in permanent bans on the first report, often before even corroborating the claims, this will cause problems.

So again, please tell me that these guidelines are being drafted by attorneys. If they are not, if you do not have any attorneys involved, then you need to hire them yesterday.

To those bringing up the cry of "censorship!" I don't agree.

This is ZONING, not censorship. They're not saying you can't do it - they are saying that there are certain proscribed places where you CAN do it. In the same way that you can't plonk a convenience store in the middle of a residential area, and can't put a strip club next to a school in RL - is that censorship, I ask you?

Please, there are many pros and cons to this issue but starting to complain at being censored is getting a tad hysterical, in my opinion. This thread is contentious enough - it didn't need to be Godwined...

The places already exist, they exist courtesy of PG and Mature ratings and Community Standards. As the zoning on issues like this already exists, why on earth do we need this?

...and that is splitting hairs.

This is SL, not RL first of all.

Currently there is the "PG" neighborhood, where the schools are. Also there is the "Mature" neighborhoods, where the strip clubs are.

If someone puts something of a non-mature nature in a mature area, they should expect the fact that they might encounter some offensive material, and vice-versa for escorts looking for work outside the churches.

The problem here is that this is in fact both censorship and zoning.

just trying to figure out wher my privet island belongs in this new order.

i totally agree to a point.

i thought the sim covenants (if they have one) are to cover their butts as well.

i say let it be up to the sim owners.

If Second Life is for "Adults" and all Players are "Adults" then those "Adults" should be smart enough to leave an area they are offended by. There is already a "Mature" button in search to filter out those areas if you chose. The thing everyone seems to lose sight of is that Second Life is a "Game".

I know people from all over the world come to Second Life to enjoy themselves and I know i enjoy Second Life a lot. If I chose to go somewhere in Second Life that is marked "Mature" and see someone having sex on a park bench or someone tied to a rack, I have the Choice to leave. I am an "Adult" and therefor have the brainpower to make those decisions.

I suppose my point here is:
We are "Adults". If your out driving in your car and see a strip joint you don't have to stop and go inside. You are capable of making that decision in your Real Life, now make the same decisions in Second Life.

Sence SL is based in the USA and therefore falls under USA laws.

The best way to establish a system to flag adult content is to get a contract the MPAA to use there rating system. Why pay them? Its a current system that can be use the court. In other words, the closest legal defention of rating of legal content that can be use in defense in a court of law. There are plenty of laws out there that define what is illegal stuff, but not for legal but adult stuff.

Whether fair or not, it's already required that all additional avatars (alts) have payment info, because there is a $9.95 charge for alts. Anyone who hasn't paid this is violating SL's TOS.

See http://secondlife.com/whatis/pricing.php

I was about to post a big rant about how ridiculous it is that most people automatically link nudity with sexual things.

Then Blondin Linden said "Nudists/Naturalist will not be deemed as Adult. This is under the assumption that the main point of the gathering is not sexual."

Blondin you are now my new favorite Linden.

On the issue of alts and payment information.

Could this be the end of free accounts??? FINALLY???

In other words, LL finally puts a halt to free accounts, and if the $9.95 USD amount is not paid for alt accounts, they are deleted?? Would mean the end of bots (hurrah), griefer alts, and a lot of old dead accounts that have been abandoned.

Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.......

Except that Linden Lab gives you no way to PAY that fee, even if you wanted to...

Try it! Open a new account, do not choose to upgrade to Premium, and show me where you can pay your $9.95 one-time fee. Nowhere, that is where. They don't bill it, collect it, or give you any way to pay it.

The $9.95 one-time fee for alts is an artifact that they left in the TOS and other areas solely so they have the discretion of arbitrary enforcement when someone grossly violates fair use of lots of alts. "Why sure, Joe Botrunner, you can have 500 Land Bot alts! Pay us $9.95 USD for each, payable now, or we'll terminate those accounts!" *grins*

I dont' mean it to be mean at all. I have an uncontrollable foot fetish, therefore all shoe stores need to be in Adult to keep me away from them.

It just seems like thought police to me.

to try to define morality on a global scale, well, it's just beyond my capacity to think that LL could accomplish what mankind hasn't in a million years.

First, if we assume an "Adult Content Area" (ACA) means "anything goes," then the problem is not necessarily to define that behavior (sex with monkeys; graphic disemboweling of avatars; kiddie sex) but to make such areas secure from folks who don't wish to be there. And the assumption is that folks are incapable of making that choice OR that such areas can accidentally be accessed by unwitting residents.

So rather then go down that route of working out what is or isn't acceptable, why not focus on making ACAs secure in some way? Folks would have to sign up to a "I don't mind adult content" clause that then tags their avatar. Folks unsigned would not be able to TP to an adult area.

Of course, that wouldn't stop 12-year-old Johnny Wiseguy from pretending to be a grown up so he can take part in Dolcett fantasies, but that has always been the case - in the absence of having registration via credit card (and I bet some folks could get around that).

Second, the bigger issue is how to SANCTION against any type of behavior. If Johnny Wiseguy drops trousers in the Hannah Montana sim (not ACA) then what do you do? Even if "dropping trou" is on some "naughty" list, that doesn't stop it happening. Unless there is a way of monitoring and then acting on, it is pretty meaningless. Currently you can file an abuse report against Mr. Wiseguy but even if he gets banned, he signs on again as someone new.

And this brings us all the way back to the deeply ingrained issue of registration and how to handle alts.

5000 years of civilization has failed to define what is "acceptable" in relation to behavior so trying to do that in a virtual world is unlikely to be any more successful. I recommend the way the handle this issue is to treat is a zoning security problem, not a behavioral one. If a sim is an ACA then the individual takes responsibility for his or her entry into it - if you're offended, sadly you must move on to somewhere else.

well my sim is 100% no sex. we only keep a muture status becase some think ab are adult orinted. our bigest rule is no kids avatars and must be adult in rl. its a hard battle to keep up with as its is and im just not shure how we will be clasified under new defntions

and nowhere does it force you to pay. I've got several alts registered under a single email address. I looked before I made my first alt, and I forget the exact wording but it seems that is rarely enforced anymore unless you're creating a lot of alts for griefing purposes. Believe me, when I made my first alt I looked for that pay box and never found it and never received a bill either.

Not that I'm complaining because my alts are to keep my fun and my business separate.

From the FAQ:

If your sim is 100% no sex, why should it matter if child avatars are present, presuming their real-life Player is 18 or older? What is "ab" supposed to stand for? Anti-babies?

The 9.95 per alt thing stopped a few years ago.

The TOS just is not up to date.

I am wondering if this is not to do with Phillip Rosedale's idea of merging the teen and adult grids, as floated at http://www.metanomics.net/transcript011909

If so, would it not be better to be upfront about it and say that, to get this to work, LL will need to introduce this "adult areas" thingy and residents will have to accept this as the price we must pay for having the benefit of having hoards of teenagers suddenly wandering round the place.

What does worry me, though, is the implication of his statement in that interview that It would seem to follow (unless Mr Rosedale has changed his mind over the last couple of months) is that these "adult areas" are merely a half-way house -- segregate particular themes and activities and then, in the fullness of time, get rid of them altogether so we have an In the short term, my worry about age verification is that, as a Brit I am asked to provide, not to Linden Labs but -- apparently -- to a company of which I know nothing other than that Linden Labs think they are trustworthy, copies of documents that are sufficient to prove to some people's satisfaction -- Linden Labs' satisfaction, certainly -- that the person who has access to them is the person whom they describe.

This, in point of fact, is precisely the sort of thing we in the UK are frequently warned not to do because of the potential for identity theft and fraud if such documents, for which there is apparently a thriving black-market among internet fraudsters, fall into the wrong hands.

One assumes that Linden Labs have satisfied themselves that adequate steps have been taken to ensure that copies of any documents they forward to a third party, should I find myself forced to verify my age, will never fall into the wrong hands, perhaps because of nefarious activities of some disgruntled or greedy employee of this third party, because the inconveniences of sorting out the mess that identity theft leaves behind are not small.

One -- this one, anyway -- would be rather less worried about being forced to provide such documentation to access large parts of the grid (including two of her own sims for which she pays Linden Labs hard cash every month) if one knew what these adequate steps were.