What do YOU want to know from LL?

That's not entirely true.

Not saying that I'm happy with this whole thing or that I don't think they should post more info, just that it wasn't all the same info 3 times.

Not entirely - you are right

But on many of points that werent well explained the first time - they continued to be poorly explained.

While the stuff they explained well the first time - they just said the same thing with slightly different words.

I still dont know if the Adult Flag (toggle) for Mature Land is replacing, the same as, or in addition to the Mature Flag (toggle) that is already there.

I even asked Robin directly in another threa and she didnt answer it, just made the same statements from the blog.

The implications for those who were following the Search Places changes of the past few weeks are pretty critical.

Question #13:

Sooooo... This is guy that's setting moral standards for me, huh?

In our RL bedroom we have a beautiful drawing of two naked angels in a loving embrace. We call it art... my mother calls it porn and blasphemy.

Who "common sense" is the best? Ours or my mothers?

Morwen.

In the current debate as regards Linden Labs' proposed age-verification system many people have expressed deep reservations about LL's choice of employing Aristotle / Integrity as the company to process the data. Many people, myself included, have felt LL's assurances that the data will not be sold on (as is Aristotle's normal practice) to have a somewhat hollow ring to them. Surprisingly, I came across this article on the The Guardian website this morning which covers Google's proposed (and patented!) plan to harvest data of MMORPG players in order to target advertising with WoW and SL at the top of their list!

This does seem to tie in rather well with concerns voiced as regards the proposed age-verification system being part of a data-mining operation. I suppose that we'll never see the end of those nasty ad farms in SL now. Instead we're likely to see more of them as they get snapped up by RL advertising companies to push RL products in SL.

Heh, that gives me an idea: the standard SL viewer delivers targetted advertising in the form of pop-ups which can only be disabled by going premium. Eh, maybe not such a great idea from a resident's POV but a handy-dandy little earner for LL.

Its been done before, in Anarchy Online, well there it was sound enabled billboards.

Hiyas Dakotaflyer! What was the overall reaction to the advert popups amongst the general population in AO? Positive? negative? Were they overly intrusive into your online epxerience? Was there any way to disable them?

Well I had a payed account during that time which I let lapse. Mainly if you had a free account you got to see the ads which were in the form of billboards that would play video clips while not really intrusive per se, in some places there would be were it would be strange to see for example a fanta ad.inside mission level instances for an example. For paid accounts they just showed made up AO related ads I have not had a paid account there since the first part of 06 so I am not sure how it is continuing. But to say the truth on the times I was on my freebie mule account transfering between my alts. I can say it was less annoying for me then say the add spam we get here on empty lands. Here if that was turned into moving shouting billboards would be 100 times worse

What do YOU want to know from LL?

what's 6 x7 ?

The last I saw from a Linden on this was in the Blog:

More on Identity Verification
Monday, May 7th, 2007 at 2:25 PM PDT by: daniellinden

"Age and identity verification will replace ‘Payment Information’ in-world. "

I am not aware of any further clarification by LL.

Currently a parcel owner (in Mainland anyway) can ban one or more of the following social classes
Deny by Payment Status:
- Deny No Payment Info On File
- Deny Payment Info On File
- Deny Payment Info Used

This means that the class discrimination built into SL land access, will in future operate on two social classes only
- Age-Verified
- Not Age-Verified


If we want to mine really hard for a nugget of goodness in this, then it would be that up to now, it was impossible for "right-thinking" people to ban from their land people who were of the type who were explicitly looking for sex and violence - which is logically what Age-Verified are. There is no other reason to age-verify!


Quite apart from that, this feature is absolutely necessary for parity of discrimination.
If people with Payment Info can be discriminated against on the basis that the might be minors, then it more than right that people with Age-Verified can be discriminated against on those grounds. They might be minors - as a minor can use a parent's ID online as easily as they can lie about their age online.



Lindens bang on about how CC info is not a guarantee of age. Yet "the odds" are that anyone with Payment Info is actually an adult.
In a similar way, "the odds" are that anyone with Age-Verified (over the Web in an anonymous 2-minute session) is an adult.
But in each case, it's *only* "the odds" - that's all, and the odds are less for online Age-Verified.

Given that any minors on the grid are determined proven liars, I'd trust Payment Info as an age indicator far more than I'd trust Age-Verified. It's plain common sense!
The odds that a Payment Info resident is an adult are higher than the odds that an Age-Verified resident is an adult.


Now children, for your assignment, answer the following:

Which is easier for a minor to do - and get away with
a) Use a parent's ID to age-verify once-off on a website
b) Use a parent's Credit Card for continuing regular payments

What jurisdictions permit a minor to use a Credit Card without the transactions appearing on a parent's statement?
These would be ONLY jurisdictions where Payment Info is not an excellent indicator of age, and where a parent/guardian could not unquestionably shown to have been negligent.

It appears that whatever organisation runs the Age-Verification, they will have to tailor their process to the jurisdiction in which the resident lives. It should therefore follow that Payment Info = Age Verified for any jurisdiction where minors are not allowed completely independent credit cards.


There is a massive cultural and legal gulf between the USA and Europe in matters of data privacy. This seems to be largely lost on LL.



For all those who are suggesting some sort of paper/fax based Notary Public proof of age:
Do you seriously believe that LL want to bear the costs of handling millions of pieces of paper? They want to do it all on a website because it massively less expensive to do it that way.
Remember, this is not about keeping minors off the grid. It's about covering LL's ass while they continue to allow free unfettered access by minors to the grid.

That's a very important point, imho.

I have my land restricted to verified accounts since LL opened the account verification process (except for a small, disclaimer-heavy area with a second shop in order to not lose any sales, which won't be possible anymore now). I was confronted with a lot of anger due to this access restriction; many potential customers IMed "we will take our money elsewhere and tell all our friends to stay away from your place". Even those who knew about account verification took out their anger on me or my alt, simply to vent their frustration (which was the reason I finally gave in and opened the second shopping area).

If you own land that needs to be flagged, be prepared for the same customer reaction. Anger, frustration, even the threat to badmouth a business. And needless to say, if you run a business be prepared for a loss in sales that LL won't reimburse. Those who can't or won't verify themselves in order to access their favorite spots will be quite upset, and the land owner is the only person they can grab and complain to. You'll have to say "sorry" at least ten times per hour.

*moves*

What I would like to know is exactly how this will be implemented. Ideally it will be implemented by preventing content on adult land streaming to non-age-verified accounts, thus preventing it from being visible in the first place, and no way around it with a custom client. It's then a question of ban-lines preventing access or allowing us to fly straight through.

Move it back.

This isn't a feature suggestion, Strife. This is a question to fellow Residents as to what information they are looking for from LL.

~Jessy

As for those that commented on the Blog having answered my questions: No they didn't

There's too much grey are in broad blanket statements. You may have your conclusion, but I can see answers in other light. I'd like a clear black and white answer from LL before this hits.

I'm collecting the questions and am going to send a letter off to LL with them all grouped as a whole (If Strife moves this thread back where it belongs, that is.)

~Jessy

Seriously Strife, move it back! It is not a feature suggestion. LL has not answered many of the questions we have about this age verification, instead they have given us the same unsatisfactory information not once, not twice, but 3 times...I think it is a perfectly valid question to residents. What do we want to know from LL regarding age verification?

Either move it back or re-open comments in the blog!

Strife moves threads sometimes instead of closing them ...

Just a thought.

Well Strife can move it back as it belongs in the RA forum. It's not a "policy change request" as he incorrectly assumed. My post is to gather information from the Residents by asking them thier opinions on what they would like to know or have clearified about the new Age Verification. It is NOT a request to remove Age Verification, nor change any existing policy.

Perhaps actually understanding a post would be a good idea before trying to moderate it.

Oh, and since cross-posting is against the forum rules, I won't repost in RA. I follow the forum rules and understand thier uses, even if others don't.

~Jessy

I only meant to imply he probably was deciding whether to close the thread or maybe let it live and move it.

Did you PM Strife requesting the move back?

We have exchanged PMs

Yep.

I'm submitting this to Linden Review, hopefully all parties will find their decision satisfactory.